Onward to Puno

October 23-24

We boarded the Inka Express bus and left Cuzco at 7am. We took this bus in order to see various sites along the way to Puno city.

Sites:
1) The San Pedro Apostol church in Andahuaylillas. The church was built in the sixteenth century by Jesuits and was originally the site of an Incan ceremonial space, a huaca. It is considered to be the "Sistine Chapel" of the Americas because the ceiling and interior walls are covered with frescoes. Here one can see the different cultures merging together. Although there is a lot of moorish influence, the presence of the Inca culture is evident, too. The Jesuits allowed the Incas to paint their symbols inside the church, along with those of the colonials. Also, because there is no written language in quechua, the use of latin letters were used to spell out quechua words around the archway of a door inside the church.

2) Raqchi: Ruins of the Inca temple of Wirachocha. It was a two story building, now left to a mere wall. It was believed to have the largest single roof of the Incan empire. This building was also unique in that it a large part of it was built with mud and not only stone. All other Inca structures were built solely with stone.
This archeological site also consisted of 150 storage houses, or qolqas, which are about 10m in diameter and over 3 meters tall!! These housed grains such as quinoa and corn.

3) Sicuani: This is where we had a buffet lunch. The locals had stands with artisanal crafts, as with all other other tourist sites. I was always tempted to purchase something. Just the colours alone of the crafts were always very magnetizing.

4) La Raya: Here we stopped briefly for snapshots of the beautiful views of the Andes towering above  alpaca farms. La Raya is the line dividing the regions of Cuzco and Puno. More locals selling artisanal crafts, and like in many other places, women hoping to earn a peruvian sole here and there by posing with their alpaca for a photo. This is the one and only time we gave up a sole to have a picture taken with a native and her alpaca!

5) Puraca: We walked for a few minutes through this village to get to a small Inca museum containing more artifacts similar to ones we had already seen in other museums along our travels, thus far. More mummies, including those of the nobles with deformed skulls, and others with evidence of blows to their heads for sacrificial purposes (sorry if I´ve already described this gruesome tidbit before!). The one story we revisited was the one about a peruvian festival during which condors are used in bull fighting as a symbol of the Andean people. The condor is strapped to the bull and pecks away at it during bull fighting in the Andean highlands. We had been told during our Inka trek that usually the condor survives and flies away, however our guide during this trip told us that the condor does not necessarily survive as the wings may sometimes be damaged during bull fighting. The museum housed many porcelain-made bulls painted with different colours and designs. It is common for the locals to have one (or more?) of these bulls in their house for good luck and prosperity. The llama was a symbol of the latter for the Incas, but was then replaced by the bull after the spanish invasion.

Along the way to the museum, we had close views of houses made of mud (very typical in all Peruvian villages), many of which were painted with bright colours.

6) Juliaca: this was not a stop, but was talked about as we rode through the city. It is a pretty big city and is where the closest airport is to the city of Puno. In my opinion, and hope that I am not offending anybody, it is the ugliest city we´ve been through. We were told that it is a huge commercial hub and where there is quite a big "black market". In fact, our guide pointed out the numerous "illegal" buses that go between Peru and Bolivia so that Bolivians can make purchases in this city without paying taxes and for cheaper. A very interesting and strange point, was the fact that throughout the city, most building appeared incomplete with concrete rebars sticking way above the top floor. This is done on purpose so that the owners do not have to pay as much property taxes!!! We also noticed quite a bit of trash lying around. Hence, not the prettiest of places!

Puno city:  Puno is another big city. Buildings very plain and box like, just like in Lima. A couple of plazas near our hotel, with a very touristic pedestrian walkway between the two. Not much to speak about. It was just a place to stay for a night before heading out to Lake Titicaca for a few days. We walked around for a bit and then grabbed some familiar dinner - pizza, caprese salad (with local vs mozzarella cheese!) and a chicha morrada (drink).