Saksawaman and a little more.

We decided that we would walk up to Saksawaman, the big Inca ruins just outside of Cuzco. It is not even 3/4 of a mile!

So we took the hike. You can see the runkeeper map here:

This was a slow walk. But remember that Cuzco is about 12,000' above sea level, and we live in Houston! 

We started off in Cuzco, though. Here is Doreen, in front of the famous 12 cornered stone.

Count 'em!

But everywhere you see other Inca ruins, the local guides tell you they have stones with more corners. Corners are a big thing here.

The other thing you see all over Cuzco are little girls holding baby alpacas. They want a sol for a photo.

We were happy to oblige. Doreen is in love with baby alpacas.

Here is the Pennsylvania Key Stone in Cuzco.

But it isn't being used as a key stone...

This was our route up. I used to have a photo of me on this same road back in 1976.  The stones haven't changed,  but the city did.

I think we were about half way here.

We have noticed very little trash or graffiti in either Lima (Miraflores) or in Cuzco. I am sure that there is a concerted effort on behalf of the government to keep the place clean and attractive to tourists.

A view down the road.

A nice view of Cuzco:

And here we are, almost all the way up:

There was a little waterfall on the way.

But we finally made it! It took about an hour.

They had alpacas there, for show.

These walls housed about 5,000 Inca soldiers in its heyday.

They almost beat the Spanish, but civil wars and small pox ultimately did them in.

The stone work is incredible.

and the size of these stones is incredible.

You can see where the later stone work is laid on top of Inca works.

I wanted to put this one in for Jesse, so she can show Eric the work that was done here 500 years ago.

This is a panorama of Cuzco

and again:

Here is the Plaza de Armas

Everyone loves having their photo taken under the lintel. Isn't there a German song about that?

Round corner rocks!

It is amazing to see these things:

They even had windows.

As we were coming back, we could see these little torritos (little bulls) that people put on their rooftops.

They are there for good luck.

This is an old photo in one of the municipal buildings here

And an old convent built on Inca ruins. We didn't go it.

Doreen with another baby alpaca The girl was playing the part, the boy, not so much.

Here is our walk back. Much faster.

I am getting behind myself again.

Let me say that the Cathedral is Cuzco is just an amazing thing. All the statues wear vestments. There is a famous Last Supper painting where a guinea pig is the main course, but the wall talker tells us that it is really a chinchilla. In any case, it LOOKS like a cuy (roasted guinea pig).

We also went to the Museum of Regional History (right underneath that convent, above)

They had mummies! and they had skulls that had been trepanned! They had skulls that had been deformed as babies to give the adults the weirdly long skulls! Fantastic. The mummies we carried around to their friends houses, and were served beer and food as if they were alive. Then they spilled the food in front of them so that it would look like they consumed it.

That night we ate at an Italian place. and we had a great time.

I will try to catch up more later.