Cusco is a pretty cool city I have to say! Very different to Arequipa and i think i do prefer it eventhough it is more touristy which can be annoying. We are staying at the hostel which is run by the daughter of the people whose hostel we stayed in in Arequipa, keeping it in the family. Its in a really nice area called San Blas a few minutes walk from the centre but the only problem is cars can only go so far and you have to walk up the steep stairs and alleys to get to the hostel backpacks and all! Cusco is 3,500m above sea level and you can definately feel it! We were both struggling for breath after about 20 steps!

Cusco and the area around it are amazingly rich in history, with lots of Inca ruins,including the world famous Machu Picchu, however we decided to take it easy and do nothing much but walk around the city for the first day - come on we are at altitude! The poverty here compared to Chile is heartbreaking but its great to seethat the Quechuan people have kept a lot of their culutre and the women wear traditional dress of tiered coloured skirts and cool bowler hats. In the evening of our first night we went out with somepeople fromour hostel, Francisca, Sheldon and Marlon as well as with Kaaty the owner of our hostel. wewere originally only going for somefood but ended up in a barthat did free salsa classes from 9.30pm for a few hours! Tom looked pretty horrified but after a couple of cuba libres we managed to drag him onto the dancefloor. We had a great night and stayed up too late and ended up getting too drunk but unlike Francisca and Sheldon we didn´t have to get up at 6am to do a trek to Machu Picchu! The hangover the next day was not good though! We got up at a resonable hour and dragged ourselves out to visit the local ruins called Saqsaywaman, pronounced in English as sexy woman! There were guys outside selling their services as guides and for a couple of quid we got one and it was well worth it. He explained that the ruins are very sacred still to this day and that it was an Inca temple before the Spanish (ooppps!) came and plundered them and used the huge stones from the temple to build the city of Cusco down in the valley below. It is still amazing how much of it still exsists.

We have decided not to do a 4 day trek to Machu Picchu as we dont have much timeleft and still needto coverBolivia, Argentina and Brazil so we have decided to get the rip off train instead. It kind of works out well as it means we can visit the Sacred Valley too which are various towns outside Cusco that have Inca ruins. I am secretly pleased as I struggle enough just getting up the stairs to our hostel!!