In this tour we Will discover the three most important cities of southern Peru as Arequipa, Puno and Cusco.
In this tour we Will discover the three most important cities of southern Peru as Arequipa, Puno and Cusco.
Welcome to Peru! Our professional tour guide will meet you upon your arrival at the international airport in Lima, and you will be transferred to your hotel where we will welcome you with a Pisco sour, the national drink of our country, while we review our plans for your memorable journey about to unfold.
In the early morning you Will be transferred to the airport and take a local flight to Arequipa.
We will stroll around the historic plaza and center of Arequipa and discover the bustling San Camilo Market where one can buy just about anything. We then will tour the beautiful and peaceful Santa Catalina monastery and the impressive museum of Juanita, the Inca Ice Maiden, whose recently discovered mummy is preserved and on display for us to wonder about and to learn about ancient Inca tradition.
Today, we depart Arequipa and began to ascend towards the Andes highlands passing through a national reserve where we hope to see vicuñas, llamas and alpacas in their native habitat of the stark Andean altiplano. Ultimately we will rise to a high pass at 4910 meters above sea level.
By midafternoon, we will arrive at Chivay, the gateway community to Colca Canyon, and check into our quaint hotel. In the late afternoon we’ll go to a nearby hot springs to relax.
An early morning departure will lead us through the incredibly scenic landscape of Colca canyon. Our aim is to get to a vista called Cruz del Condor, a place where we hopefully will observe the majestic Andean condor in flight. In local culture and folklore, the condor is the revered messenger between people and the heavenly gods.
We then will spend the rest of this day, traversing the incredibly scenic altiplano and making our way toward Puno, a major city situated on the shore of Lake Titicaca.
After breakfast we will take ecological taxis to the Puno harbor and board our boat to head out on to Lake Titicaca to the famous “floating reed” Uros Islands. There we will engage in a fun and informative program with a local island community.
Then we’ll cruise further out on the lake to Amantani Island, We will homestay here with local families and hands on in their local activities.
In the late afternoon we hike to nearby Summit Pachamama to appreciate the majesty of the lake and one of the most beautiful sunsets in the world.
After breakfast we Will cruise to Taquile island, thought by many to be one of the most scenic and culturally significant islands in the world. We’ll disembark and walk a cobblestone path to an island community where we will enjoy a cultural program and experience a simpler and unique way of life. There are no roads and cars here, and limited technology.
Then afterwards…a pleasant and relaxing afternoon cruise back to Puno.
We depart Puno and head to a sacred site known as Sillustani. There we will walk amongst meticulously built Stone funerary towers called chullpas which were used by the Inca and earlier Colla people to inter their noble families. The site is situated on a high bluff overlooking the sublime Lago Umayo. The essend and experience here is very etheral.
We head north through the busy city of Juliaca and then ultimately over the majestic pass of La Raya where we will visit a nice crafts market. Then onward to the town of Raqchi where we will experience the ancient remnants of the Inca Temple of Wiracocha.
In the afternoon, we will visit the “Sistine Chapel of the Andes” at Andahuayillas and enjoy some delicious local bread at the community of Oropesa. Eventually we arrive at Cusco, the historic and ancient Inca capital.
After breakfast we will discover the historic center of Inca culture in the Andean highlands, and now a bustling city that has retained its authentic character. we’ll stroll around the central Plaza de Armas and tour its grand cathedral. We’ll also visit what remains of Qorikancha, the original Inca Sun Temple. Then we will tour Sacsayhuamán, the remains of an imposing Inca citadel situated on the heights above the city. The splendid Inca stone masonry there constructed with massive hand-carved blocks of rock is simply astounding.
We begin our journey through the Sacred Valley of the Inca which flanks the Urubamba River. We will travel through some beautiful Andes scenery from Cusco in route to Pisac where we will tour majestic Inca agricultural terraces that once were a part of the royal estate of the Inca emperor, Pachacuti. The curvilinear terraces are situated on the steep slopes in the highlands above town. They truly are engineering masterpieces and architectural works of art. Then we ascend to the Cusco highlands where we will find more of three thousand basins of salt, the impressive salt mine of Incas.
In the afternoon, we’ll climb the rock stairways and terraces of Ollantaytambo, a dramatic Inca temple and fortress at one of the last strongholds of Inca resistance during the Spanish Conquest of the early 1500s. Also, we’ll stroll through a traditional Inca kancha townsite still in use today.
in the early morning we will board the Vistadome train for a relaxing journey down the scenic Urubamba River Valley to Aguas Calientes situated in the cloud forest at 8000 feet beneath Machu Picchu, the fabled “lost city of the Inca,”
We will experience the legendary “lost city” and wander among its regal residences, temples, and plazas while we wonder about the industrious and imaginative Inca people Actually, Machu Picchu was another of the grand spiritual retreats of the Inca emperor Pachacuti. The stone masonry here is meticulous and artful, and is virtually still intact, as the Spanish never found Machu Picchu during their 1500s Conquest. We will marvel at the engineering and architectural prowess of the Inca people, and gaze at the enigmatic Intihuatana stone, the Royal Tomb, the Sacred Rock, and the Temples of the Sun, the Condor, and the Three Windows, and speculate about life in Machu Picchu during its zenith.
In the afternoon, we’ll take a relaxing train ride back to Cusco.
We will depart this morning on a flight from Cusco to Lima, the Spanish “City of Kings” and present-day capital of Peru, for the final day of our Andean Trilogy. From here, you will make your connection to your flight back home…but as time and flight schedules permit, we will tour the historic center of the city including the ornate and bustling Plaza de Armas and Plaza de San Martín. We will do our best to enjoy one last Pisco sour as well. Salud!
