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Ollantaytambo
Sacred Valley Ollantaytambo
Ollantaytambo
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Ollantaytambo.
This is the end of the road as far as the Sacred Valley is concerned. Like Pisac Ollantaytambo is a major Inca site at which you use the Boleto Turístico, you can buy a single entry ticket to Ollantaytambo at the ruins. The site a massive fortress is one of the few places where the Spanish lost a major battle during the conquest. Below the ruins is the village of Ollantaytambo, build on traditional Inca foundations and the best surviving example of Inca city planning.
The village was divided into blocks called canchas, and each cancha had just one entrance, which led into a courtyard. Individual houses were entered from this courtyard, not directly from the street.
The huge, steep terraces guarding the Inca fortress are spectacular and bring gasps of admiration from visitor arriving in the square below. Ollantaytambo is the fortress to which Manco Inca retreated after his defeat at Sacsayhuman. In 1536, Hernando Pizarro (Francisco Pizarro’s younger half brother) led a force of 70 cavalrymen here, supported by large numbers of native and Spanish foot soldiers, in an attempt to capture the Inca. The steep terracing was highly defensible, and Pizarro’s men found themselves continuously showered with arrows, spears, stone and boulders. They were unable to climb the terraces and were further hampered when the Inca, in a brilliant move, flooded the plain below the fortress through previously prepared channels. The Spaniards’ horses had difficulty maneuvering in the water, and Pizarro ordered a hasty retreat which almost became a rout when the conquistadores were followed down the valley by thousand of the victorious Inca’s soldiers. Manco Inca’s victory was short lived, soon afterward, the Spanish forces I Cuzco were relieved by the return of a large Chilean expedition, and Ollantaytambo was again attacked this time with a cavalry force over four times the size of that used in the first attack. Manco Inca retreated to his jungle stronghold in Vilcabamba, and Ollantaytambo became part of the Spanish Empire.
It is probable that the Incas themselves saw Ollantaytambo as a temple rather than as a fortress, but the Spanish called it a fortress, and it has usually been referred to as such ever since. The temple area is at the top of the terracing. Some extremely well built walls were under construction at the time of the conquest and have never been completed. The stone used for these building was quarried from the mountainside 6km away, high above the opposite bank of the Rio Urubamba. Transporting the huge stone blocks from the quarry to the effort of thousands of Indian workers. To move the massive blocks across the river, the worker used a mind boggling technique, they left the blocks by the side of the river, then diverted the entire river channel around the block, rather than trying to haul the stones through the river itself.
Tours in Ollantaytambo
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Cusco 4 Days - 3 Nights (US$ 345.00)
Includes: Cusco, Machupicchu, Ollantaytambo, Pisac, Sacred Valley, Sacsayhuaman, -
Trek Lares - Ollantaytambo - Machupicchu 4 Days - 3 Nights + 2 Nights in Cusco (US$ 454.00)
Includes: Cusco, Machupicchu, Ollantaytambo, Sacred Valley, -
Inti Raymi Cusco 5 Days - 4 Nights (US$ 457.00)
Includes: Cusco, Machupicchu, Ollantaytambo, Pisac, Sacred Valley, Sacsayhuaman,
