Three day demonstration

6th Feb
Back on bus to Chinchero another Inca site and tourist market but high up this time so cool and getting late (1800 hrs) nice site with lots of Spanish building and church. Bus trip back to Cusco where we arrive 1930 hrs. Go to Moto hire shop and book a 400cc Honda Falcon for a trip tommorow cost US$60. Need to leave passport as deposit and show copy driving licence which they seem unintrested in. We have three home made copy driving licences as are told to use them if stopped by Peru poilce as they usually want "fines" for some thing they make up at the time. We hear stories from fellow bikers and it seems worse near Lima.
7th Feb
Today is the 1st day of a three day demonstration against the goverment as a new law has just been passed to allow large international companies to build huge hotels right next to Peru´s antient monuments. I have trouble getting back to my hotel on my hire bike as the road ahead is closed and Police don´t want me to go any further, in the end they alow me though to my Hotel which is just inside the police line where riot sheilds and tear gas are being used. There are burning tyres in the street ahead. The demonstrators have blocked all roads into and out of the city with rocks, telegraph poles, pipes, glass, concrete, buring tyres or in fact any thing to hand.

We get ready to leave town on three bikes ( Greg on BMW R1200 GS Adv , Dave on Yamaha XT 600 and me on little 400 cc Falcon which feels like a moped after the Africa Twin) . We head NW out of town back to the Sacred Valley and are soon meet by our 1st road block, there are loads of people demonstaighting and we get though all the blockages with minium resistance but at one place Dave is nearly pulled off his bike by women and children. Once we are clear of the city there is no traffic so we dicide to so to the Sacred Valley of the Incas again and see some other sites. 1st stop will be Moray but on the way be decide to explore a mountain track so we can get higher for some photos. We drive up a rough little track between crops but in the end have to turn back due to a lack of trackson in Greg´s bike ( he has a multipurpose tyre). Roly´s bike has knobbles and also very light so can go just about anywhere. We proceed along small rough roads in the mountains and though small villages until we find Moray. The site consists of 4 large bowls of terraces built into the natural landscape. These bowls are thought to have beenused to cultiviate crops at diffrent temperatures as the temperature range can vary by over 5 degrees C between the top and bottom terraces. It is believed the site was an Inca research station fro crop development. There is also a good system to deliver water to every terrace. There are over 500 species of potato (maybe 4000). Yhe main crops locally are maize and potato.

We leave for Uruvamba and then Ollantaytambo, on the way we stop for lunch at a little resturant and all have local trout (yellow) which was very good. We arrive at Ollantaytambo, Inca site which is closed there are no cabs, buses etc. and the market is closed. Its a nice village with no tourists. We speak to the local resturant owner who tells us it should be possible to drive today to Machu Picchu along the railway line about 3kms further on as no trains are running for three days. We take up the challenge and soon find the dirt track and after about 10kms follwing the railway line we come across a broken bridge down into the river. A local on the other river bank throws across a matick and Roly digs up the gravel to make a smooth ramp down to the river bed. Another local then suggests it is easier to drive up onto the rialway line and cross the railway bridge, we opt for the latter and manage to get all three bikes over the railway lines and back off a 100 metres further on. Only the BMW 1200 is difficult to manage due to its sheer weight. We travel on along the dirt track beside the railway line and eventually arrive at a railway station.