Cusco.

"Hostel, trekking, Inca Trail, how long are you staying?" was what these young men shouted as I and the other tourists arrived to the bus terminal in Cusco. The bus ride was very pleasant and it feels like you are about to go on an unforgetable experience when you get to this old city. The Imperial City, they call it because it was the main city of the Inca Empire. The city where all of the world comes to walk or bus or train to the Macchupicchu, the mysterious city built by the Incas about seven hundred years ago with huge stones, on the altitude, away from the city, an agricultural center. Cusco, Macchupichu and the Inca trail form, definetely, a whole package for a tourist. Cusco, a modern city but is so rich in history. You can see Inca architecture and you also see Spaniard architecture on top of the incas´ buildings. This has a message, the message of the Spaniards "conquering" the Incas. Macchupichu, a calm and amazing city, a wonder of this world, a place where you want to try to explain how the Incas built this perfect place where everybody lived in harmony. So they say. The Inca Trail, a five day hike which has its highest point at 4,200 meters (13,700 feet) above sea level , a trail that was used by the Incas on their time and makes you fantasize about that era, and which ends at the climbing to the Machupichu.
The city of Cusco though has been invaded with tourist agencies, small and big restaurants, coffee shops, night clubs and pubs (huge parties at nights), and the mix of tourists (about 1,000 per day) and locals makes the city look unique. You also have local people, and often from other parts of Peru, working offering "anything" you want. It gets a little annoying when you walk on the streets and people that work on restaurants or tourists agencies pull you in to their stores to sell you something, but if you simply ignore them then you can walk away.
My idea was to trek but after visiting several tourist agencies I found out the Inca Trail needed to be reserved two months earlier. There are about five hundred people walking this trail everyday so they need to control and make this route safe for everybody. Of course, tourists can not spend two months in Cusco or come back whenever there is a spot for the Inca Trail, so the people like me that didn´t reserve in advance has other alternatives. Salcantay, Lares, two day Inca trail, all of them having the final point in Machupichu. They told me the Salcantay hike was a little hard, five day hike, camping, river crossing through cables, 4, 600 meters (15,091 feet) of altitude at its highest point, descent to the jungle and finally, on the last day, walk up for an hour to Machupichu before sunrise. Sold! The price 145 USD, transportation and food included, also the hostel accomodation the final night since the town of Aguas Calientes has no place to camp.
On sunday, one day before of going trekking, I decided to visit another uncle, Luis, who lives in Calca, a town one hour away of Cusco. Before reaching to Calca I stopped in Pisaq. Pisaq has a huge artesan market on sundays so I got off there and walked around. Typical ponchos , chuyos (those hats made of alpaca hair which are very warm and covers your ears as well), ceramics, food. I also witnessed one thief being brougth to the police station. The artesans go really hard on these guys since they take away business by scaring tourists away. I don´t buy stuff when I travel but like to walk around these places. Food is what I buy so I got some boiled corn. The kernels of these choclos (as the corn is called in Peru) are huge. http://www.perutravels.net/peru-travel-guide/art-gastronomy-corn.htm I continued then to Calca and stayed for the rest of the day with my uncle who knew I was coming because I left a message on his answering machine the night before. He doesn´t like to answer the phone. But he loves to talk about all sort of things since he is an oil and watercolor painter and used to travel around the mountains of Peru looking for good material to paint.
I went back to Cusco and didn´t go out that night since I was still a little tired from the night before when I went out and went back to the hostel around five in the morning. Besides I wanted to be fresh for the beginning of my five day hike next morning.