About:

Last weekend I went and visited an Incan archeological site called Moray with my good friend Jen “Mama Duck” Megee.  The site is located about 50km outside of Cusco near a village called Maras.  The Incan ruins here are super interesting because the terraces have a circular design and the irrigation system is very sophisticated.  At the site I saw three of these terraces, and the biggest one is about 30m deep.  While not certain, it is believed that these terraces were used by the Incans as an agricultural experiment station to test the effects of different climate conditions on a variety of crops. (1)

Getting There:

There are many different ways to get to Moray, including going with a tour company, renting bikes, or just driving yourself.  To save money, Jen and I decided to take a different route…  we got up early Sunday morning and made our way to Ave. Grau in Cusco where we found a collectivo headed for a town called Urubamba.  The trip cost us S/. 6.00 each, or less than $2.00 per person.  The ride was very scenic, and led us through the Sacred Valley and past another small town called Chinchero which has some really nice markets and hiking, too.

About fifteen minutes before arriving at Urubamba we got off at a bus stop near a town called Maras.  Standing seemingly in the middle of nowhere, we found ourselves across the street from a number of taxi drivers offering to bring people on tours of Moray and nearby Salineras (the Salt Flats) for a negotiable fee. It is possible to walk to Moray from the bus station, but it would probably take over an hour and would not include Salineras; so instead, we agreed to give the taxi driver S/. 20.00 each, or a little less than $8.00 per person, to drive us to Moray, then to Salineras, and finally back to the bus station.

Getting Back:

From the bus station on the side of the road near Maras it is possible to get busses back to Cusco; however, the busses are often full of people as they are coming from the Urubamba bus terminal.  Our alternative was to split a taxi to Urubamba (about S/. 10.00 each), explore the city, grab some lunch, and then catch a bus to another small town called Pisaq (S/. 2.50 each) where we enjoyed their Sunday artisanal market.  From Pisaq you can take another collectivo back to Cusco for anywhere from S/. 3.50 to S/. 5.00 per person.

Overall Impressions:

This was a really nice day trip.  The archeological site at Moray is pretty impressive and certainly worth the S/. 15.00 entrance fee.  Not only that, it was fun to cruise around the Sacred Valley all day long and get out of the city of Cusco for a while.  The scenery is incredible and the price very reasonable… about S/. 55.00 for all transportation and entrance fees. I will definitely being going back again.

Bibliography:

1)      “Moray (Inca Ruin).” Wikipedia. Wikimedia Foundation, 18 July 2014. Web. 22 July 2014.