3 Days in Cusco: Peru's Most Sacred City (Best Travel Guide)

This is so cool. As I slog up another cobblestone street, more than 11,000 feet high, attempting to catch my breath, I stop and look out over the city below at a place where ancient Incan history and Spanish influence sit side by side. We're here Quechua spoken as often as Spanish, and we're seeing an alpaca feels nearly as common as spotting a pigeon. So I just want a baby alpaca now. And I start to wonder how could anyone not fall in love with a place like this? Because if there's one city in Peru that is sure to sweep you off your feet, it would without a doubt be Cusco. And yet most visitors barely give it the time it deserves. Dubbed the gateway to Machu Picchu, Cusco often becomes just a stop along the way. But today we're showing you why this city deserves far more than that. From incredible food and fascinating history to the experiences that make Cusco one of Peru's most unforgettable places. Subscribe to join us as we show you how to have the perfect trip to Cusco city. Our journey to the Incan capital city began with a short hour and a half trip from Lima to Cusco international. From there, we held a cab to Siete Torritos, a boutique hotel nestled in the hills of the historic Centro. Around a hundred dollars a night got us a charming, comfortable stay with breakfast included. Just a short walk from the Plaza de Armas and Cusco's most popular attractions. As much as we wanted to lie down and surrender to the effects of altitude, we knew a light meal was precisely what we needed. For our first meal in Cusco, we're going light. It's a recommendation as you acclimate to the altitude, not to eat anything that's super heavy because shockingly at elevation, your digestion does not work as fast. So soup today, and this one is the quinoa soup, which is one of the very popular and typical Andean soups. Nice and light, really flavorful, like a veggie broth. And Dennis got something called dieta de pollo, which is like chicken broth soup with chunks of chicken in it, a little bit of noodle and more veggies. Again, something very light to help you acclimate. They also serve it with this Andean bread and an amazing salsa. Yummy. Oh, hi. Hi little one. Hi baby. Oh my God. I love it so much. I just want a baby alpaca now. Cusco is known by many names, the gateway to Machu Picchu, the Imperial city and even the Puma city because the original Incan layout resembles a Puma when viewed from the air. But the Incas themselves called it Cusco, meaning navel of the earth. Constructed under the ruler Pachacutec, Cusco became the capital of the sprawling Inca empire, serving as a hub for communication, government, important ceremonies, and where the Incas believed the three realms of the Andean cosmos converged. We joined a walking history tour to dive deeper into Cusco's complex past, leading us through the plazas and neighborhoods as locals move through daily life. The Incas were master dry stone masons and civil engineers transporting enormous boulders from far away quarries, fitting each stone together with such precision that not even a piece of paper can fit between them. They use no chisels or mortar, yet somehow these interlocking stones have managed to outlast massive earthquakes and defy every theory as to how the Incas accomplished such perfection. When the Spanish arrived in the 1500s, the city's golden artifacts were plundered and many Incas were killed, but they didn't stop there. They destroyed what they could of the original temples to build the charming colonial city you see today directly on top of what was mighty Cusco. But the evidence of just how advanced Inca megalithic construction was can still be seen in the base of nearly every building in the city. Talk about a beautiful place to finish our tour. That walking history tour was awesome. Definitely start your trip with this because it gives you the context and the history of Cusco, which is so much deeper than I ever imagined. It was about two and a half hours and we walked a huge part of the city. I'm feeling a little bit of that altitude sickness. I'm getting a little bit of the headache. I had a hard time sleeping last night, but yeah, we're acclimating poco a poco. I think at this point, we are going to go grab a local lunch at one of the markets we learned about on our tour today. So San Blas market isn't quite as popular as San Pedro, but this is a great spot to grab a local breakfast lunch. It's open every day until 4pm and there's so many different restaurants that you can visit. We ended up getting empanadas. So we have one with aji de gallina, which is a very typical Peruvian dish. And we got lomo saltado with alpaca you could eat here every day and still be trying something new. Their dessert here looked really good. So we ended up getting a cheesecake elderberry on top. Falco is what they call it here. Elderberry is like super good for you. Really high in antioxidants, vitamin C. So being healthy, right? We also got a quinoa cookie. Quinoa is harvested and comes from Peru. They've been eating it for