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Pisac is also renowned for spectacular ruins situated just above the village. Although the archeological site is important, it is blissfully quiet. |
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The Incas
were, among
other things, master builders of walls. For the most significant walls,
they didn't use any sort of mortar, and they measured the stones so
carefully
that even today, you can't pry a key or a credit card between them.
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Structure made of more ordinary stones had some utilitarian purpose such as warehousing of grain or housing for workers. |
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Ancient Pisac
occupied
an important location from which several areas of the valley could be
monitored
and guarded. It was an important protection for Cuzco, the heart of the
short-lived Inca empire
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The soldiers and the priests of Pisac lived on food grown on magnificent terraces that are still being used after five hundred years. The river is the Río Urubamba, and its valley is known as the Sacred Valley of the Incas |
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Ceremonial and
irrigation
water flowed from intricate and beautiful gutters. I drank from several
of those in archeological sites, always slightly wary of some
far-reaching
Inca curse...
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There is nothing quite like climbing up and down colossal ruins in the rarefied air at 10,000ft, following a guide who's playing a bamboo flute. Even if I'd fallen down one of those precipices, it would have been worth it. |
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The landscapes
in the
background are often so steep that the perspective looks wrong, as if
the
mountains were painted on a backdrop that is hanging too close. Not
surprisingly,
this is earthquake country. But nothing can bring down the Inca walls.
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