Unfortunately, Cusco was a good 40-hour bus ride away. We asked around about some of the smaller villages along the way, and decided to split the long ride up into several segments, our first stop being the village of Lircay, 3-4 hours away along a small, bumpy dirt road. The excitement of the amazing mountain vistas along the way – peppered here and there by tiny villages or herds of llamas and alpacas - was mixed with a constant terror of the bus missing a turn and us plummeting off the narrow dirt road (with no guardrail) down the steep cliffs below. It was exhilarating and fatiguing at the same time. Lircay,
unfortunately, was not. It's a small, dirty town, and the people seemed more leery of us than curious. We were the only foreigners in town, as far as we could tell. After a day there, we did find the old center of town, which was much more appealing, and we did find some friendly locals as well, but by then we were ready to move on...
Talor: We were told by several people that Lircay was a very small, very pretty village not too far away. So we decided to give it a try and break up our long trip to Machu Picchu. A very bumpy 3 ½ hour bus ride (including a half-hour to fix a flat tire) later, we arrived in the late afternoon with a hotel recommendation from the tourist office in Huancavelica. Found the Hotel Arccara, which was very basic with two twin beds, but had a private bath (which we found out later is pretty rare in that village). It was none too clean, but for $10/night, what can you expect? Put our bags down and went to have a look around...
As usual, we got stared at by everyone, but this time, the vibe was a bit different, not as friendly. Walked around looking for the Plaza de Armas, usually the social center of each town where life revolves around, but found none. Then we realized that was what was missing. Instead, the center of town was made up of an assortment of shops and restaurants, and not too pretty, just dusty and drab. Wondered what all the rage was about and thought maybe this town is just too small. But we figured we were there so we should at least give it a chance.
The next day, asked around and found there was a Plaza de Armas. It was sev
eral kilometers away on top of a hill in a neighborhood called Pueblo Viejo (Old Village). Made up of ancient colonial houses and cobblestone streets, it was very pretty, and as always, we got carried away with our cameras taking way too many photos of old crumbling doorways and stone arches. At the Plaza, we got to see a really cute parade of school children dressed up in traditional clothes, and took more photos. Afterwards, we were spent... life on the road is tough! With not much to do or see after that, we decided to move on...
Our photos from Lircay can be found here:
http://picasaweb.google.com/erikandtalor/LircayPeru#
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