Everyone who visits Machu Picchu will encounter Ollantaytambo, but many will probably miss it. Ollantaytambo is most famous as being the end of the road between Cusco and Machu Picchu, making it the closest town to Machu Picchu where you can catch the train. When we booked our trip, we assumed Ollantaytambo was simply a jump off point to Machu Picchu and planned only to stop there for enough time to transfer from our bus or taxi to the train to Aguas Calientes. Luckily for us, we arrived a few hours earlier than expected and were able to see this wonderful town. Of all the places in Peru we wished we had a bit more time, Ollantaytambo tops the list.

Ollantaytambo town square.

The town itself is extremely small. There is a town square surrounded by a few shops with several small roads leading up the valley from there. Of those small roads, there are only business on the first one or two blocks, with the rest of the town remaining as homes and small compounds that date back to Inca and Pre-Incan time. The most amazing thing about this town is how quickly you can seemingly walk right out of the contemporary world and into your own secluded space. As I looked up at the mountains that literally surrounded town, I thought about how amazing it would be to wander up a trail and disappear for awhile. If I had only another hour, it would have been possible if just for a time.

Mountains above the town.	The end of the road from Cusco and the town center.

Ollantaytambo is one of the best preserved Incan towns. Aside from the main road, which is essentially a cobblestone street that stretches from the end of the highway from Cusco to the train station, the rest of the city is a grid of skinny stone walk roads. Several of these roads are lined with Incan canals, which bring water from up the valley into the homes. I was fascinated with the canals and found myself curiously walking up the road to see where the canals started. These canals are amazing not only because of their age, but also their utter simplicity. At one point I found where a larger canal branched into 3 smaller canals that each made its way down one of the roads. The water was segmented into equal volume not by a fancy mechanism, but literally by a board and some fabric that was gingerly positioned to create the proper result. I can only image that every day for hundreds of years the people of this town fidgeted with this part of the canal to ensure the proper amount of water reached its destination. As a point of fact, I watched an elderly man doing just that, and smiled for a moment as I watched him nudge the contraption with his foot to get it just right.

Man fidgeting with the branch in the canal(left) and canals along the roads of the town (right)
More roads with canals.

As the town follows the valley along the river, it rapidly gets smaller as it gets quieter. Perhaps is it only 200 meters from the town square on one end to the end of the town on the other. The homes are a combination of mud and brick and the compounds in which they reside seemed to be unchanged for generations, perhaps the same buildings and walls the Incas roamed over 500 years previous.

Looking up at the mountains surrounding the town.

While in town we were lucky to visit the Awamaki Weaving Project where we met Emma and some of the wonderful volunteers at their office. We had planned a tour with Emma to visit Patacancha and the weaving center, which is about an hour drive from Ollantaytambo, but due to the delay of our flight from Lima, we didn’t have time. Of course we also bought some wonderful weavings made by the women in Patacancha.

High above the town you will see a rather impressive Incan ruin, which would probably be a destination all to itself if Machu Picchu didn’t exist. We didn’t have time to venture up to the ruins, but it is easy to respect their grandeur even from a distance.

Ollantaytambo Ruins.

There is a good selection of good quality and reasonably priced restaurants in Ollantaytambo as well. We dined at a restaurant situated at the bottom of a hostal just up the road from the bridge (I cannot remember the name) and enjoyed some excellent guacamole and hot chocolate along with our meal (I cannot remember what we ate either). I guess not remembering what I ate might be a sign that it wasn’t a spectacular meal, and that is probably true, but the point is that it was comfortable with good décor and we were able to spend an hour or so before our train relaxing and looking out the window.

After dinner we walked to the train station, which is about a 5-10 minute stroll from the town center. The road parallels the river, which makes a walk down the road at night even more memorable. Along the road there are also a number of riverside restaurants and a few hotels that all looked welcoming.
We departed Ollantaytambo on the last Backpacker train to Aguas Calientes, which departed at 8:25PM.

Basic Info

• Ollantaytambo is part of the Sacred Valley.
• Ollantaytambo is the end of the road from Cusco and the closest you can get to Machu Picchu by car.
• You can reach Ollantaytambo by Train from Poroy or Cusco, by private taxi, by shared taxi, by tourist bus or by local bus. We took a private taxi and paid 80 Soles for the two of us after some light bargaining. Shared taxis and local busses are likely much less.
• Ollantaytambo is the best place to catch PeruRail to Aguas Calientes if the trains from Cusco or Poroy are sold out.

Credits:
Photos by Azza Basarudin