Unidentified meats and a festival

I had a bit of a lie in today and then wandered out around town to get some lunch. I ended up at Il Monasterio which is a very nice hotel. I was hoping to stay there, but they were full, so I ended up at a different hotel. Lunch was really nice. I had ceviche of snapper with corn and sweet potato. The fish is raw and then "cooked" by a citrus sauce. Very tasty. For a main course I had Goat confit with country "serrano" ham. The goat was very tasty - think crispy duck with pancakes for the texture of it. It came with a nice bean/corn mash.

After that I took a taxi up to Sacsayhuaman which is a nice inca ruin that overlooks the town of Cuzco. I'm glad I took the taxi because it was a LONG long way up. When I got up there there was some sort of festival going on. Apparently it was to commemorate the days when the military was divided into North, East, South and West and they used to meet to have competitions to see who was the best. I arrived for the tail end of it and wandered around with the locals. I bought myself a skewer of something from a hawker and couldn't actually find out what it was made from. I think it might have been Alpaca (like llamas) but I could be wrong. It had a really nice green chili sauce with it.

It seems I must look like a local even with my poor excuse for a tan, dark hair and my oriental-ish eyes as I hardly ever get approached to buy stuff unlike the rest of the tourists here!

Here are some more photos:

Looking down onto Cuzco with some of the performers

Down into the town square from Sacsayhuaman

Looking over the valley that Cuzco is in to the sign that's carved in the hillside

The statue of Christ up by Sacsayhuaman

Down into the town again

A couple of Alpacas

Some of the festivities

Old Incan foundations

In the courtyard of Il Monasterio

Again...

Out the front of my hotel

In the chapel at Il Monasterio