We visit Qorikancha, the old Inca temple, once known as the 'navel of the world', so central was it to the Inca world view. It is an impressive building, though not nearly as impressive as it once was. The temple complex was adorned with gold, as far as can be told through archeological investigation, more or less walls and ceiling. A huge gold depiction of the sun filled one whole wall of the sun temple, and there was a corresponding temple dedicated to the moon, being the bride of the sun, which was entirely decorated in silver. Throughout the grounds, gold sculptures of animals, and life sized depictions of men, women and children were scattered, which sounds so amazing as to cast aspersions on the exact truthfulness of documented accounts which claim this. However, archeological investigations recently have uncovered evidence that these chroniclers were not exaggerating. The Incas used precious metals a lot in their construction, but they had no monetary value, being of purely religious significance. I rather enjoy the idea that the most precious things were dedicated so solely to their Gods that they could not be of any worth to individuals as currency, though on the other hand I wonder if the concept of 'precious' may have been different.
Walking through the temple, imagining it as it once would have been is intriguing, and also saddening. The building as it stands now has been restored but its principle purpose is still to the Spanish Catholicism. Adorned with religious paintings, statues and information about saints, saints days and rosaries, alongside the old Inca stones and information on the Inca world view, and with the church building dominating the skyline I am a little sad that the two ways of life could not coexist more equally. The Inca temple was looted and the gold melted down into coins to send home to Spain by the Spanish conquistadors, where it did, very definitely, have a monetary value. The church was simply built on top of the old Inca walls and, oddly, when, in 1950, an earthquake destroyed the church, leaving the Inca ruins intact, even in the background of a resurgence of the value of indigenous culture, the church ignored suggestions to relocate it to leave the Inca site purely as an Inca building, and simply rebuilt over it a second time.
The rest of the day is taken up with the preparation for the start of our Inca trek. We have relocated to a hotel in town from which our group will start the trip early tomorrow morning. The hotel is apparently 'basic', though as usual we find that our definition of basic is different to others. It has hot water and heating and soap and toilet paper, our room is big (though twin rather than double - sex is frowned upon here, obviously) and we are given tea as we arrive. I would have said it was fairly luxurious, though a bit stiff and unfriendly. Give me a homestay any day. I am so grateful for the existence of AirBnB, which has allowed us to stay in such interesting places, with such warm and friendly people. Hot water and heating are secondary requirements.
We leave from the hotel to ho to a briefing at the offices for the tour company we will do the trek with. We hire a sleeping bag each and learn a bit about the next week. We will be climbing to 4200 metres at our highest point, most of that being done on day two, known as 'the killer'. Generally we walk between 7 and 8 hours per day, on hilly terrain, sometimes consistently uphill, sometimes down. Our 'porters' carry our strictly streamlined luggage (only 3 kilos each) and basically run ahead of us with tents and cooking equipment to set up camp before we arrive, when the cooks will whip up amazing food. It sounds amazing and painful in equal measure - and I really can't wait.
The only slight flaw on the horizon thus far is that the rest of our group seem to be a group of six or seven people who speak a language we can't even identify and show no special interest in breaking their group to talk with us. We look a little enviously at the other group, which seems to be composed of a much greater mixture of ages, and less of a pre-knit group.
I am looking forward to being proved wrong and to becoming best friends with the unknown language speakers by the end of the hike.
Watch this space.
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