This is a continuation of my report on our Galapagos with Machu Picchu trip.

After the Galapagos, it was on to Lima, Peru. Someone from Globus met us at the airport in Quayaquil, Ecuador, gave us the money for the airport departure tax, and showed us where to go for our afternoon flight to Peru. Then she quickly disappeared. Only one other couple continued on to Peru with us. We travel with them for all 12 days and got to be good friends. We met up with 3 more people in Lima, Peru to make a 7 person group.

The hotel in Lima was the Las Americas. It was only two blocks from a main square with lots of shopping and restaurants, including the free internet which we used a couple of times. On the way to the hotel we got the guide to switch the next day tour to a morning tour instead of an afternoon tour. That gave us the afternoon free. American money is accepted in most markets, but I got local currency twice from the ATM at the airport and in Lima. Cuzco had ATMs as well and places to change currency to get Peruvian Solus (3.2 per dollar). The biggest problem was getting change. They have a real problem in the countryside with small bills. I took a lot of US $1 and $5 bills that came in handy when buying things. I got the hotel to bread the large 100 solus bills that I got from the ATM.

After two nights in Lima we took an early morning flight to Cuzco, Peru. Cuzco was the old Inca capital that is now an old colonial city at 11,000 feet. It is a nice place to get use to the altitude, which takes a day or so. The hotel in Cuzco was the Novotel Hotel, located a short 2 blocks from the main square. The hotel was great. All the hotels offer you cocoa tea which is supposed to help with the altitude. Cuzco is really a major tourist town these days and there was lots of shopping and restaurants. Most menus were in English and Spanish. You could get by without Spanish, but one of the members of our new group spoke Spanish so that helped. The thing to buy in Cuzco (or Pisac which was on one of our included tours) is Alpaca sweaters. On one trip we stopped at a store/factory and we give a demonstration on the difference between Alpaca, baby Alpaca, hand sewn, machine sewn, etc. All kind of options and you are never really sure. The baby Alpaca feels so soft though.

We had an afternoon tour of Cuzco. The next day was an all day tour of the local area, with a stop at Pisac for what was billed as a local market (tourist market really). We got a few things, and I got a ear of Peruvian corn for a snack. March and April are the end of the rainy season but so far we had very little rain on our trip. Not so today. We got half way up the pre-Inca ruin in Ulataytambo and it started to rain. While not real heavy, I sure wish that I was wearing my water proof jacket instead of it being in the bus. We returned to Cuzco via another route and saw some nice farm lands that were over 11,000 feet. The restaurants had mostly chicken and fish, but my wife had Alpaca meat for dinner. It was pretty good.

The next day it was up early again (5:00 pickup) to take a 2-hour bus ride to the train station for the 1.5 hour ride to Machu Picchu. So we got to Machu Picchu before 9 am. We were only allowed to take back packs to Machu Picchu. We had most of our overnight stuff in one backpack and the hotel picked it up at the train station. The other backpack we took to Machu Picchu. At that point our guide took us to the buses for the 20 minute ride up the mountain. It was a long trip but well worth it.

We got a 3-hour tour of the site that got a little difficult when it started to rain half way into the tour. Getting pictures was difficult with the clouds rolling through the valleys and the rain coming down, but we did our best. The local guide took us to the buffet café for lunch as the rain continued to come down. After lunch the guide went back down the hill and some people went with him. We did not but waited out the rain in the café for another 30-45 minutes and the weather got better as the rain stopped. Before the guide left, I had him show me on my map where we had been, and we had cover quite a bit of the site, including all the major points. (House of the Sun, Sundial, Condor) However, by this time many of the day trippers had left so there were a lot fewer people wandering around Machu Picchu. Most people visit Machu Picchu during the US summer which is the dry season in that area. The rain was a minor problem but not a major annoyance since we had two days to see the site. People that came in for day trips could have been disappointed since the rain fell between 10:30 and 2:00 the peak time for day trippers.

By 3:30 we had enough for the day and took the bus ride down and found our hotel, the Machu Picchu Pueblo Hotel. It is suppose to be the best hotel in Machu Picchu and it was in a really nice setting. We did not know it, but the dinner was in the price as well.

We had to catch the 1:20 pm train the next day, so 5 of us agreed to meet at breakfast at 6:00 to go up the mountain again. Cloudy, but no rain this morning. When we got to the top we took the 1-hour hike up to the Gate of the Sun. That is the first place where people hiking the Inca trail get to see Machu Picchu. The hike is not too difficult: up hill, but not too many steps. The sun did not make it out for us, but the clouds rolled away long enough for some nice pictures. We got to say we walked the Inca trail, but of course we did not do the 4-day walk that the hikers did.

Back down the mountain, train ride, and bus ride and we are back in Cuzco. Our previous hotel was over booked, so they “upgraded” us to the Libertador Hotel. It was a better hotel, but it was a mess there. They had an electrical/computer problem, so we could not get room keys. So someone escorted us halfway to our rooms, told us the number and left. We had to find the rooms, find some one to open the doors and then wait for our bags to show up. We finally got the room keys after we returned from dinner.

While we had a bad experience at the hotel we found a great shop to get Alpaca sweaters near the new hotel. It was a family business. The wife and small child ran the store and the husband did the sewing up stairs. They had good store English. He took us upstairs to see his small shop. My wife got a really nice sweater at a good price and I bought a nice Alpaca rug for our daughter. They would have made a sweater for me that night and delivered it to the hotel. We were leaving early the next morning. I trusted them, but I really did not trust the 5-star hotel.

The next day it was up early for a flight to Lima. The airport in Cuzco only operates in the morning due to the conditions there in the mountains. Our flight left Lima at 11:55 pm, so they gave us a room to use in the Las Americas Hotel, and we wandered around Lima for a while, including the national museum. They asked if we wanted a guided tour in English for 10 solus. We had a very energetic guide who took us through the entire history of Peru up through the Spanish conquest over the next 60-90 minutes. We gave him an extra 10 solus tip for a total of US$ 6. Well worth it since most of the signs were in Spanish.

Always get the cab fare in advance before you get in the cab and carry the hotel card wherever you go. We went to the national museum. It was $8.00 US going. The cab drive asked for 15 Solus ($5) for the trip back and raised it another 5 Solus when he figure out where the hotel was. It was a long ride, and still less than the trip there, so we paid him the extra. He had to look at the hotel card three times to figure out where it was.

We were picked up at 8:55 by Globus for the trip to the airport and home. The flights went well, but red eye flights are no the best. We had plenty of time in Miami, but our new friends from California had to really hustle to get to their flight.

All in all it was a great trip. I thought Globus did a good job of passing us off from one person to the next. While expensive, almost all costs were included, including all airport taxes and park fees. Almost all flights had food, except for the American Airline flight from Miami to Baltimore.