Ollantaytambo & the Sacred Valley

Back on the train I got, and headed back to Ollantaytambo, which I had briefly passed through on my may to Machu Picchu. There are many more Incan ruins in the Sacred Valley, with Ollantaytambo being one of the most impressive. The town is one of the most intact Incan towns, with original walls, layout, and irriagtion systems still in place. And looming over the town are the ruins of a sun and moon temple at the top of a steep terrace. Ollantaytambo is also the site of one of the few defeats of the Spanish by the Incans, which may be why the Spanish never made it as far as Machu Picchu.

Leaving Ollantaytambo, I went to visit some of the sites in the Sacred Valley. First up was Moray, an Incan ruin of terraces in concentric circles. The differing levels of terraces in Moray results in a temperature difference of 5 °C from the top to the bottom, so the structure acts a bit like a greenhouse allowing them to grow crops that they otherwise couldn't in that environment. Next I went to see the Maras salt mines, where salt is mined from 4500 individual terraced pools fed by the mineral rich river water. It's unclear when the mines were bulit, but they are pre-Incan and are thought to be from 500 - 1100 AD. The mines are still in use today and have been continuously used since their construction.

My final destination in the valley was Chinchero, more Incan ruins of terraces and irrigation systems, topped with a Spanish colonial town from 1607 that was built on top of the Incan palace. Chinchero is also the home of Peruvian weaving, so it was a good place to stop and see some alpacha producs, and of course the alpachas themselves!Read more