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Sacred Valley Guide

The “Valle Sagrado” or Sacred Valley of the Incas is located about 15km north of Cusco. This beautiful valley is situated 600m lower than Cusco and enjoys a pleasant, sheltered climate.

Among the main attractions are Pisaq and Ollantaytambo, both described below. However the towns and villages of Calca, Yucay and Urubamba are all nice places to visit as well as the fascinating salt pans of Maras, the agricultural site of Moray and Chinchero.

The citadel of Pisaq, at the entrance to this gorge, now in ruins, controlled a route which connected the Inca Empire with Paucartambo, on the border of the eastern jungle. Set high above a valley floor patch-worked by patterned fields and rimmed by vast terracing, the stonework and panoramas at Pisac's Inca citadel are magnificent.

Terraces, water ducts and steps have been cut out of solid rock, and in the upper sector of the ruins, the main Sun Temple is equal of anything at Machu Picchu. Above the temple lie still more ruins, mostly unexcavated, and among the higher crevices and rocky overhangs several ancient burial sites are hidden.

The village of Pisac is a great place to buy local artifacts.  There is a big artisans market here every Tuesday, Thursday and Sunday and many of the local craftsmen come in from the surrounding hills to sell their goods.

Ollantaytambo is an attractive little town located at the western end of the Sacred Valley (about two and a half hours by bus from Cusco).  The town has been built on top of original Inca foundations and is the best surviving example of Inca town planning. The town is divided in canchas (blocks) which are almost entirely intact. Each cancha has only one entrance (usually a huge stone doorway) which leads into a central courtyard. The houses surround the courtyard. Good examples of this construction can be found behind the main plaza.

The town is located at the foot of some spectacular Inca ruins which protected the strategic entrance to the lower Urubamba Valley. The temple area is at the top of steep terracing which helped to provide excellent defenses. Stone used for these buildings was brought from a quarry high up on the opposite side of the Urubamba River – an incredible feat involving the efforts of thousands of workers. The complex was still under construction at the time of the conquest and was never completed.

Chinchero, 28km from Cusco is an attractive Indian village with a colorful Sunday market. The central square has a splendid Inca wall on its western side, etched with 10 trapezoidal niches, each large enough to hold a human being. Also on the square, sitting on its upper level, is the town’s colonial church, built of adobe and decorated internally with beautiful floral designs.
Moray, an Inca site, was an experimental agricultural centre. It comprises numerous terraces carved into a large, natural amphitheatre, each one with a different microclimate from those above and below.

The salt pans at Maras are still worked by the local community to crystallize salt from water. These mines were exploited in pre-hispanic times and reach back to the pre-Inca period. The spectacular scene of the salt pans forming from an underground river source is a bizarre contrast with the fabulous Andean landscape.