The Sacred Valley

On the 6th, our 2nd day in Cusco, Liz and hired a car and driver to take into to Urubamba Valley.   We opted for doing it that way instead of joining an organized tour so that we could set the schdule ourselves, stop when we needed a break, and determine the places to visit ourselves.

The Urubamba Valley, also known as the Sacred Valley, was the breadbasket of Inca Cusco, with its mild climate and diverse ecological zones.   It was -and is- optimum land for growing corn, and Cusco corn is famed for its size and quality to this day.   The Incas lined the valley with agricultural terrraces, carrying fertile bottomland soil up the slopes by the basketful to create vertical fields, and brought in experienced maize farmers from elsewhere in the empire to settle the valley.

The Incas prized the valley as the Inca heartland, holding it as sacred.   The Inca nobility established country palaces along the valley, and built temples all along its length.  Accordingly, the valley contains a number of important Inca archaeological sites, principally Tipon, Pisaq, Ollantaytambo, Moray, and Machupiqchu.  Of these, we were to visit Pisaq and Ollantaytambo, along with the saltworks at Maras.

The Sacred Valley, viewed from Pisaq

Eastern slope of the Sacred Valley, viewed from near Maras

Cuzco

Liz and I flew to Cuzco last Tuesday (July 5th), arriving late in the morning. 

One of the best things about Cuzco is, well, that it´s Cuzco - a modern city superimposed upon a Spanish colonial  city built atop the capital of the Inca empire.   Everywhere one looks in the downtown portion of town, there are vestiges of the city´s past visible: colonial mansions and churches, Inca walls and foundations, the layout of the streets - even the entrance to our hotel.

Hotel Rumi Punku

 At the heart of ancient Cuzco lay the twin plazas of Aucaypata and Cusipata, divided by the Saphy river, which was paved over in ancient times and still runs under the city.  The two plazas thus made up a single large open space.  Aucaypata (the Plaza of War) was the site for state ceremonies and became the current Plaza de Armas.  

Plaza de Armas, with the Church of the Company of Jesus visible

Of Cusipata all that remains is a small square a block from the Plaza de Armas, still known as the "Plaza of Joy" -  the Plaza Regocijo.

Plaza Regocijo

Surrounding the ancient, and modern square, were structures that housed the mansions of the Inca nobility, and the Aqllawasi, a sort of convent where  "chosen women" served the Inca and the state religion by brewing chicha corn beer and weaving fine cloth.

On our first day in town, Liz and I wandered those streets, many of which still bear their Inca names, soaking in the sights and the history of it all.

We walked down Hatun Rumiyoq, the Street of the Large Stones, admiring the walls of the former palace of the Inka Pachacutiq, and down Loreto Kiqllu (formerly known as Intiqkiqllu, the Street of the Sun) which is lined with some of the finest stonework in Cuzco, in the walls of the former Aqllawasi (which was turned into the Convent of Santa Catalina).

12-Angle Stone, in the wall of the former Palace of the Inka  Pachacutiq, on Hatun Rumiyoq

Hatun Rumiyoq

Old Archbishop's Palace, erected atop the foundations of Pachacutiq's palace

Convent of Santa Catalina

Basilica of La Merced

Street of the Seven Snakes

Note: Edited to add a few more photos.

Hi.  Got back from Cusco last night, after spending four days and three nights there.  We toured the Sacred Valley and the main sites around town.    We were also lucky that our stay in the city coincided with the celebrations for the 100th anniversary of Machu Picchu being brought to the world's attention by Hiram Bingham.   There were street events and a concert in the plaza.

Right now, between the internet connection at the apartment being unsteady at the moment and Blogger's new software still being a bit buggy, I can't do much more that this brief update.  So, as they say: More later ....

In Cuzco

We´re in Cuzco.  Did the Sacred Valley tour yesterday, and after climbing all those stairs my knees and thighs are complaining!

Right now I´m at a cafe overlooking the Plaza in Cuzco, getting ready to listen to a concert by legendary Peruvian rocker Miki Gonzalez staged for the 100 anniversary of Hiram Bingham´s finding Machu Picchu.

Munich

Take one old bar, add an ancient piano and one ancient piano player, toss in 1 L steins of cold beer and big plates of sausage and potatoes and you've got a recipe for success, if downtown Lima's Munich Piano Bar is anything to measure by. 

