Saturday the 18th of August I went to take the trek from Tambomachay to Sacsayhuaman, on the way you also go by Puka Pukara, Templo de la Luna, Q'enqo and you can see the huge Christo Blanco from close. For all these sites, except Christo Blanco, you need to have the ''Touristic Boleto'', that is sold in 3 packages or you can buy all three has a full package.
Tambomachay
Tambomachay
Package 1 includes : Tambomachay, Puka Pukara, Q'enqo, Sacsayhuaman. Package 2 includes : Ollantaytambo, Pisaq, Chinchero and Moray and finally Package three includes : Museums of Contemporary Art, Regional Historic, Qorikancgha, Popular Art, Native Art Qosco Center and Inka Pachacuteq's Monument. The price for one package is 70 soles or you can buy the full package for 130 soles. On the full package if you have a student ID the price is on rebate for 70 soles.
Puka Pukara
I was told that the trek would take around 4 hours, so I got there beginning of the afternoon at 1 o'clock. I took a collectivo from Avenida Pachacutec for 2.50 Soles, it's the same collectivo to go to Pisaq for the same price. The bus ride was about 30 minutes and you must tell the driver that you want to get out at Tambomachay or else he might just go by without stopping.
I got to the first site, which was Tambomachay. It is not a very big site. Interesting, but not big. The ruin are only in one little spot and that's it. Not disappointing, but not what I expected. Visiting the site and the walk to go there took around 30 minutes.
Then I crossed the road and not far is Puka Pukara, that was bigger and a little more things to see and walk around. It did not take me much more time to walk around the site and take a few pictures of the place but it was more interesting. I then took the road down and tried to find the trek raod to go down to Templo de la Luna but I must have missed it so I walked along the road until I got to Q'enqo.
Q'enqo
Q'enqo
was interesting it it's own way because it was somewhat of a place that
was built into a rock formation with cavelike places. Not very big and
not very long to go around maybe 30 minutes also in total. When I left Q'enqo, it started raining and I did get caught it it. By the time I got to Christo Blanco I was pretty wet and it was pouring pretty hard. I took shelter under some bushes for 15-20 minutes the time that the little storm went by. Has soon has it slowed down raining, I headed strait to Sacsayhuaman hoping it was really over but the sky was getting blue again.
Q'enqo
Q'enqo
Sacsayhuaman
When I first got on the site on Sacsayhuaman I was not quite convinced that it would be that nice. The first few things I saw were in fact very interesting, but not very impressive. I kept going just walking around the place until I walked out from behind rocks and saw this...
Sacsayhuaman
Sacsayhuaman
Sacsayhuaman
Now I was impressed, the dimensions of that wall of rock was amazing. I actually had not even hoped for such a site, it flabbergasted me completely when I started getting closer and closer to that wall. I did not have a guide to tell me why it was built, but from the way it looked it was some kind of citadel or fortress. The purpose, keep invaders out. For a full history of Sacsayhuaman I will refer you to Wikipedia. The rock used to built this site are huge and it is very unique in it's own way. I have to say that I probably spent 1:30 on this site and could have taken a bit more.
Click on picture to see the whole album
In the end I must say that if people do not want to see all the sites north of Cusco, you must at least go see Sacsayhuaman. You cannot go past it and say it's not worth it, because it definiletly is worth seeing.
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