
Touring the Sacred Valley near Cusco, Peru
There are many Inca ruin sites near Cusco and throughout the Sacred Valley. Here are the primary ones that I visited and the ones that I enjoyed the most. This region is home to the indigenous Quechua people who speak the Quechuan language – which in 1969 became Peru’s second official language. Quechuas are a collection of several ethnic groups in Peru, Bolivia, Chile, Colombia, Ecuador and Argentina. I had an excellent tour guide, Jose Luis Blanco C., that I hired through th

Cusco - the ancient Inca capital
I dosed off shortly after the plane took off from the airport in Puerto Maldonado. It had been a fun-filled four days in the Amazon region’s rainforest and I was a little tired. It’s a short flight to Cusco so I know I didn’t sleep for long. As I awoke, I noticed the snow-capped Andean mountains through the window. What a stunning sight! I almost felt like I could reach out and touch them – probably because we were flying between the mountains and not above them. It was such

An unforgettable stay in the Amazon Rainforest
The sharp crack of thunder woke me from what seemed like a dead sleep. As I opened my eyes, streaks of lightning came one after another – each one followed by a loud boom that seemed to be off in the distance. I glanced at my watch. It was 2:46 am. The rain was torrential hitting the thatched roof above my head. It sounded as if the skies had opened up. The sounds were especially loud due to the open-air construction of the lodge. There were no outer walls. Each guest room wa