Peru Day Two

Yesterday was excellent. It began with a breakfast of coca tea, orange juice, an omlet, "dutch toasties," which are like extra-crispy grilled cheese sandwiches, fresh fruit, bread with a locally grown marmalade made of minature grapes. After breakfast, we set out to find the REAL Plaza de Armas and we were successful. In fact, we stumbled upon a celebration of education here in Cuzco. Some important Peruvian diplomats/politicians were in attendance. I took a bit of video, which I'll try to post later. Anyway, the event lasted about an hour and it honored all of the teachers and school workers in a parade with hundreds of students and teachers. It was quite impressive. We walked around a bit more and stopped at a pharmacy to try to buy some tums for the heartburn that I've been having regularly here. Apparently "acid" translates quite well and, along with my heartburn motions, the pharmacist was able to get me what looks like Peruvian Pepto Bismol tablets. They seem to work OK, but not as well as tums.

A Cuzco Card-room :)

After the parade and getting pictures of the Plaza we headed back to the hotel and had lunch at the cafe here. We had lentil soup, vegetarian lasagna and some avacado dip, all of which were very tasty. Our little hotel cafe serves up great food which seems like Peruvian "home cookin'" at very cheap prices.

After lunch, we took a nap.

After the nap we went back to the Plaza to buy our Boleta de Touristico (Tourist Cards) which will get us into the archaeological, art and historical sites that we plan on either visiting today or when we come back through. These cards are sort of expensive, which was a bummer. They cost 130 soles per person, which is a little less than $50. Recently they doubled the price. >(

After we got our boletas, we decided to try a "nice" meal on the Plaza at a place called the Inkan Grille. The atmosphere was excellent, as was the service. The food was a little disappointing and not very flavorful (despite the bright colors on my plate). I ordered Alpaca steak and Amy had a Burger. My steak came with fried bananas on the side, which were great, and some sort of potato/rice mash. The steak itself was very good, it tasted like a very tender and lean version of a porksteak. I wish that they had included some type of sauce with it as seemed a bit plain alone. Anyway, this was the most expensive meal we've had (and might be our most expensive of the trip) at $25, tip included. After dinner, we took some more pictures of the Plaza at night and retired aroudn 7:30. I did some homework and crashed.

Today we're going to try to fanagle a deal with a taxi to take us to ruins around Cuzco and to Ollantaytambo, wish us luck.