Birth Control Pills Cause Brain Damage: Monday/Tuesday in Cuzco

June 26^th 10am

Yesterday was a relatively lazy day. In the morning a tour of the Iglesia de Santo Domingo and the Qorikancha. The latter was an Inca ceremonial area, known as the Golden Courtyard, which consisted of multiple temples with walls covered in gold sheets. Various religious rites took place within its walls. The walls themselves were built of interlocking blocks, designed and built without mortar in such a way that earthquakes had no impact on their structural integrity.

When the Spanish arrived they plundered the gold and silver within the temples and destroyed much of the courtyard, re-using much of the blocks to build their own ceremonial structure on the ruins of the Inca temple. Ironically the Church sustained almost total destruction in the major earthquakes, of 1650 and 1950 as well as serious damage in the quake of ’84. The Inca walls however, remained unmoved.

After a fast lunch of quinoa soup (Peruvians make really great soups) and grilled trout/chicken we returned to the main square for a tour of the La Compania (actually Iglesia de la Compania de Jesus) A Jesuit church, construction commenced in 1571, it is also built on the ruins of an Inca building, in this case the palace of the last Inca ruler.

A magnificent gold covered altar reaching to the ceiling is its most remarkable feature.

Down both side walls were secondary altars and shrines to various religious figures. A trip up some very steep and rickety stairs allowed me to snap one photo of the church and altar (no photos permitted- helps boost the sale of crappy postcards!) as well as a panoramic shot of the entire Plaza de Armas.

Walking back to the hotel we detoured up some other side streets to locate the hotel being used by our Intrepid tour.

After a brief siesta we continued our tour of the city centre looking for some gloves and hats, in order to deal with the much cooler temperatures of the days ahead.

Apparently Puno area, 2 ,000 feet higher has night-time temps dropping to -8 Celsius.

While people are probably complaining about sweltering weather back home, we are anticipating an uncomfortable night in our new hotel, the Buena Vista Cusco. The supplied heater is much smaller and less powerful than the one at the Corihuasi.

10pm

Our group consists of about 16 people, 2 from Norway, 2 from UK and the rest from USA. Most (11) are doing the 3 day Inca Trail. At this time of my life comfort is more important than bragging rights. It is cold enough at night in the hotel. Why would I want to sleep on the cold hard ground for three days, since the prize at the end, Macchu Picchu is the same. Actually, the Inca Trail is one of several trails that go to Macchu Picchu and the other treks seem far more interesting and yet are not offered by many tour companies.

Today we paid a visit to the Coca museum, a small place dedicated to all things coca. Everything from arthritic rubs to cocaine seems to be made from this plant which is considered almost sacred to the locals. The tea has various medicinal properties including altitude sickness, headache prevention, eradication of sore throats and colds. The leaf itself is chewed as an energy source similar to caffeine and is applied in various forms to aching joints. Legal here in all forms except actual cocaine, it is seen everywhere. Even our hotel has leaves available to make coca tea or to add to regular teas.