Puno & Cusco 28th August - 31st August 2006 We are up pretty early to get the bus back to Puno, Peru and catch a taxi at 7.30am to the bus station. Typical South America efficiency sees us waiting for the bus company to sort out tickets to Puno with the travel agency whom we booked the tickets through. For some reason they thought that we should have been on the bus to Puno yesterday?? All is eventually sorted and we get the last 2 seats at the back of the bus, right next to the chemical toilet, nice. The journey is not too bad though as we go straight through to Puno and they even serve a multitude of crackers on the bus, how luxurious. Amy wins at scrabble. We arrive back in Puno at about 2pm and immediately book the onward bus to Cusco for the following day (20 dorrar each on the 'tourist' bus). As it's our anniversary we have a nice relaxed afternoon in our 3 star hotel before going out in the evening for a few cuba libre's in a little bar and then on to our favourite Pizza restaurant. We are used to the local musicians coming in and playing whilst we are eating but the guys that night deserve a special mention as they were very good and contributed to a lovely atmosphere in the restaurant. In the morning we are up at the crack of dawn (6am) again to get the bus to Cusco, despite having had very little sleep. This was due to the Peruvian equivalent of those teenagers who hang out in the local park playing rap music, only these guys were doing it right outside our hotel room till about 4 in the morning. We catch the bus and spend the day being entertained by our Peruvian guide who takes us to some of the Pre-Incan sites along the route to Cusco. We visit a museum in Pukara and look at some not really-that-interesting pottery and stonework before heading off to an Ancient temple site. We pass some little villages along the way and climb up to an altitude of 4350m ish and the scenery is excellent once again. Dare we suggest however, that perhaps we are getting a little bored of this Andean scenery, one huge mountain after another? Maybe we just need a change. After lunch we stop to see an old colonial church which is rather splendid with the alter covered in 22 carrat gold. We see some more frescos from the Cusco school and learn that they always portrayed stories from the bible simply to enable the indigenous people to understand as they obviously couldn't read or write Spanish. This helped immensely to convert the locals to Christianity before they were wiped out by all manner of diseases or weaponry. How nice those Spaniards were. We continue our journey to Cusco and descend in the Urubamba valley where the scenery becomes a lot greener and the land a lot more fertile. We arrive in Cusco and check into a lovely little hostal which is like someones house (albeit rather large) with well crafted furniture. In the evening we head out into the centre (called the plaza de Armas as with all central plazas in Peru) which is well lit up with the striking cathedral built on Incan foundations (directly over the former temple) particularly nice. We can't resist the typically English pub "Cross Keys" so pop in for a happy hour drink before heading out for excellent trout and mash. The following day we have a relaxing day around Cusco, sorting out our train tickets to Machu Picchu (70 dorrar each!) and have a walk around town taking in a few churches and the Incan Museum. Cusco was the focal point of the Inca empire and there is still a lot of evidence of their existence, mainly in the form of well constructed walls and foundations. It's quite clear that the Incas were a well developed people and it's a great shame that they were wiped out by the Spanish, I mean what have the Spanish done since? (ok, apart from Fernando Alonso and loosing to N Ireland at footy). In the evening we go to a specially set up Quiz to assist the local children who are too poor to go to school. We are on a team with a middle aged American couple (yes everyone can hear our answers, naturally) and lets just say they haven't got a clue about anything other than a few token "all American" questions. Stu is a star answering the majority of the questions in the music round and nearly all in the Sport round where we get a perfect 10 out of 10. Sadly it's not enough to stop us coming 5th out of 6, alough we were only 4 points off the eventual winners. The following day is our last around Cusco as we get a local bus, which is pretty cramped, to the Inca ruins immediately surrounding Cusco. We visit Pûka Pukara, Tambo Machay, Qenko and Sachsyhuaman (pronounced "sexy woman"). It's pretty warm and from Puka Pukara we walk the 8km back into Cusco via the sites. Easily the most interesting is the last site at Sachsyhuaman and we get some good photos (Amy gets told off by the guards for climbing on the walls). In the evening we head out to the token Irish bar for a beer then to Chez Maggy's (nothing to do with Margaret Thatcher) for a decent pasta before bed. Tomorrow we are off on a mini tour of the Sacred Valley before we end up at Machu Picchu. Lots of Love Stu & Amy.