Excursion Sicuani 2026

 Adventures around Sicuani! 

We are hosting a wonderful family: mother, father, 15-year old girl, and 14-year old boy. None of them have ever stayed in a hotel before, nor soaked in a hot springs.

(Note: cell phone blogging is challenging, and many of these pictures are duplicated and out of order. Have fun with it!)

Plaza central in Sicuani

Purging waters of San Pedro

The grounds are beautiful and the toilets clean. 

One drinks at least a dozen cups the this water. Poops until the poop is clear, and then done. Recommended is a glass of aloe vera juice followed by a broth-rich soup. 

Incan Spirits: Puma, land; Condor, air; Serpent,

Fountain of purging waters of San Pedro

Chemical analysis of purging waters (sort of like a colonoscopy prep)

Aguas Calientes, up in altitude from Sicuani

Mineral-rich hot water soothes the muscles; gives fun for play. The kids got a bit of swimming lessons  lake Titicaca is a bit too cold for serious swimming.

(These pictures are not in chronological order; too difficult to rearrange on my phone )

The Bonbonera Market in Sicuani

This is a HUGE market, covering several blocks on the street as well as covered areas.  Alicia especially wanted to buy som special seed corn and fava beans. They also found a good deal on bayeta, the natural wool fabric used to make traditional shirts on Taquile.

Mercado Bombonera 

Near our hotel is the Central Market, where we ate breakfast every morning and bought our treats a picnic supplies. 

Mercado Central, where we ate breakfasts

Raqchi, major Incan archaeological site

We hired a local Guide, and our good fortune was it was the same guide we had hired in the past, Denis. He is very experienced and told us good stories. Took our picture as a group. We had visited his father, who is a very competent potter, in previous years. (Note: More Raqchi continued after Tinta)

Entrance to Raqchi 

From the Mirador at Raqchi 

Tinta and the Tupac Amaru museum

The museum is a difficult and terrible part of Peruvian history when the Spanish conquerors inflicted torture and slavery on the indigenous people, and in particular their leader, Tupac Amaru , and his family. The museum consists of paintings telling the story and shows lots of blood and suffering. Afterward, to cheer ourselves up, we have ice cream and chicha in the main square.

Chicha and ice cream at Tinta

Sacos y sacos de maíz, Tinta

Tupac Amaru museum in Tinta

A small structure tucked in Raqchi

View of Raqchi from The Mirador

The Inca baths fountain (do not drink!)

The biggest wall at Raqchi 

The December Solstice hallway

The bus ride from Puno to Sicuani was 6 hours and over a 14,240ft (4340m) pass

Inside the food storage qolqas at Raqchi 

Excursion to Sicuani

Sicuani: hotsprings up the pass and ruins toward Cusco, plus healing waters

Silvano and Ruperta were totally busy last year as autoridades, and had no time to play, so we invited them, their two sons, Ivan and Clever, and Silvano's mother, Eufrasia, to join us for our annual excursion. Sicuani is ideally located just off the Altiplano and over the pass toward Cusco, in Cusco Province. In one direction are delicious hot springs, and in the other is the archeological site of Raqchi. A museum to honor and tell the story of the last Inca, Tupac Amaru, is nearby in the town of Tinta, and the purifying waters of San Pedro are also available.

Hot Springs were our primary goal:
A line of taxis are always ready to take patrons to the Aguas Calientes about 20 minutes south of Sicuani, where outdoor pools of many temperatures are available.

That's Samuel in the blue hat

I spoke up to some splashing boys with some swimming lesson tricks, such as "Take a breath IN when your face is out of water. Blow your breath OUT when underwater." Pretty basic stuff, but children don't often have swimming lessons and many are fearful in the water. Later, a young girl, maybe age 12, who had seen me with the boys, actually came up to me and asked me to teach her to swim! We worked on breathing, and kicking and some standard strokes. She got a LOT more relaxed and later I saw her teaching her little sister about blowing bubbles. So much fun!

The other hot springs in the area are higher up the pass, and we had to contract the taxi to take the group there and pick us up. We had a lovely woman taxi driver who took a lunch break as we soaked and it all worked out. 

The mineral deposits above the springs were a beautiful golden yellow:

Clever in front of the mineral deposits

Water seemed to boil at the source, with Silvano.

