Page II-Saborear La Vida-“Cielo”

Day 2- August 4 [Lima to Cusco to Chinchero to Ollantaytambo to Urubamba]

Cielo: /sjelo/noun. Spanish: sky.  heaven.

If I had to choose a word to describe this day, it would be cielo.
 

I remember boarding the bus after we landed in the Cusco airport and Freddy, the tour guide assistant for this leg of the trip, handed me a bottle of water; the brand name being Cielo. I recall turning to Angele and explaining to her that cielo meant sky in English. I remember thinking that it was perfect for a shot against the clear, blue sky.

I guess, cielo can also describe the fact that at this point, we were all closer to the sky. Elvis, our tour manager and actual guide for this leg of the trip, has led us to the “highlands” of Peru.  This is where we become “explorers”—as he terms it—and not tourists. 

Henri, possibly my favorite coach driver in this whole trip, drove us from the Cusco airport to Chinchero town where we were to have lunch.

We had the “local’s lunch” or, as Ryan, one of our tour mates has termed it, “local’s lunch for tourists.” It was an array of different dishes, served family style. This is when I fell in love with quinoa and decided that cuy (or guinea pig) is a thinner wannabe version of lechon (roasted pig) and it’s not really my kind of food. They also served tortillas that were just to die for. If I can recreate this meal, I totally would.

The ladies in the house did a weaving demonstration. How they do their craft and past it among generations was just a sight to see. I think my favorite amongst the photos I have of that moment was the juxtaposition of the generations from one to the other, passing down knowledge from mother to daughter.

 
After Chinchero, Henri drove us to Ollantaytambo. I remember falling asleep in the bus on the way there but I was woken up because we were to walk to the site. The roads were small and since it’s a tourist area (and also, locals were traveling as well since it’s the Independence Day holiday week), our coach was stuck and not moving.

 

I stepped into Ollantaytambo and I remember the feeling of being in awe. There is something about travel that makes it less about time and more about the moment, less about the precise and more about the vague.  I don’t exactly remember the story that Elvis has said about the place. All I remember is that Pachacuti has built it and the story, when I heard it, was touching. I remember marveling on the architecture and thinking that if I were more versed in how architecture works, my appreciation for this would turn from merely its beauty to the technicality. (Elvis, I must commend, is an excellent storyteller. This might have been the moment that I decided he was actually worth listening to.)

Angele and a couple of other people in our tour group climbed up and it was worth the pain. Ollantaytambo just left me breathless, both literally and figuratively. I can’t wait to go back during the summer solstice and see how the sunlight hits and the beauty that is that sight.

Afterwards, we headed to Urubamba where we were staying for the night and the next night. We had dinner where I was able to try a creampuff like dessert filled with lacuma which I just about devoured.  Dinner was more about conversation with our tour mates and less about the food, from what I am remembering. Besides the dessert and trying pisco sour for the first time, most of what I recall from dinner was the pushy musician and the things I learned about who Angele and I sat with at that time. By the time dinner ended, we were all about ready to just go to bed and rest.

I went to sleep that night satisfied , happily exhausted and closer to the heavens.

For more photos see: my flickr