Jessica and I decided to go to the Sunday market at the town of Pisac today as well as visit the nearby ruins. Lincoln, Kat and Phil wanted to watch the world cup soccer games today, so they stayed behind in Cuzco. First we dropped of laundry, and then had breakfast at an all-you-can-eat buffet for 10s, which was a great deal. Finally, we made our way to the Pisac bus station and caught the next bus out. The ride was around an hour, and we got to the market around noon, missing the big morning crowd when all the tour groups from Cuzco come on buses. The market was big, and had lots of nice stuff to choose from – too much! Jessica didn’t make it past the second stall before buying something. We both bought some jewellery and a few gifts for people before forcing ourselves to leave and head for the ruins. Before we left the market, we sat down near the “food” section to have a drink of water and a snack. We were taking some pictures of some cute kids playing when one of them noticed and ran over to see his photo. Needless to say, the popular game ensued where we would take his picture in various places (with his Mom, his Dad, sister, friend, etc.) and then he would run back to see the pictures. Eventually even the adults came over to see their pictures on the camera. One old lady asked me if she could have the picture that I took of her, but unfortunately I had to explain that it was only in the camera and I couldn’t get it out for her. It was loads of fun, and probably our best experience that day! Eventually we went on our way and found a taxi to bring us to the top of the ruins, and then we planned on walking back down the hill. I had to sweet-talk my way into the ruins because I my “tourist ticket” had expired, and I had also forgotten it at the hotel. I ended up paying the guy 20s for entrance, which was better than the 40s he tried to get me to pay for another “mini-tourist-ticket” which provides entrance into all the ruins around Cuzco, all the others of which I had been to already. He told me not to tell anyone, so don’t say anything. If I had brought my expired ticket with me, I think he would have let me in for free.

The Pisac ruins are very big, and are spread out over around a kilometre, so we didn’t have time to see them all. One of our favourite bits was the hillside where there are hundreds of holes that were used to bury people. All the mummies have since been excavated, but the holes are still pretty impressive. We also climbed to the top of the highest set of ruins and had great views of the surrounding valleys. It rained a little bit off and on when we were up there, and it started getting dark, so we headed back after walking around for a bit trying to find the trail back down to the town. The walk down was nice even though it rained for some of it, and we got back to the town around 5:30. We were supposed to meet the others at the hostel at 5:00, so we were going to be late! Finally we made it back to the hostel at 6:30, just when Lincoln was starting to get worried. We were all hungry, so headed out for dinner at a good restaurant that was across the street and down a bit from Jack’s, but I can’t remember the name of it. Then we had to head back to the hostel to pack for our jungle tour.