Cusco

Susan kicked altitude sickness’ ass and we had a great afternoon in Cusco. We went to Qoriakancha, but the museum was already closed. We could still see a lot from the outside though and the insides of the Inkan stones. From there we continued walking around and had a really nice dinner in Fallen Angel. It’s decorated with symbolism from heaven, hell, and purgatory and was really fun to be at! The tables were bath tubs turned into aquariums, so we had gold fish watching us during our entire meal. We called it a night early so that we could wake up and head out to the Sacred Valley, but unfortunately the people we were sharing a room with weren’t nearly as sleepy as we were. The next day, we got up early to see a little more of the city before heading out to the Sacred Valley. We went to the San Blas district which is known for its cafes and art gallery, so we browsed some of those. We made a stop at El Museo de la Hoja Coca (The Museum of the Coca Leaf), and while we didn’t actually go in, I bought a fair amount at the gift shop: coca beer, coca chocolate, and coca chocolate covered raisins. It was all actually really delicious and you can only get it from the museum, where it’s made. Unfortunately, I can’t bring heaps of coca back to the United States and it’ll show up in my system as cocaine if I get drug tested, but only in the first round… for the second test they’ll see that it was only tea, beer, and chocolate. From there, we got mochas as a really cute café/ bar. They run a free school for children, so it was decorated like a child’s play room. We drank our mochas with Eeyore and a penguin. After that, it was time to find a bus into the Sacred Valley.