23.03.2008 Cusco 3400m (city tour on our own)

A new day, a new city!

This time our hotel is called Hostal Pascana, situated 10min walk from the center, 28€ / night, including breakfast and heating, but without a TV. It is correct, but not exceptionnal. After eating our breakfast alone (since we were the last ones), we decided to go for a tour around the city. Equipped by a guide book and a map we started to walk the streets of the capital of the ancient inka Empire. We headed to the Plaza de Armas, which is the main square in most of the Peruvian cities. Like always, it is very impressive, this one surrounded by a jesuites church, the main Cathedral and colonial buildings. And behind you could see green mountains, we decided to call the colour "the peruvian green" since it has it´s special shade. We found a nice little cafe on the second floor of a colonnial building with a beautiful view over Plaza de Armas, and a real cappuccino!!! From there we continued to the San Blas neighbourhood, which is known to be one of the most beautiful parts of the city. It is situated a little bit up hill (we lost our breath while going up the stairs), and it is filled with narrow allies and roads, buildings mostly white with blue shutters and doors. From some parts of San Blas you can see the red roofs of the city of Cusco below you.

After a lunch in a little cafe we continued to visit the Santo Domingo convent. Yes, we went to the convent, ok it is situated on the ancient inka ruins of Koricancha. The way the inkas have built the walls is very impressive! All the stones have been formed the way that they stay perfectly together, it is not possible to push a needle between two stones. In the Santo Domingo we saw a interesting painting that explained how the sacred sites of inkas are situated around Cusco. Cusco is the center and form there 42 lines are drawn as sunrays and along the sunrays there are more than 300 sites, one for each day of the inka calendar.

In the evening we took it easy, just passed by a shop that makes shoes by measure (25€), you can choose the color, the model, and the figure you want on your shoes. So of course we ordered inka shoes!! And headed for dinner in a very nice little (trendy) bar in San Blas. We came to a conclusion, that the bar was run by a local basket ball team, since all the staff measured at least 190cm! The food was excellent and cost us less than the drinks (no, we didn´t have that many drinks!!).