City Tour Cusco

Detailed Itinerary

DAY 1: Cusco | Cathedral – Qoricancha – Sacsayhuaman – Q’enqo – Puca Pucara – Tambomachay

Highlight of the Day: Learning all about the ancient Inca culture and observing their incredible craftsmanship.

Touch Down in Cusco City and Explore the Sites.

Your exciting day out begins when we pick you up between 12:40 and 13:00 to begin the city tour. First off, we’ll visit the Cathedral in the Plaza de Armas—the main square of Cusco. Inside, you’ll enjoy a wide range of incredible paintings from Cusco’s School of Art—famous in all of South America—and gold leaf and embossed silver works.

Our next stop will be at Qoricancha, or Temple of the Sun, to appreciate its architecture and perfect stone constructions only seen in Inca temples of high importance.

We’ll then board our transport and head out of the city center to visit four highly significant Inca archaeological sites: Sacsayhuaman, Q’enqo, Puca Pucara, and Tambomachay.

At Sacsayhuaman, you’ll see the gigantic stones that have been perfectly carved. Q’enqo boasts areas of high religious importance. At Puca Pucara, you’ll observe an ancient military construction, part of Cusco’s ancient defense system. The final stop is dedicated to a water cult and has working fountains where water still runs to this day.

At the end of your city tour, we’ll take you back to your accommodation in the city at around 18:30. You’ll then have the evening free to spend as you please.

Below is a little more info about each site you’ll visit.

Qoricancha Sun Temple and Santo Domingo Convent
This hundreds of years old religious center was built to worship the sun, the most revered deity during the Inca Empire and what most of their culture was based around.

Inside the temple, you’ll find smaller temples dedicated to the sun, moon, stars, etc. To construct the site, the Incas used ashlar masonry, constructing upon the placement of similarly sized cuboid stones that they’d cut and shaped for this very purpose.

Outside the building are beautiful, regal gardens and fountains on the grounds of the monumental temple. You’ll find many pretty flowers as you walk along the paths. Here, the combination of the outstanding Inca architecture and the Spanish colonial architecture is what stands out the most.

Cusco’s Cathedral
Located in Cusco’s Main Square, the cathedral is a colonial monument of astounding artistic value. It was built on top of the Wiracocha Inca Palace and houses. Once inside, you’ll be able to observe works of carved wood such as the choir, pulpit and altars, beautiful paintings from the Cusquenian School of Art (including a Last Supper painting in which Christ and his disciples eat cuy—guinea pig!), and works of embossed silver and gold leaf.

Among all the 13 churches located in Cusco Historical Center, the Cathedral is one of the most important because it represents the mix of the Andean and colonial civilizations. The grand cathedral sits at the head of the Plaza de Armas—the historical and cultural heart of Cusco.

Sacsayhuaman
Located 2 km from Cusco center, this archeological site was built using enormous carved rocks joined with compelling precision—it’s almost unbelievable how they were able to engineer such incredible feats hundreds of years ago. From here, you can also enjoy a spectacular view of Cusco city along with the beautiful landscape formed by the surrounding mountains.

The site itself is composed of three overlapping platforms that stretch roughly 360 meters. In the construction, you can see stones as big as 9 meters tall. The most well-known part of Sacsayhuaman is its grand plaza and the adjacent three massive terrace walls. The stones used in the construction of these terraces are among the largest used in any building in pre-Hispanic America.

Q’enqo
Another 1.5 km from Sacsayhuaman is Q’enqo. This archaeological complex was an Inca ceremonial cult center. The name may have derived after the small yet intricate network of underground passageways that make up the site. It’s fascinating making your way through them all.

The most prominent feature of this site is an open space called the amphitheater. Hundreds of years ago, you would have found Inca mummies in the 19 trapezoidal niches found here. Today, the amphitheater is only half of its original height.

Puca Pucara
This site is known as the red fortress due to the reddish tints resulting from the vast amounts of iron in its rocks. Many experts believe that this fortress was perhaps an old Tambo that served both as a resting and guarding spot to protect Tambomachay. Here you can see some excellent examples of architecture, fountains, aqueducts, and several Inca enclosures.

Tambomachay
The final complex on your tour is made up of a combination of finely carved stones, waterfalls, and aqueducts that were constructed to carry water coming from nearby springs. Tambomachay is associated with the water cult for this reason. In front of this construction, there’s a tower that’s believed to have served as a guarding post and communication tower.