We went down to the markets in Aguas Calientes, our first opportunity to shop for souvenirs during the trip. Since I haven't travelled much, I'm not used to the bartering that goes on so I watched Sharon do her stuff as she was much more experienced than I. I was totally laughing as this was a side of her that I'd never known, she's a hard bargainer!
We mostly went to check out the stuff to see what they had as Boris and Yvette (our tour guide from Cuzco) said the markets here were a bit more expensive than in Cusco where we would be staying tomorrow night. I bought a few things, but one of the things I wanted the most were the cotton pants (kinda look like pajama bottoms) that Kate had told us about (she has them on in the picture at camp from Day 1 of the hike). They looked so comfy, pants to change into and just hang out in after work. Many of the vendors had the exact same stuff (I'm sure they buy all their stuff from the same factory to re-sell), it was just a matter of price. I ended up buying a few pairs of the pants for 20 Soles (about $7 US), they started out telling us 30 Soles. The pants were so comfy I ended up getting another pair in Cusco, but paid 18 Soles. Oh well. It's actually pretty funny that you sit there and bargain with these vendors and it turns out to be only a few dollars, part of the game I guess.
It was totally funny to watch Sharon as she would just walk away, didn't know she could be so hard core. One lady ended up chasing her halfway down the sidewalk lowering her price. Too funny. I decided not to buy much here because I didn't have enough room in my pack and because we had to carry both backpacks and daypacks, I thought it would be best to wait until we got back to Cusco to shop.
In the afternoon, we were scheduled to take the train (Peru Rail) back to Oyllantaytambo. Luckily, the train station was only a few blocks away from the hotel; important for us, as we were our own porters now! The train ride was about an hour and a half and we were met by a bus who drove us back to our hotel in Cusco where we had stayed our first night. We arrived back to Cusco by about 5:30pm. Here's a picture of Sharon and I as we were leaving for the train station....
Here's a picture of some of the scenery on the bus ride from Ollantaytambo to Cusco. 
From there, we did some shopping at the markets in Cusco. Then hiked up to the Main Square for dinner which was paid by the tour company as compensation for not having a transfer for us to get us from the airport to the hotel when we had arrived in Cusco earlier in the week. So the 10 Soles we paid for a taxi ($3 US) earned us a free dinner in a nice restaurant, who got the better end of that deal? We did a little more shopping in the main square where some of the nicer shops were and had a really nice dinner, then headed back to the hotel for the night.
Tomorrow we start to our journey home...
No comments:
Post a Comment