Day 154 - The Living Pantry
Thinking we would arrive in Chachapoyas at around 7am ready to start our day, we actually arrived at around 5am, exhausted. Luckily there was a night watch man who kindly organised a room for us at the first place we knocked on the door of and we had a bit of a nap, before getting up for our tour of Kuélap at 8am.
We were picked up, along with about a dozen others and driven out of town two hours to the site where the ruins of Kuélap are located. Kuélap is a 600m long 110m wide fortress associated with the Chachapoyas culture. It was occupied from around the 6th century AD until the 1500s. After that it lay untouched until 1843 when it was ‘rediscovered’ by a local judge carrying out a survey of the area.
Our first glimpse at Kuelap, high up in the cloud forest.
The path leading around the walls to the main entrance.
The remains of the main entrance, originally reserved for royalty.
Before entering our guide warned us the be careful of the llamas, one of them had bitten an American tourist recently. With no American tourists we though we might be safe, but a Quebecois guy in our group certainly qualified for a llama attack, he was so obnoxious I though I was going to have to separate him and Anna at one point. He also seemed to have a way of getting in everyone’s photos…
The site is mostly unrestored, but picturesquely covered in bromeliad covered trees and cute orchids.
The sheer cliffs to one side of Kuélap and high walls on the other helped protect it from invasion for centuries. When it was eventually conquered it was via siege, as Kuélap has no fresh water source and insufficient rainfall to sustain the population.
Our guide secretly removing a stone from the wall of the central building to reveal…
… a huge area filled with human bones.
Another interesting tale our guide told us was about a ceremonial platform where shamans would wash their own blood down a drain that lead to a narrow ledge below. On that ledge Chachapoyas warriors would fight to gain access to the blood which they believed increased their vitality and general warrior-ness.
That’s the main entrance from above, you can see why invasion wasn’t a successful technique for conquering the place.
Stone ‘Puma’s eyes’ decorate the circular shelters of the Sharmans. Our guide explained that there were three levels of ‘living’ or classes, with all the royalty living in shelters at the top of the site and the knights living on the bottom level.
The offending (some might say heroic?) llama, now safely tied up out of reach of tourists.
The remains of a dwelling. The circular thing in the centre would have originally had a human corpse or two stashed in it (good luck apparently, don’t try it at home though, it’s probably illegal). The low wall to the left was the guinea pig enclosure (otherwise known as a pantry!).
More dwellings with their corpse holes and guinea pig enclosures.
One of the few restored buildings, this is one of the dwellings.
Erin and Anna huddling in the wind that sweeps through the entranceway.
On the way back to Chachapoyas we stopped in the tiny hamlet of Maria for lunch. A few brave souls had the cuy (baked guinea pig), but my tum wasn’t feeling too great, so I just opted for the trout.
Just before dark we were back in Chachapoyas and absolutely exhausted. After running a few quick errands in preparation for the following day we were all in bed, without the energy to even go out for dinner.
3 comments:
Motherly comment here that you won't care for much I suspect.
No wonder you couldn't shake the cold, sometimes you just try to fit to much into one day. You are away for a year you know, not a month. Be kinder to your body and it might be a bit nicer to you. Here endeth the lecture!
I think that might be my fault Sylvia... These two are consumate hosts!
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