We left early this morning for a 90-minute flight (vs. a 20-hour bus ride!) to Cusco, the capital of the Incan Empire, whose name means “navel” (as in “the belly button of the Incan world”). While our lungs strove to adapt to the thin air (Cusco is at 11,200 feet above sea level, twice as high as Denver), we toured the area around the main plaza, had lunch, visited the Koricancha (the ‘Vatican’ of the Incan Empire), and that evening heard a lecture on Andean spirituality.
Willy, our coordinator for trips and service assignments, leads the students through the ancient streets of Cusco, the Inca capital.The city is crowded with tourists in June, the month of various festivities for the winter solstice.Wherever we go for meals, they have to line up many tables.As seen on the right, many walls in the city center date from Incan times.The biggest hit at this open market were the alpacas.An alpaca gets a personal treat from Josh, the son of Maria and Doug volunteering this year with Mennonite Mission Network in Ecuador. Fellow MMN’er, Seth (at right), also joined the group for the week of traveling to Machu Picchu.Students take notes on paper or smart phones as our guide explains at the Koricancha that this was the central religious building of the Incan empire.Jordan is standing on a stool and radiantly beaming because …… she sees how the Incans made these windows align perfectly.Note how the Incas seamlessy repaired the chip in this block with a small, perfectly shaped stone.The Incas had placed gold panels around the top of the walls. On the right half of the photo is the church the Spanish built on and around the Incan temple.The church has not withstood earthquakes over the last 500 years as the Incan walls have.The diorama shows how the original temple would have looked.The painting represents how the Incas placed religious sites on lines radiating out from the Koricancha.
