Urubamba, Peru

A 1:00am flight from Quito, Ecaudor took us to Cusco via Bogota to arrive just before midday. We had booked a bus online to get directly into the Sacred Valley 'capital' Urubamba to try and get acclimatised to the high altitude before inevitably taking on Cusco's altitude and more importantly - Machu Picchu.

We were lucky that we had spent time in Quito though, having been at a relatively high altitude before coming. Be aware, coming into Cusco can be a shock - we witnessed two ladies presumably in their thirties who were experiencing signs of altitude sickness in the immigration line just 30 minutes after landing. If you are concerned about altitude sickness, I would recommend taking precautions before making your trip to Cusco.

Despite being the only plane coming internationally, immigration still took over an hour to get through. Depending on the immigration officer you speak to they can be quite thorough on their questioning - just be aware.

After getting through immigration, we needed to get to the bus station that was taking us to Urubamba.

STAY ALERT HERE.

We didn't Peru was going to be super questionable from a scam point of view, especially having spent the last 3 months around South America, but we got scammed twice in the first 2 hours of being in Cusco. Firstly, getting a taxi that costs us $25 AUD for a 15 minute ride to the bus station despite telling us a much more reasonable price to get us in the car initially. Then, getting told to jump into the 'collectivo' van that we thought we had booked to Urubamba just to arrive in Urubamba and have the driver demand cash from us and tell us that the van we booked wasn't the same.

SO, some advice, if heading to Urubamba from Cusco:

- Take a marked taxi and pay before leaving (shouldn't be more than 20 soles)

- No need to book a collectivo or van prior, they have collectivo's leaving regularly from a particular street. They don't leave until the van is full, and it works out cheaper than the van tickets online.

We arrived in Urubamba around 2pm and headed to our accommodation Hostel Arcoiris Urubamba. It isn't signed very well, it took us a bit of walking up and down the street to find it, but eventually we found the doorbell beside the big red gate to get in. It's a decent family run hostel with large rooms, a shared bathroom that is outside but has hot showers. There isn't any cooking facilities but there is enough cheap food options in town that you don't need to necessarily cook to save money.

After a nap we headed for Om Asian Restobar, eating beautiful Chinese Peruvian dishes made by lovely locals. Would highly recommend eating there for a hearty meal, especially because it gets quite cold at night - such a perfect way to warm up, the Ramen Noodles are DELICIOUS!

Still wanting to take it easy we took the day to explore the city. The best way to keep costs low in a lot of the Sacred Valley (and most of South America to be honest) is to find the local markets and eat there morning, day and night if they are still open.

Not too many vegan or vegetarian options from the restaurants but with my partner being a polo-pescetarian we were able to find a store that's 'menu del dia' was a beautiful potato soup and a chicken and rice main. To save money we had just one between us and it was honestly more than enough.

We were in the mood for a museum so took a collectivo heading towards Calca and stopped at Museo Inkariy to explore the Inka history famous for creating the Sacred Valley what it is today.

We can highly recommend this museum! The way they have set it up with 8 buildings dedicated the growth of the Inka community through South America and into Cusco and the Sacred Valley was both engaging and interesting. It is designed with a mix of educational articles describing how the community ran and then artistically created life-size mimic's to connect you to the story that you have just read about.

An easy museum to explore solitary, as a couple or with your family - very kid-friendly. Not too big either that it gets boring. And, because it is dedicated to just the Inka's it is easy to stay on board throughout the whole museum - I find that a big museum dedicated to every aspect of humanity, science, philosophy, space and the rest of it can get quite overwhelming.

Excited to explore more of what the Sacred Valley had to offer we jumped into a collective headed towards Ollantaytambo and hopped off at Tarabamba Andenes (a small park) to take the path to the Salineras de Maras. The collectivo was just 3 soles each.

Getting off at the park we used the path for a 20 minute walk to the camino trail entrance leading to the salt mines. From there it is about a two kilometre hike to the salt mines. The treck for the first kilometre is mostly uphill and can get steep - we saw one of the local women have a small fall on her way back down, so we knew to be careful on our way back.

Along our way there was two small buildings explaining that there was a 20 soles entry fee to see the salt mines, however in both of those buildings there was no one there to collect our cash. So we got lucky I guess to see the salt mines for free.

The walk is truly worth it, the salt mines is a very breath-taking view. There is about 300 small pools that line the edge of the mountain. And, taking the camino trail you can damn near taste it you are that close - you could easily lean over and take a scoop, but thy don't look very appetising.

When we arrived there were groups of tourists coming and going who had taken trips from Cusco to see the salt mines. I imagine that the salt mines were amongst many of the stops those tourists had because I cannot imagine people paying to just go there. It is a great sight to see, but not worth a tour for.

If you're in Urubamba and a willing walker I would highly recommend the walk there. Don't bother taking a tour, unless there is multiple things to go and see with it. Hell, if you walk it like us you might get lucky and do it completely for free!

We were still in the mood to do something on our last day so we looked up some walks available around Urubamba. We visited the market again for a delicious early lunch, and then grabbed some small snacks - bananas, strawberries and chocolate - to head out for another walk.

We found what we thought were going to be some old Inka ruins called Chullpas de Yucay not too far from Urubamba just outside the neighbouring town Yucay.

The walk was about 45 minutes a small park Plaza Manco II where we spent about two hours reading our books, listening to music, chatting and eating some snacks. The days are usually a perfect temperature before it gets cold at night so it was easy relaxing in the park. We thought we felt some small drops of rain so we thought we would start walking the trail towards Chullpas de Yucay.

It is a lovely trail right next to a small stream of water connecting to the mountains, and we were joined by many locals taking a afternoon stroll or walking their dogs. We didn't see any ruins, but nonetheless I would recommend the walk if you are keen to get out for an afternoon but you don't want to spend money or go anywhere too far away.

It was the perfect way to spend our last day before heading to another town in the Sacred Valley.