Cusco, Day 2

Today we were lucky to watch the festivities of Inti Raymi.  The town was going crazy.  The actual day that the new year (Inti Raymi) is celebrated is tomorrow, but the festival was already intense toaday.  What we saw today was just a glimpse of the craziness that will happen tomorrow.  Unfortunately, our trek begins tomorrow and we will miss the big celebration.  What we saw was crazy enough though.

Cusco's plaza was slammed with people celebrating the new year.

Many of the parade participants were waiting for their turns, adjusting their costumes.

Some were extremely elaborate, as you can see. 

Cutting through the different groups was interesting.  Each village from around Peru, and I think other countries, came to Cusco to celebrate. 

Most of the roads were shut down for pedestrian traffic only. 

I could not say no to raw sugar cane. 

Cusco!!!

While being entertained by the parades, we were still able to get some shopping done.  There were more vendors lining the streets than you could possibly see.  People were cooking in the roads, camping, and celebrating.  I have never seen anything like this before.  As the afternoon wore on it became increasingly harder to move through the streets.  We heard music and celebrating until we woke up at 4:15 am the next day.

Also during the day, we dealt with a local artist named Ronaldo selling his own work and some of his friends' work from one of the local art schools.  We got into a discussion about the regional stringed instrument called the charango.  Finding a quality charango has been difficult.  All the vendors have been selling poor quality tourist instruments, but I need a playable one.  I got Ronaldo's phone number and might give him a call.  He says a friend of his makes charangos and could meet with us when we get back from our trek.  

In the evening we went to SAS Travel for a trek briefing.   Our guide Elias met with us and was very friendly.  We also got a chance to meet the other people in our group.  We found out there will be 8 of us trekking, with a crew of 12 to take care of us.  Besides the 4 of us,  a couple from St. Louis and a Canadian couple who was born in Poland will be embarking on the 4 day trek.  Our support crew includes Elias the guide, a head chef and an assistant chef, and 9 porters.  After the briefing we headed back to the hostel to prepare our porter bags and our day packs for the morning.  

Tomorrow will be an early morning.  We meet at 5:20 am to head to the Inca Trail.  Machu Picchu here we come.