Cusco

Cusco

August 12, 2019

We arrived at our small but stylish boutique hotel in the San Blas area of Cusco. This area is full of small individual boutiques, restaurants and bars. It seems to be a bit of a ‘hippie’ area. Cusco is bulging with tourists and it is hard to walk around the narrow cobbled streets without being run over by the cars that do not slow down to avoid pedestrians.

The main Plaza and historical areas of Cusco are absolutely magnificent. The story of the Inca period and the invasion of the Spaniards is clearly told and evidenced in this city. We have taken a tour, which included a visit to the cathedral and surrounding Inca sites and, with the help of a very knowledgable guide, we learned so much about the Inca way of life, how Cusco was created and dominated and then how it fell to the Spaniards in a very quick and brutal way back in the 1530s.

It was sad to see how many of the original Inca buildings and monuments were ravaged by the Spaniards, who not only stole the gold, silver and other treasures from the Inca, they used their considerable power and more sophisticated weaponry to ensure that Christianity was firmly installed in Cusco. Although, the population surrendered to the domination, with many of them accepting Christianity as their new faith, there is strong evidence that some of the people helped to decorate the interior of the Cathedral. Looking closely at some of the paintings in the Cathedral, you can see that they still held on to their Andean culture. For example, their Jesus is dark skinned with a stocky physique. In a painting of the Last Supper, Jesus is seen with the typical Andean bread and a roasted guinea pig as their final meal. There are mirrors on the spectacular altars representing the reflection of the soul, which is a strong link to the Andean and Inca culture. There is literally tons of gold and silver decoration throughout the cathedral, all of which was stolen from the Inca. Even more tons was was transported to Spain.