Day 5

Day five started with my doing some Internet work updating the blog. Then I went to breakfast with Jan and Sam. The excursion this moring was to the Inca fortress Saqsaywaman (pronounced by Americans as "Sexy Woman"). Which, as it turns out, is not a fortress. Our tour guide Edwin explained that it was probably used as a fortress by the time the conquistadors arrived at Cuzco, but it was originally used as a temple. It had some astrological features, and just two weeks before our visit, archaeologists discovered the mummies of five children in a position of offering. I don't know if the children were supposed to be making an offering, or if they were the offering. Anyway, the site was later used as a prison. Ultimately, the stones were torn down and broken up to use to build buildings in Cuzco. There were some enormous stones there, but the craftsmanship didn't seem to be as good as at Qorikancha. My geologist brother-in-law said the stones were limestone and had eroded because they were out in the weather. The stonework at Qorikancha was closed in. So it's hard to know exactly what the stonework looked like six hundred years ago, more or less.

Edwin told us something interesting about Inca culture. If a person was struck by lightning and survived, they were considered gods, or at least something more than other people. If a pregnant woman was struck by lightning and the woman and baby survived, the child became a prince, assuming it was a boy. I'm not sure if a girl became a princess. He said during the time of the Incas, there was only one known case of that, so I'm guessing you couldn't just show up and say your mother was struck by lightning and you're ready to be a prince.

As we finished up at the site, I spotted three little girls with a llama who were dressed up to have their picture taken. So Sam and I went down and Jan took our picture with the girls and the llama, and they had a baby llama they let me hold. That should be a good touristy picture.

On the way back to the hotel, we took the scenic route to see some of the narrow, stone streets. As it happened one was blocked at the end by a police barricade. That would have been nice to know at the other end. There was nothing else to do but back the bus up. The street seemed narrow enough going forward, but the driver expertly backed all the way back up to the top of the hill (he had to get a good start to get a bus full of people up), and then had to maneuver the bus back onto the narrow street we came from. All this was probably a lot more impressive than it sounds. The point is, the tour bus drivers in Cuzco have mad skills.

Once back at the hotel, we had just a few minutes before we got back in the buses and went to the airport to head back to Lima on LAN airlines. It was a fairly short (~1.5 hours) flight, and uneventful. We had box lunches from Cuzco which were tasty. LAN shows funny videos during the flight which is a nice diversion.

We found out later that while we were flying uneventfully back to Lima, they were having a 4.5 earthquake. The people that had gone to Trujillo instead of Cuzco were in Lima at the time and got to experience it. No extra charge for the bonus excitement. The odd thing is that someone asked our tour guide when the last earthquake in Lima was and she said in the 70's. I guess she thought they meant a really destructive, killer quake. Anyway, we didn't notice any unusual activity or any sign that anything out of the ordinary had happened when we got there.

Once back in Lima, we got on a bus and toured the city. This was basically just a time killer, I think. We drove around while our tour guide, Alicia, gave us interesting tidbits about the city. We stopped in Armas Square, in front of the presidential palace. There were tanks on either side of the compound with soldiers at the machine guns who looked like they meant business. While we were there taking pictures, someone came up to Sam and asked if he would have his picture taken with a group of young school girls. At first he said no. I think he thought they were going to charge him, but they were just a school group that wanted a picture with an American boy. The fact that he hadn't shaved in a couple of days probably made him look more dangerous, too. That will also be a good picture. When those girls were gathering around him, he had the biggest smile I've seen on him this whole trip. In fact, for a long time, even before the trip. I guess I'll have to find a group of girls to ask him to pose with them at every city, and he'll actually have to admit to having a good time.

After driving around the city, we headed to a Hacienda. Don't ask me to remember the name. We saw some very good demonstrations of riding and dancing. The riding was a demonstration of the Peruvian Paso Horse. This hacienda is apparently well known for breeding them. They are walking horses, with a gait that makes for a very smooth ride. Their legs also swing out to the side on each step, rather than just going up and down. The riders rode them around the review area in various formations and ended by riding up to the audience and taking a bow.

The dancers were also very entertaining. They did several dances from different regions of Peru. After one lively dance with the men and women, the two women and two of the horses and riders did the same dance. The horses and riders moved very gracefully with the ladies. It was quite a display.

After dinner, the dancers returned for another dance demonstration. This was a dance from the rural area of Peru. The premise was that the girls and boys tried to show each other up with their dancing ability, and it was a kind of ritualized power struggle. At one point, one of the ladies went and sat in the lap of one of the men on the tour, and her dance partner came and got her and threw her over his shoulder. She didn't seem to mind too much because they continued dancing until the audience participation part where each of the dancers chose a partner from the audience. That was an interesting display. Glad it wasn't me.

One thing that came up here that's bitten me already this trip is that my camera just eats batteries. I've been through five sets of batteries, (four AA's per set) and it looks like I'm going to make EverReady's stock price increase at the rate I'm having to buy the things. And that's when I can buy them. Not every stop is so easy to find batteries.

After the show at the hacienda, it's back to the Lima airport to head to Easter Island. Our flight is scheduled to leave at 10 p.m. We get to Easter Island at 3:30 a.m. A long night...