Monday, March 12, 2012

Exploring Chinchero...

Ok, so onto our week of adventuring... First stop, Chinchero.

Chinchero is a village about 30kms from Cusco that is know for its Sunday market (primarily a locals market - not so tourist oriented as some) and its textile workshops.

Mum and I set off early (Dad, Zac and Milka would meet us later in the day) in search of our accomodation - Succes!!  To get there we took a taxi into the Centre of Cusco and then Mum took me meandering through the streets until we stumbled (well - it felt like it to me... Mum knew where she was going!) on a bus station.  As we neared the bus station I man was outside touting for business.  I walked right past him, but it seemed he had a "collectivo" that was going our way and so Mum had arranged a price (and we were directed towards the vehicle.  Collectivos are like small buses with about 12 seats.  They don't seem to leave on schedule but rather when they are full.  So we hopped onto the collectivo and waited about 15 minutes for the remaining seats to be filled and off we went.





30 minutes later we arrived in Chinchero and found our accomodatin (and Mum found a friend too!).  It was a lovely place - very colourful!!


Pleased with our success (at finding the hostel and seeing that it looked good) we ventured out for a walk to see what we could see and stumbled upon a textile workshop where a group of people were demonstrating weaving, knitting, spinning with a spindle and had a display of natural dyed wool and the dyestuffs. 






We might just have supported the local economy as well.... the ladies were very persuasive! :-D


Before we did too much damage, Zac, Milka and Dad arrived and off we set again, to find more textile workshops (with a lady very keen to give a demonstration of natural dyeing)...



...and explored the town and the ruins a bit.






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