Peru, Cusco to Machu Picchu

10–20 May 2025 · Peru

11 days4 stops1 country651 km

Fifty years on the list. Ten days, two of them spent doing nothing in Cusco so the altitude didn't win.

Day 1 10 May
1

Lima 🇵🇪

Peru · 1 night

Ceviche for lunch, the Pacific for the afternoon.
Day 2 11 May
2

Cusco 🇵🇪

Peru · 4 nights

3,400 metres. Coca tea on doctor's orders.
Day 6 15 May
3

Ollantaytambo 🇵🇪

Peru · 2 nights

An Inca town people still live in, water running in the stone channels.
Day 8 17 May
4

Machu Picchu 🇵🇪

Aguas Calientes, Peru · 2 nights

The first bus up at 5:30. The cloud lifted at eight.

12 May

Plaza de Armas 🇵🇪Cusco, Peru
Coca tea, a bench, the cathedral turning gold. At 3,400 metres an old sailor walks slowly.
13 May

Sacsayhuamán 🇵🇪Cusco, Peru
Stones of a hundred tonnes fitted so close you can't slide a card between them. I tried. A guard sighed.
16 May

Salineras de Maras 🇵🇪Maras, Peru
Three thousand salt pans on a hillside, worked since before the Incas. A geographer's idea of heaven.
18 May

Machu Picchu 🇵🇪Aguas Calientes, Peru
The cloud lifted at ten past eight, like a curtain. Fifty years I waited for that.
18 May

Inti Punku 🇵🇪Aguas Calientes, Peru
Up to the Sun Gate. The whole site below, the way the runners saw it arriving.

3 0 Liked by Inês, Lena and 1 other

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