Cuzco(topia)

Any one awesome enough to know that the title of this entry is a play on the movie "The Emporers New Grove" gets bonus points. The rest of you who didn't know, consider yourselves educated!

Ever since I arrived in Peru, people have been asking me if I have been to Cuzco. The fact that I had been here a year and not been to Cuzco gave me a lot of street-cred with Peruvians. It was surprising to them to meet a gringo who was here, not turning a blind eye to the woes of their country and making a bee-line tour to Machu Picchu and Lake Titicaca. I have now lost my edge on other white people visiting Peru. A week ago, I went to Cuzco and Machu Picchu. Not only that, I did it in style.
I was so stressed out when my parents arrived and spent a few days in Lima and at my site. I felt 100% responsible for their itinerary and their happiness. Lima is my stomping ground. Therefore, I knew all the ins and outs and would serve as their travel agent and tour guide. My parents had done next to no research on Lima and didn’t even bring an opinion as to what they might like to do. Cuzco was fantastic cause I was as clueless as they were about what to see and how to spend out time. So I got to sit back, relax, and be tourist just like everyone else.

The last time I had been on an airplane was the one I took to come to Peru a year ago. Since then, all my traveling has been by land, usually on overnight busses that have lasted as long as 16 hours. My parents paid $150 for me to fly with them to Cuzco, an unfathomable amount of money to me for transportation these days. I have flown a lot, especially in recent years. But this plane ride really blew me away. My whole perspective has changed and I felt as if I was flying for the first time in my life. It is such an amazing concept to travel such a long distance in such a short amount of time. A bus ride to Cuzco would have been 24 hours, but I stepped on a plane in Lima and hour later I was 12,000 feet in the Andes mountains in Cuzco. Crazy!

I have traveled to a handful of Andean “cities” in Peru. Cuzco was unlike them all. For starters, it was surrounded by mountains, but unlike the rest of the cities, the mountains around Cuzco seemed dry. They were not green (perhaps they are during the rainy season), and there were not snow capped mountains in sight. The city itself was more spectacular than any other Andean City I’ve seen. I was expecting that though. Cuzco was the capital city of the Incan Empire and therefore home to more beautiful architecture and ruins. The Spanish likewise made the city it’s base for the area, so there is an interesting mix of native and colonial influence.

Most noticeably, the difference between Cuzco and other Andean cities, is the amount of money it has flowing in. Cuzco is the main tourist destination in Peru and the local economy milks it for all it is worth. It seems as though modern day Cuzco was built for tourism. I couldn’t believe how many people spoke English. It was weird to be in a town where the Spanish architecture still looked well maintained. In Lima, the colonial heart of the city is very run down to the point that it feels dirty and dangerous. The main square in Cuzco felt like it was plucked from any city in Spain.

Our Hotel was once the home of a well to do Spanish man. It was a far cry from the high rise, steal and glass Marriott we stayed in Lima. Our hotel in Cuzco was made out of stone with a traditional Spanish plaza and fountain in the middle. It was rustic enough to transport you back to a different time, but modern enough that my dad could watch the US Open on the TV in our bedroom. As always, my favorite thing to do was curl up next to the fire at night time. Cuzco was pretty cold. It sits about 12,000 feet in the mountains and it’s winter time here. But because we’re so close to the equator, the coldest is gets is the 40s.

During the days, we went on tours of the churches in the cities and ruins in the country side. My parents were in heaven with the food, the shopping and the massages. All of which they found incredibly cheap. I on the other hand, was still having a hard time shaking my peace corps frugality and flinched with every swipe of the credit card.

I have been really reluctant to buy much since I arrived in Peru. One, because I don’t make the kind of money to buy much. Two, I know whatever I buy has to fit in two suitcases at the end of my service. But mostly because as some one who is spending 2 years in Peru, I feel the souvenirs I buy shouldn’t be the typical touristy crap. I want to bring back to the states some really awesome stuff that I will use and will last for a while. I have wanted to buy a baby alpaca blanket as one of the few investments I make towards my “worthy Peru memorabilia”. I resisted many of things my parents offered to buy for me, but I couldn’t say no to a blanket. By the end of our Cuzco trip, my parents had purchased five $100 baby alpaca blankets as gifts because I had given my blessing that it wasn’t just touristy crap.

Cuzco I think was the trip of a life time. I don’t think my parents ever would have come to South America and visited one of the new seven wonders of the world if I hadn’t been placed here. Machu Picchu was definitely the apex of our trip but that will be left for the next installment of my trip.