Mountain Biking to Morray and Maras

A farmer plows his fields with his oxen, the Andes towering over him, shrouded in mist as they stand like eternal sentinels over the fertile plains.

               Working in Loki is great. It has been an awesome experience, but it also has a way of sucking you in and you soon forget there is an outside world that doesn't consist of drunk Australians and blood bomb drinks. With this in mind, I booked myself a mountain biking tour (my haggling skills getting me such a low price that my guide was sullen with me all day haha). The tour was 5 hours along the rural area outside of Cusco, stopping at the archaeological site of Moray and the famous salt mines of Maras. Although the weather would be a gamble as it always is during the rainy season, I thought it would be good for the soul to get out a bit!
              We got our bikes and checked them out early in the morning, and everything looked fine. After everyone was ready, we hopped on and zipped downtown to hop on a collectivo bus out to the starting point... It was then, just too late, when I found that my back brakes did not work so well. By this I mean, I had to use all the force I had to get them to slow me at all, and complete stoppage was out of the question. Oh well. How important could rear brakes be when mountain biking in the worlds second highest mountain range?
We squeezed the 6 of us into a four seater taxi, roped our bikes to the roof, and 30 extremely uncomfortable minutes later we were dropped off at a fork in the road. With sunny weather, we started off through a small village before turning onto a country dirt road. It wound its way through beautiful green fields where children kept watch over flocks of grazing sheep and cattle. The rain caught up to us a bit and we sped up, getting to our first destination ahead of anything serious.
                We arrived at the Moray archaeological complex. In short, its a huge series of concentric rings cut into a natural bowl in the earth. Made by the Incans, it functioned as a laboratory to help create different strains of potatoes and corn by planting them at varying altitudes. We went down and walked a bit of the stoneworks, before climbing back up and heading off to the town of Maras.
          Maras is a small town famous for its proximity to the two sites I was touring... beyond that its nothing spectacular to behold. We stopped in the main square for a quick snack, before the rain caught up and pushed us onward again. We wound down the sides of a steep canyon until we caught our first glimpse of our second destination. The Maras salt mines.
              These mines were important to the Incans, who used the salt to cure meat before transporting it to their jungle strongholds like Macchu Picchu. Now, each family in Maras has a single plot from which they can harvest salt by diverting the salty water coming from the mountainside onto small plots where it forms pools. When the sun has done its work, a thick layer of pure salt is left behind. The families scrape this and sell it in town. After a quick tour and explanation we hopped back on our bikes and headed on down the canyon.
                     After crossing several streams the Urabamba river, we caught the main road to the town of Urabamba. From there we split the cost of a taxi, making it home just as the sun was setting over Cusco. It was a beautiful day full of adventure!

Many houses are still made with the traditional mud and straw materials with thatch or tile roofs.

Our biking group, the tour was all in Spanish.

The rain was chasing us all day, occasionally pelting us for a few minutes.

The lush grass is kept well trimmed in the bowl

Precarious steps jutting from the sides of the rings lead up and down.

Strange plants abound.

Old women wait to sell their hand made wares to passing tourists

Moray, the giant crop laboratory of the Incans. The concentric stone circles were used to create different strains of potatoes and corn by growing them at varying altitudes. Now there are thousands of variations, each with their own distinct properties.

The man plows while his wife and daughter wait in the fields for him.

A woman herding sheep through the fields, crossing the road towards better grazing.

We pause for a quick break, my guide at the lead.

The deep red earth stretches to a dramatic sky, bordered by lush green fields that are thriving from the rainy season's yearly inundation.

A vista well worth the grueling ride to the top of this hill.

I beat em up (to the top of the hill that is!). It was not an easy day for most of the group.

Our bikes parked in the town of Maras, home of the salt mine workers. We were pausing for a quick snack before heading down to the famous mines.

An old woman in a top hat sells us water and snacks.

The terraced salt mines of Maras. In Incan times there were about 20. Now there are over 3300. With salt selling for less than a Sol a kilo (about .30 USD), it makes for grueling work to get the heavy loads back out of the steep canyon.

An old woman takes a load of salt up on the backs of her donkeys. 

When the water evaporates in the dry season, the terraces are totally white with the layers of salt.

Snowcapped mountains surround us.

Our guide explains the purpose of the terraces and the functioning of the mines

The channel of salty warm water that feeds the mining activities here. They funnel it off into their individual plots then let the sun evaporate the water. This leaves pure white salt.

A beautiful old sign.. forgotten in the terminal of the bus station.