Cusco

I arrived in Cusco and found an email from Wayki trek telling me that I should head to their office as they had an inca trail leaving the next day that I could join. Apparently a man from Wayki had waited for me at the bus stop but I walked right past him! Anyway I went to the office and it was all organised for me and I just had to pay. These guys were so helpful to me as we had problems organising the trail because I could not pay by western union as I was in Copacabana that did not have a western union. I was relieved because I thought maybe I would not get the chance to do the trail as I could only be in Cusco a few days.


Anyway after the inca trail I was pretty exhausted and kind of just wandered round Cusco in a daze. Its a very beautiful city to wander around aimlessly. I then spent a night at Marco´s house, a friend I met on couchsurfing. He is also an architect and took an interest in my thesis. His work is mostly for the muncipality and he has done a lot of community based work (kind of like the school consultation process we do at ADP but without the children, teachers and governors, just residents). He showed me some of his designs too which were lovely, nice combination of materials and senstive to the local environment. He knew all about sustainable methods of design, which relieved me a bit as there is so much concrete in Peru, I thought it was only self builders who used adobe and stones anymore! He was an excellent host and interesting company. Long live couchsurfing!

The Plaza de Armas

The view from my hostel

The long lines of juice sellers. These were also ubiquitious in Bolivia (and cheaper)

The cathedral