Machu Picchu
The Inca city on its ridge, at two thousand four hundred metres, never found by the Spanish.
Duration
4 hrs – 6 hrs
Best time
First slot of the day
Open
Every day
Entry price
To confirm
The site was built around 1450, probably as a residence for the emperor Pachacutec, and abandoned a century later at the time of the conquest. The Spanish never found it: which is why it is intact, when every other major Inca site was taken apart.
It sits on a ridge at two thousand four hundred metres between two peaks, with terraces that served for drainage as much as for growing — sixty per cent of the work is underground, in layers of stone and gravel. That invisible drainage is why it is still standing.
Getting there
Train from Ollantaytambo or Cusco to Aguas Calientes, then a twenty-minute shuttle up the switchback road. No road reaches the site directly.
What the price covers
timed-slot ticket compulsory, several circuits to choose from; rate and quotas to be checked on the official site
What to bring
- Swimsuit
Rules on site
Entry is on a fixed circuit and a named time slot, with passport, booked weeks ahead; the circuits do not show the same things, so choose before you buy. Huayna Picchu and Montaña are booked separately and in very limited numbers.
Other places in Cusco
- Plaza de ArmasThe Inca square turned colonial, with two baroque churches set on Inca walls.
SacsayhuamánTwo-hundred-tonne blocks fitted without mortar, above the city.
- San Pedro MarketAndean fruit, the morning juices and soup for a few soles.
Sacred ValleyPisac, Ollantaytambo and the Inca terraces along the Urubamba.