After visiting Machu Picchu.

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  The City of Cuzco, Utah, Peru
Monday, December 15, 2008

The flight from Lima to Cuzco took about an hour. Cuzco's population is around four hundred thousand and is at the heart of the once mighty Inca empire.  Lying within easy hoping distance of the city is the country's biggest
draw-card of all, the 'lost' city of the Incas Machu Picchu.  More later. Sister Rosario greeted us and treated us to
coca leaf tea, to help us with the adjustment to the high altitude, and advised us  to sleep for two hours.  We attended Mass at 6:30 and found quaint little restaurant for a light supper and a much appreciated cup of coffee.

Thursday morning was filled with a visit to the Museo where our guide Irma gave us the history of the pre-Inka cultures and explained all the beautiful artifacts in the museum.  Cuzco is now the undisputed archaeological
capital of the Americas, as well as the Continent's oldest continuously inhabited. In the afternoon we joined a city
sight-seeing tour and visited the places of interest, temple of the sun, tambomanhay, saqsaywoman, and a few others that I can't even try to spell. Fortunately, we attended Mass at the Iglesia de Santo Domingo  and  then attended a musical and dance theatrical presentation of the traditional songs and dances of the region. Very lively
and colorful. Exhausted and starving, we found a place that served sandwiches and ice-cream and that is how we
ended another full day.

Friday was the Feast of Our Lady of Guadeloupe, we celebrated Mass the the Dominican community.
In the afternoon we went to the bus station to board the bus for Aquas Caliente. On arrival we learned that
our travel to Allantaytambo 

was a taxi, not a bus. Cesar our driver and Jose, riding shot gun, dashed us over
hills and down through valleys at speeds that would have had the vehicle confiscated in Canada. At one point,
we were flying down the mountain side, at about 140 klicks, came around a corner, and low and behold a great
truck cutting across the race track right in front of us. Cesar hit the brakes big time, the truck swerved to the right
to avoid a major crash, end result the truck went into a bunch of rocks and the taxi suffered a fender-bender and
a broken head light. We were lucky that nothing really major  happened.

The two hour ride was really spectacular, nine thousand foot mountains of solid rock on each side, sometimes so
close you could almost reach out and touch them. I was like driving through the deepest valley of  Mother Earth.
At other times, the valley opened a little and there was not one inch of rich land that was not being prepared for
planting. And other plush crops, like corn, almost ready for harvest. There were a least twenty teams of oxen
ploughing and tilling the soil. These people are very hard workers indeed. We arrived in Ollantaytambo and took
a stroll to the town square had a cup of coffee and talked with a beautiful couple and their three year old son who
were selling paintings in the town square. They sure donīt have much in the order of material things, but seem very
happy and willing to take the time to answer question and practice their English as we practice Spanish.  We then went looking for a church and a Mass for the Third Sunday of Advent. We were informed that there would be a service at 7:00 P.M. However, this was only a liturgy of the Word, I guess there is no priest here on a regular
basis. I talked to the young man presiding at the service and he told me he was a seminarian. Now since we had
already celebrated the Liturgy of the Word, (I had a English translation we shared) we found a quiet restaurant
asked for bread and a little white wine, and completed our Sunday Eucharist, on Saturday evening..

The next day, Sunday, our guide Juan Carlos had studied Inka history, their rise and fall, and more importantly
Inka archeology and their incredible ability of working with stone. Some stone weighed ten tones and more. 
How these were transported from the quarry, a mile away, carry over land and then brought to the temples,
some five and six thousand feet above the valley. Kristine invited Carlos for lunch and we learned more of the culture and ancient traditions. We ate Alpaca for the first time.

At 4:00 P.M. we took the train to Aquas Caliente and arrived at our Hostal Payacha, which is only a 30 minute
bus ride zig zagging up the mountain to Machu Picchu. Yesterday was an all day fantastic experience at this most sacred site. For more information, just google Machu  Picchu, you learn an awful lot more then I can tell you here.

Now. we are off to catch a flight back to Lima.
God bless,
Vaughan

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