Back in Cusco
Since we had the time my mom and I decided to spend one more day in Cusco. We started the day by visiting a large ruin site right on the edge of town. We decided to view the ruins from a couple central lookout points rather than walking around the whole place as our legs were still pretty tired!
In the afternoon we went back to the market to have a more traditional Peruvian meal (for $1 each) and a delicious smoothie. We also stocked up on some fruit and snacks for the next day as we would be on the move. I was also able to find the tour agency that I will be doing my second hike to Machu Picchu with when Brent arrives and was able to ask a few questions to make sure we are ready to go! We did some research later in the afternoon on the best way to explore the Sacred Valley as we would be leaving to do that the next day and didn’t want to do all the sights in a single day on a pre organized tour.
In the evening we went to the cultural Centre in town and watched an hour live performance of dancers doing various traditional dances from different communities around Cusco. The show itself was a lot of fun to watch, and the crowd was equally as entertaining. Before the show started we seemed to be an attraction with various people asking to take our picture. After the show we had a delicious fire oven baked pizza (something they have no shortage of in tourist towns). And then headed back to the hostel to reorganize our bags for the next two days of exploring the Sacred Valley.