City and Ruins (4 Hours)
Private & Shared Services
Afternoon guided visit of the city of Cuzco which includes the Main Square, the Cathedral with its religious Art Museum, and the Santo Domingo Church or Koricancha. Continue with a visit to the four ruins nearby, the Sacsayhuaman Fortress, overlooking the city of Cuzco, a pre Inca architectural masterpiece; Kenko, a rock sanctuary whose main attraction is a monolithic altar representing a puma, the red Fortress of Puca-Pucara and Tambomachay
City Tour (3 Hours)
Private Services Only
Includes the Main Square, the Cathedral with its religious Art Museum, the Santo Domingo Church or Koricancha, the Church and Cloisters of La Merced, the artisans quarter of San Blas, the San Blas Church and baroque pulpit, the Archaeological Museum.
Pre-Columbian Art Museum (3 Hours). Not included in the City Tour
Private Services Only
The Pre-Columbian Art Museum was an Inca ceremonial court around 1450 A.D. In 1580 became into the mansion of the conqueror Alonso Díaz, and in 1850 of the Earl of Cabrera. It was restored to be the PRE-COLUMBIAN ART MUSEUM since June 2003.
This extraordinary Cuzco historic monument holds the only museum in Perú dedicated to rebound the arts of ancient Peruvian cultures. The collection of 450 master pieces dates from 1250 B.C to.1532 A.D. They were selected among 45,000 objects located at the storages of the Larco Museum in Lima, by curators Fernando of Szyszlo and Cecilia Bákula.
The exhibition uses texts in Spanish, English and French to emphasize the artistic context of the collection displayed in 11 showrooms inside the museum. Its galleries were designed to meet the highest standards of modern museography enabling the visitors to admire Pre-Columbian art in its best expression.
Surrounding Ruins (3 Hours)
Private Services Only
This tour includes visits to the Sacsayhuaman Fortress, overlooking the city of Cuzco, a pre-Inca architectural masterpiece; Kenko, a rock sanctuary whose main attraction is a monolithic altar representing a puma, the red Fortress of Puca-Pucara and Tambomachay, a beautiful fountain fed by a spring forming a series of basins.
Pisac Market (4 Hours)
Private Services Only
The Village of Pisac, founded during Colonial times, is set at the foot of a hill crowned by the remains of an Inca city. Every day in the main square, locals barter their products and artisans from all over the area sell their woven alpaca, wool blankets, and ponchos, engraved gourds, antique reproductions, jewellery, etc. On Sundays it is also the meeting place for Mayors from all the villages in the region, dressed in their traditional costumes to attend morning mass.
Chinchero (4 Hours) – Sundays
Private Services Only
Chinchero is a very typical Quechua village, where a market is held on Sundays. Nearby, the Colonial church has interesting frescoes on the portico and overlooks Inca terraces. The natives still wear traditional dress.
Pisac Inca Citadel (4 Hours)
Private Services Only
Located on top of a mountain range overlooking the Sacred Valley of the Incas, Pisac is a complex of temples, housing areas, agricultural terraces and astronomical observatories built by the Incas, centuries ago. Did you know that Pisac is larger than Machu Picchu?
Pikillacta and Andahuaylillas (4 Hours)
Private Services Only
Pikillacta, a pre-Inca citadel from the seventh century, (Wari culture) maintains its ancient mystery and bizarre architecture. It is located in the Cuzco valley near the shores of Huacarpay Lake. On the other side of the valley, Andahuaylillas, a town built by the Spanish conquerors, is famous for its 17th century church. Behind a rather modest exterior the church (recently restored) boasts an interior of exceptional beauty: a Mudejar roof over the apse, richly embellished and all walls with numerous frescoes and paintings.
Shrines: Temple of the Moon (3 Hours)
Private Services Only
Around the city of Cuzco, the Incas built a network of shrines devoted to their divinities, Water, Moon, Air and Earth. These shrines, though perhaps less famous, were very important to the people. Visit natural caves, stone sculptures and burial grounds
Inca Stonemasons: Rumikolka (quarry) (3 Hours)
Private Services Only
Rumikolka is the name of an ancient quarry where the Incas worked the stones and then transported them to Cuzco to build their palaces. Recent investigations into the ancient tools and techniques involved in the process of stonecutting, dressing and fitting can be explained here. The pits, stones and tools remain as they were.
Sacred waters and ancient agriculture: Tipón and Kaira (4 Hours)
Private Services Only
Tipón was built at the base of Cerro Pachatusan, a crucial point in the horizon that connected earth and heaven. During Winter solstice the sun appeared behind and over its summit and in Cuzco could only be seen with splendour from the placid surroundings of Coricancha. Tipón was erected by the Incas with masterful architectonic precision. This was a centre of agricultural research and a space to worship water and is still a mystic place where shamans and spiritual persons congregate to pay tribute to earth and to worship water.
The Incas developed crops such as corn and potatoes, and the ancient farmers had their research-centre-temples on the terraces they built throughout the Andes. Tipón is a unique site, with twelve large stone terraces and water channels, where agricultural initiation rituals, research and experiments were performed. This tour is combined with a short visit to Kaira, the University of Cuzco's Andean Plant Research Centre, where technicians are trying to recover the lost forms of agriculture used by the Incas.
