Close to Cusco is the Sacred Valley, where you can visit several  different archaeological sites.  We took a bus to Pisac, the first of these sites. Pisac has an Inca village perched high on the hills – we took a taxi up to the ruins, and walked over the high path to arrive at the temple. We then went around the side and climbed back up the terraces to explore the forts and citadels.  We were a bit confused by our guidebook and somehow managed to double back on ourselves and climb up multiple terraces – but we did manage to see everything!

Our next stop was Moray, which we got to by a combination of bus, mini bus and taxi. Moray is a collection of three areas of circular terraces, which you can climb right down into. These were originally used for some form of agriculture.  We enjoyed climbing into these. Because we were there late in the day, we were some of the only people there which was cool.

We then took a mini bus through to Ollantaytambo, where we found a hostel and ate dinner at Heart’s Café, which was set up by an English woman as a café where profits go to help the local people. The food was good and it was cool to see an initiative like this.

The next day, we walked out of the town and into the ruins which were spread over the hill next to the town.  We explored throughout Ollantaytambo, climbing the terraces and walking along the windy path to visit different parts. The cool part of these ruins is that they look right over the town (which was also an Inca settlement).  That afternoon we took the train to Aguas Calientes, the town at the foot of Machu Picchu.