Tonight, being "Friend Day" -a "holiday" invented a couple of years ago by one of the big beer companies-, we decided to go downtown for a stroll and a beer.    After walking from the Plaza de Armas, overlooked by the Presidential Palace, to the Plaza San Martin, we headed to the Munich, where neither Liz nor I had been before.

 Located down a set of stairs off of Calle Belen (also known as Jiron de la Union), and though a barrel-shaped door, Munich has long been a favored hangout for students of the nearby San Marcos and Federico Villareal universities, and for downtown workers.

Tonight, every seat in the place was full, and it took us a few minutes to get a table.   Of course, being in the Munich, we ordered what the Munich is known for: 1 L jugs of beer and the Piqueo Munich (Munich Appetizer), which is a grand plate of salchipapas made with three kinds of wurst.

Munich was founded in 1954 -I think by a German immigrant- and soon established its place in Lima's bohemian night scene, becoming one of the city's classic bars.  Difficult finances led the original owner to despondence and, eventually, to suicide.  His widow tried to run the place for a while but eventually decided to turn it over to the employees, who have run it ever since, and they do seem to do a good job of it.

This evening, business was booming, and a steady stream of people wandered in hoping for a table and showed no sign of slowing when we left around 11 pm.   One can hardly blame them, for despite the booming of a discotheque right next door, the old school atmosphere of the Munich makes for a pretty cool watering hole.



Munich Bar
Jirón de la Unión 1044
Lima (Cercado)

San Felipe turns 45

Forty-five years ago today the first phases of the Residencial San Felipe were innaugurated, and to mark the occasion, there was a small ceremony this afternoon in the plaza of the complex's commercial sector attended by the mayor of the burrough of Jesus Maria, Enrique Ocrospoma, and the students from San Felipe's three pre-schools.

San Felipe is a large residential complex comprised of some 40 buildings amidst walkways and gardens.  It was the brainchild of then President Fernando Belaunde, and is a unique space in this city.  When it was built it comprised the largest collection of tall buildings in the country -"Little Manhattan" it was called- and was visible from almost any point the city.

Here's what I wrote about it a few years ago:

Today San Felipe has a birthday.

Started as project by President Fernando Belaúnde Terry, who was an archictect in regular life, the Residencial San Felipe was inaugurated forty-two years ago, on July 2, 1966. At the time, with almost 50 buildings in five distinct styles holding apartments for over 10,000 people, it was one of the largest -if not the largest- housing project in all of Peru.

The complex was planned and built, on the grounds of a former hippodrome, as a single huge block with no cross-traffic and interlaced with sidewalks and gardens, and including three preschools and a shopping center. Over time a cooperative school and a chapel were established on the grounds and a clinic was built across the street, meaning that residents could have almost all their needs met within the Residencial itself.

Into the 1980s the Resi was a dominant feature on the Lima skyline, its 15-storey buildings topped only by the former Ministry of Education on Avenida Abancay and the Banco de Credito tower in Miraflores.

its four decades San Felipe has remained a distintict neighborhood, with many of the original families still occupying their apartments. Its mix of buildings and large green areas are unmatched anywhere else in the city, leading to lower levels of noise and atmospheric pollution within its boundaries than is the average in this sprawling city. Its gardens abound with birds and butterflies, and it is even said that they harbor an endemic type of blind snake.

The neighbors recently won an important victory when they defeated a move by the mayor of Jesús María and a grocery store chain to take over part of the parking areas and build a larger supermarket and movie theatre. The neighbors insisted that the project was unecessary and would harm their quality of life by increasing foot and vehicle traffic while reducing parking, arguing that the parking areas -like the gardens- are held in condominium by the neighbors and are not for the municipality to dispose of at will.

Confronted by the organized neighbors, who staged rallies, and weekly cacerolazos in which pots and pans would be banged together from apartments all over the resi at 8:00 pm sharp every Saturday, and a media and internet campaign, the Plaza Vea chain backed out and the mayor backed down.

Such is the hold that San Felipe has on those who live and have lived here, that there is a Facebook group dedicated to it that draws current and former residents from all over the world -as far away from  Lima as Europe and New Zealand.

Tonight the celebration of the anniversary will continue with further ceremony and a dance in the plaza and some of us participants in the group who happen to be in Lima will use the opportunity for a face-to-face meeting and, in some cases, reacquaintance.  Should be fun!