Cusco, Peru (elevation 10,800 ft) is an utterly charming city, and by “charming”, of course I mean “dirty”. Like many places in Peru, the city takes its name from the ancient Quechua word Qusqu, which I believe translates roughly as “smells like dog”. There are hundreds of dogs milling about the streets, outnumbered only by the persistent street vendors.
One of the first things you notice upon arriving here (besides the dog smell) is that it’s very difficult to breathe. Forget about 3 flights of stairs, you can get winded just crossing the street here – or bending over to tie your shoes. To make matters worse, the town is laid out in a series of ever-steeper hills.
Luckily, cab rides cost less than a dollar.
All kidding aside, Cusco is a pretty cool town. Absolutely dripping with history (not just dog urine), the city has an impressive mix of Incan ruins and Spanish Colonial architecture.
The Plaza de Armas is simply gorgeous despite all the vendors, and the many churches are among the most impressive I’ve ever seen.
It took us awhile to adjust to the altitude and get the hang of this town, but after that we really began to enjoy it. Before we left, I’d read about how expensive things are in Cusco, but most of the time I couldn’t get over how cheap everything was compared to the U.S. (and especially compared to cruising).
There’s so much to see and do in this town, I’m afraid we barely scratched the surface in the 2 weeks we spent here. More than anything, we enjoyed taking it easy, finding our favorite places in this strange new environment, and just getting the hang of this travel thing.
{ 3 comments }
Looks beautiful..
the picture of the city with the mountains is absolutely beautiful!
hope the dogs were at least friendly!
The pictures you took don’t tell a dirty, smelly dog story. It looks really cool. I’ve always wanted to visit there. On the list, for sure.
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