Day 4: CUSCO TO OLLANTAYTAMBO, in which I visit some community projects and later eat something small and fluffy
After a breakfast of cheese wrapped in filo pastry, as well as toast with the butter that I had now located, we set off for the Sacred Valley. The valley itself was glorious, although the road left a little to be desired and the van’s suspension certainly got put through its paces.
The first stop was a women’s weaving cooperative in a small village in the valley. I am often a bit apprehensive about this kind of tourism, and the visit did get off to a bit of an uncomfortable start when our arrival was marked by an elderly lady blowing into a shell with the rest of the women standing up and clapping. This performance made me feel uncomfortably like a Spanish conquistador from the days when the Incas had mistaken them for gods, before the Spanish shattered the illusion by pillaging everything.
Things improved however when the ladies began to demonstrate their tremendous talent, explaining the processes in their own language while our local guide translated with a dubious level of faithfulness. We then got to see some alpacas and some guinea pigs, and there was a small market where one of the weaving ladies tried to convince me to buy a hat with a condor on it.
After another beautiful but harrowing journey in the minivan, we visited a pottery studio, where a gentlemen showed us how they make mud bricks and we perused their beautiful wares in their shop.
For lunch we went to another community project, and I tried another traditional local delicacy – guinea pig. It was not as tasty as alpaca, and texture-wise it was similar to a really juicy chicken thigh, but the taste was something quite alien.
We then journeyed on to Ollantaytambo, our location for the night, where we checked into our lodge, ate some pizza and had a walk around the town. The town itself turned out to be a charming place with cobbled-stones streets, nowadays popular with tourists as the starting point for the Inca train and the location of the train station where, the next day, we too would be catching the train to Aguas Calientes.
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