thousands of years. You'll find it in soups, breads, cookies, beer, beer. This is so yummy. It has chocolate chips in it. Pretty much all of Cusco is stunning, like sweep you off your feet. Gorgeous. But the San Blas neighborhood perched high among the hills is particularly colorful with great spots for dining and shopping. What'd you do? The shopping here is outrageous. Outrageous. We have gotten so many things, sweaters, bags, jewelry, socks, hats. It's like everything you could ever want. Come with money for spending. We're buying more, getting an ornament for our Christmas tree. The artistry here is amazing. You're actually seeing them work when they're out selling. This isn't just like mass produced items. There are a lot of stores that have some more mass produced items, but a lot of it's still handmade. They're just using the same designs between different stores, but they told us that this market's only here on Saturday. At least that's what they said during our visit. So if you want, come to the San Blas Plaza on Saturday and you'll get something original. The weather in Cusco is super fickle because of its high elevation, the mornings and evenings. It's super cold. You definitely want a light jacket and a sweater, but in the daytime when the sun comes out, it gets really hot, which makes packing for this trip really tricky. We're in Peru for three weeks. So we wanted to pack clothing that we could wear in multiple destinations that was comfortable, lightweight, layerable, and most importantly, odor resistant, which is where Unbound Merino shines. Merino wool is not only odor resistant, but it's temperature regulating and resistant to wrinkles, making it perfect for trips like this. I'm literally on day three of wearing this shirt and I still smell fantastic. Unbound Merino has become our favorite wool clothing brand because they have such versatile styles like their women's travel button down, which looks just as good at afternoon tea in London as it does in the streets of Peru and everyday staples like their men's crew neck tees, which is great for layering. Dennis has worn his Unbound travel pants every single day so far. And despite not washing them for 14 days, they still fit and look amazing. If you travel often, Unbound Merino is worth the investment. You'll pack less, re-wear more, skip the concept laundry and stay impressively fresh. Scan the QR code on the screen or use the link in the video description below and get 10% off your first order as a new customer and start feeling the difference the second you start packing. With the altitude effects finally catching up with my body, I made a last ditch effort to revive myself with some coffee at Florencia y Fortunata, a woman owned and run coffee shops who are seeing specialty coffee beans from female farmers throughout the Andes. I can't even lie to you. We're struggling, particularly me. The altitude has gotten worse every single day for me. It started just feeling a little bit funny, you know, out of breath, maybe a little bit of a headache, but the coca tea was enough to kind of keep it at bay, but I'm barely, barely making it. I can't sleep at all. I've had a terrible headache at night. I just feel so tired and fatigued. I've been doing everything they recommend. We've been using Element to stay hydrated, which is an electrolyte pack. I've been drinking so much water, staying away from alcohol. I think maybe we're just walking so much as we try and explore because it's just such a beautiful place and I just want to see and do it all. I think we're not taking enough breaks. My advice to you is maybe consider if you're nervous about altitude sickness, talking to your doctor beforehand and getting some medicine so that it can kind of keep it at bay or possibly right when you arrive to Cusco, go straight to Ollantaytambo and then do Aguascalientes and then come to Cusco and acclimate because it's all lower elevation than where we're at right now. I kind of wish we would have done that because you live and you learn. I'm struggling. So we're right now at a gorgeous coffee shop, just down the street from our hotel. I'm hoping the coffee will bring me back to life so we can at least explore a little bit today. We got a cinnamon roll inspired by a chai latte. And we got pan de queso, which is made from yucca flour. We can do this shadows. We can do this. And how do you guys like my swagger? We're in the Plaza de Armas right now, which is the largest plaza in Cusco in the center of town. And it's like the hub for the city. There's always something going on in the evenings. It's beautiful with all of the lights scattered throughout the hills and for the last two nights we've actually seen people dancing, practicing for traditional festival or parade. I don't know, but it's been cool to see like the families gathering. There's always dogs running through the grass playing and street vendors are very persistent here. They're not pushy, but persistent. It's also like the hub for exploring. You can go almost any direction from here and it feels like you're in a completely different