April Adventures: Saqsaywaman

After our tour bus adventure on Thursday, we switched it up and set out to explore some of the old Inca sites closer to Cuzco on our own, on foot.  There are four sites we visited in total, and they all are situated more or less on the same road heading north from Cuzco.  We were able to walk to them all over about a 5 hour round trip of maybe 10 miles.

Here is the view as we started our walk uphill from Cuzco:

Saqsaywaman was our first stop, and as we climbed up we ran into a large group of elementary school boys in blue track suits.  We talked to some of them, and they were a sixth-grade class at an all-boys school in town who were going to Saqsaywaman on a field trip.  They were somewhat excited that we were American, but then got called over by their teacher and we parted ways.

Here is an initial view of Saqsaywaman:

The site is a huge fortress, with zigzag shaped walls on one part that were apparently used for military strategy.  It is also huge, so we took our time exploring it.  According to wikipedia, the site was initially built by the Killke culture that inhabited the area in the 1100s before being conquered by the Incas, and the Incas then expanded and finished it.

The walls in the zigzag section are pretty high:

But they used to be even higher.  Apparently the Spanish dismantled the higher portions of the walls and took the stones to build the Cathedral in downtown Cuzco and other buildings.  The stones are fitted together carefully without mud or mortar or anything that would hold them together--but they have stayed in place for 500 years in an earthquake zone.  It is amazing to see the scale and scope of the building projects.

We climbed up to the third level of the zigzag walls and could see the large open plain it faces, as well as the other portion of the site, pictured in the background.  This plain is where the Festival of the Sun is celebrated on June 24th, which is the biggest yearly event in Cuzco. The rocks behind it include a supposed "throne of the Inca" carved out of the rocks as well.

Allegedly, one of the Inca emperors also worked to have Cuzco laid out in the shape of a puma, with Saqsaywaman as the head of the puma and the zigzag walls forming its teeth.  Here is a picture of the supposed puma shape:

This seems like a stretch to me, but several tour guides referenced it.  So, in the map above, Saqsaywaman is up where the head is, the Plaza de Armas is near the heart, and Qorikancha, which we will visit in an upcoming post, is the reproductive organs.  The city extends far beyond these puma boundaries, especially with increased growth in recent years, but the tourist industry seems to like this story so we keep hearing it.

Anyway, back to the site.  After exploring the zigzag walls, we walked across the plain pictured above to the small rock walls surrounding the hill with the Throne of the Inca:

After we climbed up the hill, we got a good aerial view of the zigzag walls of the site:

Finally, as we walked around the back of the site, we saw our elementary school friends again:

They had found the sheer walls on the back of the hill and decided they would make great slides!  They all seemed very pleased with themselves and it isn't that high, so it didn't seem too dangerous.

From here, we kept walking to the three other sites, but those will be another post since they are smaller and we took fewer photos.  More soon!