The pools were inside, which gave us paleskins a sunburn saving grace. The water was hot enough to need to get in and out to thermal regulate. The whole family fit in the private pool.

Ahhhhhhhh

The Raqchi archeological site is an important one:

It is an important stop along the long Inca highway between Cusco and Puno and includes the most skilled Incan rockwork. 

A small detail that we appreciated was how protruding rocks in a rock terrace served as a ladder:

See how one terrace leads to the next.

Natually, the ladder made a nice family portrait.

The most prominent structure is the Temple of Wiracocha, an enormous rectangular two-story roofed structure that measures 92 metres (302 ft) by 25.5 metres (84 ft). 

In front of the Temple of Wiracocha

This long "hallway" is oriented exactly to the summer solstice of December 21.

A hike to the viewpoint high above shows the whole layout, including the Temple and the hallway.

Naturally, Samuel couldn't pass up a good wind to fly his rainbow kite, with Eufrasia's rainbow manta in the background

The Museum of Tupac Amaru 

In the village of Tinta, just a few kilometers beyond Raqchi, is a tribute to the last Inca, tortured and killed by the Spanish Conquistadores. 

We enjoyed fresh Chicha (fermented quinoa drink) when we first arrived in Tinta.

Tina is also famous for this stone arched bridge from Inca times.

stone arch bridge; one arch eroded

 Early in his life Jose Gabriel Tupac Amaru traveled the vast Incan Empire, trading goods. During these travels, he also saw the cruelty of the Spanish Conquerers.

Eventually, the Spanish famously tied his legs and arms to horses to pull him apart in the central plaza in Cusco. This failed to kill him and they cut off his head.

It's a gruesome tale, but an important one for Peruvian History.

Healing waters of San Pedro

A fountain of deep spring water contains purging minerals. The Taquileños place lots of confidence in the power of this process and Eufrasia wanted to do it. None of the rest of the family was interested, so I joined her. It's a lovely park and people sit around drinking and then running to the squat toilets. Everything is very clean, with buckets of water flushing everything away.You can pay a little extra for sitdown toilets.

fountain

chemical analysis

Gardens and sculptures

Our vacation in Sicuani was full of laughter and education and relaxation. What a pleasure to share this with our Taquileño family!

Vacation!

Excursion around Sicuani 

Sicuani has hot springs in one direction, the Raqchi archeological site and healing waters in the other direction. The city itself harbors few tourists. We brought three Taquile young Taquile friends with us. Juana is our goddaughter and hasn't been on an excursion since she was a child. Delfin also hadn't been on any of our excursions except many years ago to Silustani. Kusi had been to Sicuani with her family and us two years ago, but since she is starting college next month; a vacation seemed like a good start.

Juana got some free postcards at the museum.

The central plaza even has palm trees.

Sicuani has a pleasant central plaza with lots of plants

Sam and Delfin relax in front of a Palm Tree

The city has painted murals

We visited the Incan archeological site of Raqchi, a sacred place for Viracocha. 

We hired the same Local Guide, Denis, as two years ago.

Stone steps built into the wall of a terrace

We climbed to the mirador-viewpoint high above the ruins for an overview.

On part of the trail was like a bower, a tunnel of lush plant growth.

Girlfriends in the bower

It even had purple mushrooms!

The long corridor is oriented to correspond with the December (summer) Solstice:

Juana and Kusi wash at the Inca fountain for women

The Town of Raqchi is a town of potters. Denis's father is a skilled potter and was working on some commissions for various museums in Cusco. His pots are beautifully finished and all hand-built without a potter' wheel.

Church in the town central of Raqchi

The San Pedro natural cleansing waters are for drinking and diarrhea. It is rather like that medicine one takes before a colonoscopy. The Taquileños place quite a bit of credit to the healing powers of this process, so Delfin, Kusi and I decided to go for the experience. Delfin was an old pro, having come here a couple of times, but Kusi and I struggled. The grounds are quite lovely with fountains and beautiful gardens.

For the chemists, the following is the analysis of this water, of which we drank about 20 cups, until our diarrhea came out clear.

San Pedro Eye Bathing is a different set of water where one places open eyes in the water to bathe them. Sam compared it to his antihistamine eye drops. It stings quite a bit so you only leave your eyes in the water for a moment. Afterward, my eyes felt quite relaxed.

The Town of San Pedro was lovely, with this statue in the main square

Tupac Amaru Museum