The Inka Express

So the 10 hour bus journey turned out to be a rather splendid affair, and not exactly the hippie experience I was anticipating!  The bus trip from Puno to Cusco organized by Inka Express is travelling in style – very comfortable, with huge windows, and as we were only 7 passengers in a 40 seater bus, we had grand views on both sides.  There’s a tour guide on board, full of interesting facts en route, and a hostess serving beverages – though no beer, wine or English tea, and I just can’t take to Coca tea!

Also, my antibiotics were kicking in and I’d had my first good sleep in days, so was back on form again.  We started off as soon as everyone was on board, ahead of schedule – before 7am!  We said farewell to Puno and to Lake Titikaka and rolled through lovely wetlands and on to the seriously ugly industrial town of Juliaca – less said the better! There, the main road to Cusco was a muddy pot-holed swamp.  The guide explained that the reason so many of the houses are not completed, with only the ground floors occupied, both in Peru and Bolivia, is that taxes only have to be paid once the whole house is finished!! And because no-one pays taxes, there’s no money to repair the roads. Well, I think that’s what he said!

 

 

 

 

Our first stop was at the little town of Pukara, where a large Inka settlement up behind the church has yielded a treasure trove of artifacts (and mummified bodies), many of which are displayed in the local museum. 

 

 

 

 

After the Spanish introduced cattle, the Inkas took to bulls in a big way and included them in their lives, especially small clay bulls and crosses on the eaves of the roofs to guard the house!

 

 

The town square was lovely, and there were many painted houses in the town.

 

 

 

More lovely scenery followed, a sort of mix between Scottish highland hills terraced to the tops by Inkas, with a backdrop of  Alpine mountains topped with snow! All interspersed by llamas, alpaca and ladies in colourful outfits and hats….

As we climbed up from the Lake, the agriculture of field cultivation gave way to animal grazing – we learned that llamas have longer necks and more erect tails, and are used chiefly for meat and transportation whereas the smaller, fatter alpaca have shorter necks, dopier faces and tails tucked down like sheep.  They are the major wool producers, being a finer quality than llama, though vicuna is finer again, and highly prized.  They are all very cute and I have a ridiculous number of photos of them!

 

Our next stop was the highest point on the road – La Raya at 4,335m,  and the locals take full advantage of the regular stops by tourists en route! Lovely views though.

 

 

 

 

The bus ticket price included an excellent buffet lunch a little further on, then we rolled on through more lovely scenery

To our next point of interest, some splendid Inka ruins called  Raqchi, which housed over 600 people in its heyday, larger than the Machu Picchu with only 500 residents.  It was very impressive, and I particularly enjoyed the old ladies sitting looking quite the part with their wool and spindles,  then demanding payment for photos!!

 

 

The old round houses were for crop storage and the ruins are now decked with some lovely wild flowers, including wild iris.  We enjoyed the atmosphere and begin to get more excited by the upcoming visit to Machu Picchu now we understand more of the Inka way of life.





The day was slipping past most enjoyably, and our last stop in the attractive town of  Andahuayillas was no disappointment.  This was to visit a most unusual church, a mix of Catholic and Jesuit background, the early part of which had beautiful murals, as on the exterior below. Sadly, we were not allowed to take photos inside. The newer part was all baroque and gold leaf, but still interesting.  Another lovely town square too.

And so we finally arrived in Cusco at 5pm after a wonderful day – a taxi to the Monasteria  Hotel which was located up behind the main square of the historic part of town.  And what a lovely hotel it is (Orient Express-run), being set in an old cloistered monastery, built on the ravaged site of an Inka Palace in the 1500s. 

After the early kick-off, we were quite tired (well, I was!!) and didn’t want to wander far, but luckily found a lovely roof-top bar and restaurant nearby to end the day.