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Discover riches in Peru’s original City of Gold
We were still two hours away, but we had a sense of what we had hiked to see. Across the ravine, a series of terraces had been excavated. Farther up the hill was another set of terraces, partially cleared but still with large clumps of trees.
Far above the terraces was the perfect helipad of the ushnu, "the sacred meeting place of Choquequirao," Ana said. And above that, joined by a neatly mown plaza on the ridge, was more of the site. Choquequirao was a giant Sudoku with only a handful of numbers penciled in. In comparison, Machu Picchu is a fully filled color-by-numbers.
"People have known about Choquequirao for centuries," Ana told me. "There was a French explorer in the 1800s. Before him there were Spaniards." Some say the city was built during in the mid-1400s and became the last refuge of the Incas a hundred years later. Others say that pottery found at Choquequirao show that it was inhabited hundreds of years earlier. Each visit by anthropologists and archaeologists brings a new theory. And yet Choquequirao gave off a whiff of inscrutability as we came around the bend.
There was something ethereal about Choquequirao as we walked out of the trees and onto the terrace leading to the ruin. There are a couple of town squares and a handful of stone buildings like the ones at Machu Picchu, with tapered doorways and niches and hooks for hanging lamps or securing roof thatching.
During the eight hours we wandered through the ruins, we saw two groups of six people in addition to the guardian of the site, perched with a paperback on the heights of the sacred ushnu with a view of anyone entering. That was all.
At five o'clock, the sun set at the far end of the valley, and we began the two-hour hike back to Marampata. As darkness fell, Rebecca and Ana strapped miner's lamps to their foreheads. I followed their beams and voices as closely as I could, feeling stupid not to have brought a lamp — as stupid, perhaps, as that bus driver the moment before he hit the rock that sent him and Nazario to their death.
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Suddenly the path opened up in front of us, bright as dusk. I found Rebecca and Ana standing in wonder, their lamps extinguished. The earth had breathed a thousand fireflies to light our way home. Choquequirao had brought me gold.
More information
The country code for Peru is 51. Prices quoted are for March 2009.
The best way to explore Choquequirao is to fly into Cuzco and then drive to the town of Urubamba. In Cuzco, tour operators can arrange trips to Choquequirao. Roger Valencia of Auqui Tours runs trips to all the famous sites in the Sacred Valley—Machu Picchu, Ausangate—as well as to other parts of Peru. A five-day hike to Choquequirao includes tents, cots, three-course dinners with wine, and transportation to and from Cuzco or Urubamba (84-261517; auqui.com; five-day hike, $800 per person with a four-person minimum).
The 30-room Hotel Sol y Luna, in Urubamba, is the luxury choice, with everything from massages to horseback rides to special feasts (84-201-620; bungalows, $200). The Sonesta Posadas del Inca, in Yucay, has 84 rooms, a colonial chapel, and even a ghost (84-20-1107; doubles, $160). Part of the Libertador chain and with a private train to Machu Picchu, the Tambo del Inka Luxury Collection Hotel is scheduled to open later this year in Urubamba.
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