new area of Cusco. We've spent the last two days fully exploring and every time we turned on a new street, I'm like, how have we not seen this yet? It's amazing. It looks so much better already. So you shouldn't have said no to all those other guys, huh? No. Cause it was made for him. Yep. You're waiting for the right dude. After our shoes shine, we decided not to overdo it in the streets and stepped into the museum of pre-Columbian art, a beautiful space dedicated to the artwork and cultures of ancient Peru. The Incan empire may have been Peru's largest and most recent imperial power, but Peru's story stretches back far beyond the Incas. Archeological evidence shows many distinct civilizations lived throughout the different regions of Peru as early as 250 BC. As we walked through the museum, we began to see how each civilization left its own mark behind. Clay pots and storage vessels, carved wooden totems, funeral masks, jewelry, and burial offerings. Each reveals something about the people who made them, their environments, beliefs, traditions, and how generations built upon the knowledge of those who came before them. It feels so good to have a salad. The food in Peru has been outstanding, truly such an underrated culinary country. And we've been really impressed with Cusco, but a lot of it's been like very heavy on the meat and the same few vegetables over and over again, like Papas or Aji. So to have like just greens, fiber, very welcome right now. This spot Organica is so cute. It's a farm to table restaurant. They're sourcing all their ingredients in two different locations around the Cusco region, which is really cool. They have a lot of the traditional dishes that you might want to try while you're here. Today we've gotten the grilled alpaca and they put it with gnocchi. They still love fish in Cusco, but since they're so far from the ocean, they eat a lot of trout. So today I've gotten a grilled trout. The sauce is a little fruity, which is nice, but the trout is so tender. It's good gnocchi. I'm going to get a side of gnocchi just for me. We've tried other dishes with alpaca, including an alpaca burger. Alpaca tacos are also a thing here. So you can kind of choose how you want to have your alpaca. This one's in a red wine sauce. The sauce is really savory and the alpaca honestly tastes very similar to a lean steak. I got more gnocchi. A short walk outside the historic center, a different side of Cusco emerges. Busy streets filled with locals going about their daily lives without the facade of high-end boutiques and tourist focused restaurants anchored by the bustling Mercado de San Pedro. San Pedro market is the heart of the neighborhood where locals can find everything they could want or need. As you weave your way through the aisles, you'll find affordable food stalls, produce stands stacked with some of the 3000 different Peruvian potatoes, mountains of cheese and handmade goods around every corner, making it a Mecca for souvenir shopping. Finally feeling like some semblance of myself after drinking more water than I thought was even possible. We ventured into one of Cusco's best examples of its layered and complex history, Coricancha. Today, you see the beautiful Spanish Santo Domingo church, but in the 1400s during the height of Inca rule, this would have been the temple of the sun. It was a spiritual heart of the Incan empire and the tale of the Puma in the Puma city. Coricancha was where the Inca elite came to pay homage to Inti, the sun god, the most important deity in Inca culture. The Incas weren't just remarkable architects. They were also incredible astronomers. Coricancha was the physical nucleus of the Inca spiritual, social and political universe. From here, the empire radiated outward in the four cardinal directions linked by pilgrimage lines to other sacred sites called Huacas. It was designed to reflect the sun's rays with the surrounding walls crowned by thick gold bands and a garden full of golden statues. When the Spanish arrived, they quickly looted the temple of all of its gold and deconstructed what they could of the structure. In its place they strategically built a Catholic convent above the ruins. It wasn't until a massive earthquake in 1950 exposed sections of the original foundation that conversations began around restoring and recognizing its Incan past. Sadly, nearly all of the Inca's recorded knowledge was destroyed during the conquest, leaving only fragments behind. The more we explored this region of Peru, the more we realized how little is truly known. We heard different stories with competing theories, depending on who we asked. But the truth is no one can say with complete certainty exactly what these sacred places once looked like, how the structures of the scale were built with such precision, or truly how much ancestral knowledge has been lost to the conquest. It made us think about how the destruction of culture doesn't actually erase it. It simply leaves the generations thereafter, searching for answers that will never be fully understood. That feeling stayed with us as we headed