The Sacred Valley can be reached from Cusco in less than 70 minutes by car.
“What is so special about the Sacred Valley anyway?” people may ask. For anyone who gets out and explores the area on foot, or bike for that matter, they will soon understand the answer to that question!
The Incas thought the Sacred Valley was an impressive and holy place. As such, it is a place where many of their ruins are prominent features, strong and proud against the mountainous back-drop.
Most of the Sacred Valley ruins were built in strategic, agricultural or sacred places. Almost every smaller valley heading out of the Sacred Valley hosts something rare and unique.
On one side of the Urubamba river, just outside of the town of Urubamba, sit the Saltmines (or Salineras) of Maras. They offer the visitor a unique photographic opportunity, nestled into the Canyon, featuring a fascinating mix of colors.
Moray also offers something special to the visitor with its conundrum of concentric cylindrical terraces, which is very different to other Inca sites across the Andes. This is thought to have had an agricultural purpose, possibly test-farms but there are many other theories to the origins of this complex.
There are several ways to get to this wonderful place, it can be hiked or biked from the top to bottom!
As part of the trip Apus Peru clients have the choice to do some down-hill mountain biking through the specatular surrounds, to get you down to the Sacred Valley floor.
Here is one of our guides, Jose, showing Apus Peru trekkers around.
Many thanks to Thayer Allyson Gowdy http://thayergowdy.com/ and her partner for the great shots of this location from our Apus Peru ‘Shapes of the Past’ hike https://www.apus-peru.com/treks/shapes_past.htm that they took with us this year. We offer this hike on any day of the year, as well as a number of other one day hikes all within close reach of Cusco. For more information, please drop us an email at [email protected] . Happy Trekking!
