Dreamscapes Travel & Lifestyle

Winter 2015/2016

Dreamscapes Travel & Lifestyle Magazine

Issue link: http://read.dreamscapes.ca/i/606819

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F oraged roots and bark from the Amazon basin to Andean peaks infuse the cuisine of the capital Lima, transforming sea-level chefs into culinary superstars. Visitors, mean- while, are pulled like a magnet to the mountains, up 3,400 metres to wild west Cusco then down 2,453 metres, by rail or hike, to the mysterious Inca city of Machu Picchu, its brilliantly engineered stone tem- ples and terraced fields built in the 1400s and abandoned a century later. Spoiler alert: you'll get your selfie shot framed by mountains within five minutes of walking into the Inca sanctuary, unless Mother Nature decides to obliterate the background with cotton-batten clouds. Not good for photos, but it makes walking up and down the ancient stairways even more surreal. When the sun finally broke through at 9 a.m., we found ourselves in the midst of majestic green mountains looking way, way down to the Urubamba River. THE SACRED VALLEY Though Machu Picchu attracts the world—I sat beside a Brazilian man on the crowded bus up the mountain as backpackers chat- DREAMSCAPES WINTER 2015/2016 46 BEYOND MACHU PICCHU BY CYNTHIA DAVID IN PERU, ALTITUDE RULES.

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