uphill, high above Cusco to Sacsayhuaman, the head of the Puma city. Hi, I'm struggling. I'm not going to lie. We didn't do rainbow mountain or Siete Lagunas or Humtai lake, which are all very, very popular day trips from Cusco. You have to wake up at like three 30 in the morning, drive really far. They're at super high elevation, but they're supposed to be absolutely stunning. So if you're fit and you're really interested at the end of your trip, you can add that on. It's truly bucket list experience if you're coming to Cusco. But because I had such a hard time at the beginning of the trip with the altitude, I did not want to do those. So we did this thinking it would be easier and I'm over here panting. I'm pretty sure it is easier. I do think I've caught my breath. You ready to keep going? Sure. This is incredible. This view is insane. You can see all of Cusco, all of it. Yeah. We thought we had a good view from our room, huh? I know. Our hotel was actually very close to the walking path. I think it was like a seven minute walk to get to the entrance where you go up all the steps. So that was really nice that we were already so close up the hill. Historians and archeologists say this was a fortress or an armory to store military weaponry. But others we spoke with, including a local guide who was born and raised in these mountains told us this was a sacred place for ceremonies and rituals. It's also believed to have been an astrological observatory. A 65 foot astronomy tower once stood here used to observe the sun's position between equinoxes and solstices. One thing is for sure though, the megalithic stones used to build Sacsayhuaman are an engineering marvel brought here from a quarry over 12 miles away. The construction took thousands of workers over 50 years to complete. We just learned that this is the largest rock in the entire main plaza. It weighs 120 tons. For reference, the largest elephant can weigh up to seven tons. That's like a lot of elephants. This one is crazy how it's curved. Literally it has one, two, three, four, five, six, seven points with this massive curve. It is incredible to think about how they constructed this. Today, only around 40% of the structure remains. The rest was demolished to build modern Cusco during the colonial era. We thought we saw some big ones earlier. This is enormous. We're standing in their like main plaza, which is enormous as well. I think it's double or three times the size of a traditional football field. It's huge. And the only reason these stones still stand here is because they were too big for the Spanish to deconstruct. This site is huge and while you can DIY your experience, I highly recommend hiring a local guide to help you explore the various areas, including a small portion of the Chinacanas, a massive network of subterranean passages that spread from Sacsayhuaman to other sacred sites throughout Cusco and possibly far beyond. Oh, this is so cool. We're inside one of the temples of Sacsayhuaman and it is so dark in here. Supposedly there's tunnels throughout all of the Incan territories that would link all back to Cusco. I believe it. I wonder if this is what it felt like. I mean, I can stand up completely in here. It's crazy. Wow. Exploring Sacsayhuaman is worth it any time of year, but if you can align your visit with Inti Raimi, the Incan festival of the sun held every June 24th, you'll get to see this ancient site come alive during the second largest festival in South America. As the sun faded behind the Andes on our final night in Cusco, it felt like the perfect excuse to slow down and enjoy one last meal before moving on to the next chapter of our journey in Peru. Just down the hill from our hotel, we found Loco Bistro, a small relaxed bistro with a global menu inspired by the owner's travels. We started with creamy polenta made from local chocolate with cheese and roast beef. This dish is just too good. We ordered it the other night and had to get it again. There's beef that's been stewed for over eight hours at the bottom. It's not the prettiest dish, but I promise the flavor is outstanding. Then Nikkei bites, crispy shari, trout dredged in sriracha mayo, Nori and togarashi with a house Nikkei sauce. I love it. It's like crunchy rice on the bottom and that beautiful Nikkei sushi feeling to the top. And it's with trout, which is fun because we're so far from the ocean here. Sometimes ordering fish seems a little bit scary because we're close to lots of lakes. Trout. It's a safe bet. It's a delicious bet. For the main course, we split their trout beurre blanc with Peru's famous asparagus and a puree of potatoes. The trout is cooked perfectly. The beurre blanc is a little bit different than I'm used to. It has less butter, a little bit more acidity, but it's very good. Capers on top. I love everything that has potatoes. I could just have potatoes here. And he's so happy. I'd be enormous and probably be protein deficient, but very happy. I'm done. I can't do anymore. Okay, now I'm going to eat. Yeah. Spooking the llamas. Spooking them for the gram. Didn't work out.