Sacred Valley

I can count on my hand the number of times I've been on a horse.  That's even throwing in the time I road a donkey the first time I went to Mexico back in '91.  It's not that I'm afraid of them, it's just that I've never had any training and I think that's something you should have with these creatures.  At least more than the standard "this is what you do to make the horse do left (or right) and this is what you do when you want to stop and never walk behind the horse".  But I think instructions are hard to remember when you're hanging on for dear life.

My horse west Toronado.  He was spunky and if I didn't have a good grip on the saddle horn there would have been a couple of times where I might have been thrown off.  And since much of the trek was a narrow path high up on the face of the hills surrounding he valley, I'm sure falling would have been a problem.  Toronado would often break out in a trot which was fine but the cantor and and on another occasion, the leap he made up one of the slopes wasn't movement I was expecting.  

Judith's horse was Napoleon.  She tells me he wasn't a happy horse today because his ears were swept back all day.  He wasn't spunky.  

The scenery was spectacular.  There are two valleys that join together here and is an important agricultural area going back to the Inca period.  From one end you can see the Andes mountains with their glaciers.  

From the other end the valley is in sight. 

We stopped for a rest along a bluff and take pictures.  There was a photographer that accompanied us during the trail ride.  He was there to take pictures and video to make a promotional video for the trail riding company.  I'm skeptical he can make something look decent with my riding skills--I think he will need to focus on Judith.  

After the trail ride I was glad to dismount in one piece.  We then met the driver and went into the local town Ollantaytambo (Ollanta, for short).  On the way we see huge quarried stones that were left abandoned mid steam as the Spaniards invaded.   Ollanta is an interesting place that's full of Inca architecture.  It's been continually inhabited since the 13th century.  This Inca built doorway is still standing.  

The Incas planned cities with narrow cobblestone streets.  The bottom layer of the wall was Inca built and the top layer of bricks or mud was a more modern addition.  The walls are sloped to withstand earthquakes.  

There are spectacular Inca ruins overlooking the city.

We came back to the hotel and both of us spent time in the afternoon napping.  Judith was the first to go down and I blogged and then it was my turn and she packed for Machu Pichu and explored the grounds of the hotel. 

We ate dinner at the hotel and then decided to take in an astonmy lecture on site.  The hotel has an observatory.  The astronomer was David, originally from Brazil, who had an idea about 12 years to do astronomy tourism thing and this hotel bought into his plan.  We looked at constellations on the lawn, gazed through the telescope and sat trough an audio visual presentation.  I learned a lot.  But the coolest take away was taking a picture with my phone through the eyepiece of the telescope.  

Early day tomorrow!  Machu Picchu.