Peru: 9-Day Itinerary
- Kelly Risk
- Nov 15
- 16 min read
Here is my 9-day itinerary for exploring a small slice of the beauty of Peru! We spent a majority of our time in Cusco and the Sacred Valley, with the ultimate destination for our trip being Machu Picchu. We did not do the Incan trail, which does have to be booked pretty far in advance. We had an amazing time and loved every minute, but if I could do it again I would have made several changes to our itinerary. I discuss my thoughts on this in more detail below, but I personally probably would have done: Day 1 Arrive, Day 2 Fly to Cusco and take a train to Ollantaytambo, Day 3 Ollantaytambo, Day 4 Sacred Valley tour, Day 5 Machu Picchu, Day 6 Cusco, Day 7 Cusco (or day tour), Day 8 Cusco and fly to Lima, Day 9 depart.
We traveled to Peru in mid-October (11-19) and encountered pretty good weather. You will definitely encounter some rain during this time of year since November is the start of rainy season. We experienced mostly beautiful, sunny days but did experience a lot of rain during the first part of our Sacred Valley tour day and the latter half of our Machu Picchu tour day. Luckily, we went to Machu Picchu at 0700 and experienced beautiful weather. I would recommend an earlier start in this shoulder season because the rain tends to come in the afternoon, though the sun did come out again around 1600 while we were there. The temperature during our trip was mostly in the upper 50s at night and upper 60s during the day. Particularly in Cusco, I did get a little cold in the evenings. I only packed a jean jacket, a rain jacket, and a fleece pullover. Some sort of light coat would have been nice!
Prior to our trip, we made sure to get several travel vaccinations. It is best if you meet with a doctor, but we primarily wanted to get our Yellow Fever vaccine. This vaccine is only administered at approved locations; for us, Walgreens was the easiest and could handle walk-ins. While current (2025) CDC guidance does not recommend this vaccine for the Cusco/Machu Picchu region, it was recommended as of 2024 and we were told it was still a good idea to get. I had read that mosquitos were bad near Machu Picchu this time of year, but honestly we did not really notice any. We also ensured we had the Hepatitus A and B and Typhoid vaccines.
Most people we encountered in Peru could speak at least broken English, but having some basic Spanish background is good. You should not drink the tap water in Peru and we avoided fruits or veggies that were raw and possibly washed in tap water; we also used a bottle of water in the bathroom for brushing our teeth. While we both experienced some slight stomach problems, it was not bad at all--I have experienced much worse! Peru also has a lot of stray dogs. Some were friendly and I would pet them only if they came up to me with a wagging tail. Otherwise, we gave them their space. I definitely wanted to take them all home. Also coca tea is very prevalent throughout Peru but especially in Cusco because it is caffeinated, which is good for altitude sickness. Coca leaves come from the cocaine plant, so it can show up if you have to do drug tests for work. We unfortunately had to avoid!
Things to bring:
Rain jacket and/or poncho (I liked the option of both; they do sell cheap ponchos there)
Sunscreen
Daypack (I had a 14L)
Printed Machu Picchu tickets
Vaccine Travel Card
Possibly Diamox, a medication for altitude sickness
Day 1: Arrive to Lima
This was a pretty relaxing travel day! I personally booked two separate one-way tickets to and from Lima to get the timing I wanted. We flew Delta on the way there, leaving from Washington, D.C. around noon with a lunchtime layover in Atlanta before our approximately 6.5 hour flight to Lima. We landed in Lima around 2200 local. Some people had booked roundtrip tickets all the way to Cusco which meant they had connecting flights that night and I am very glad we did not do that. The line for customs took quite a while and instead we got to spend the night at the airport hotel before our flight the next morning! We would have taken Copa Airlines flights to Peru, which friends have said was a nice airline experience, but the times were not ideal (arrive at 2am, leave at 4am, etc.)
For an airport hotel, it is not confusing at all but there are two Wyndham Costa Del Sol "airport" hotels. We accidentally stayed in the one not within walking distance of the airport our first night: the Wyndham Costa Del Sol Lima Airport. The hotel is nice and comfortable and has a complimentary shuttle. The other is called Wyndham Grand Costa Del Sol Lima Airport and we stayed here on the way back. It is within walking distance of the airport, brand new as of 2021, and very nice. I would definitely recommend this one for a quick night at the airport.
Day 2: Fly to Cusco
There are several airlines that fly from Lima to Cusco, but I booked ours with LATAM airlines. Some of the others (JetSmart, Sky, etc) are considered budget airlines and I heard that they are more prone to cancellations. We saw a flight or two from those airlines get cancelled while at the airport, but our LATAM flights were always fine. The Lima airport is nice and new and while there always seemed to be insane lines for checking bags, we were able to skip that and head right to security with our carry-ons and everything was super easy.
We flew out at 1125 and landed in Cusco at 1245. There were a bunch of taxi drivers waiting at the airport to offer rides, but Uber is widely available in Peru and I always prefer to use that when possible for safety. The Ubers in Peru here made you give a 4-digit pin to the driver every time you got in the car, which I thought was a nice safety feature (and helped me practice my Spanish numbers!). Our Uber took us to our lovely Airbnb for the week, which I would highly recommend. It was located towards the top of one of Cusco's hills next to a great viewpoint of the city: Mirador de Sán Cristobal.
Cusco sits at an incredibly high elevation of 11,152ft/3,339m, especially for us living-at-sea-level folks. Located in the Sacred Valley, Machu Picchu is lower at 7,972ft/2,430m. My husband and I have been at these elevation levels multiple times--like on our several visits to Colorado--so we thought we would be ok. But it is very different to land at that elevation vs. driving up to that level and acclimating along the way. We noticed it immediately upon landing: the typical shortness of breath that we are used to feeling in Colorado but also a headache. I was mostly fine with rest and water, but my husband's reaction was worse. He was nauseous, threw up, and was quite fatigued. Altitude sickness is no joke! You can bring medication to help, such as Diamox and Ibuprofen, but if you have the flexibility in time I would recommend either a) arriving in Cusco and immediately leaving to stay somewhere in the Sacred Valley for the first few nights, my recommendation being Ollantaytambo or b) flying to Arequipa first to experience that beautiful city and Colca Canyon. Either of these options would let you acclimate at an elevation that is easier to adjust to initially than Cusco. If you are short on time like us, you can fly straight to Cusco but I would take it easy your first two days to help you adjust. We met some people that other than shortness of breath were totally fine. You just never know!
We spent the afternoon wandering around town visiting the Mirador de Sán Cristobal, strolling down the streets to Plaza de Armas, and having dinner on the rooftop at Mistura Grill. It was fun to grab a bench in the plaza and people watch. There are a lot of street hawkers in the plaza and some are really cool artists--we bought a unique piece to bring home! Because the city has such steep hills, it is highly recommended that you take Ubers or taxis back to any accommodations up hill, especially as you are adjusting to the elevation. We always took an Uber back to our Airbnb after spending time in the historic center and it was never more than $5 with tip.
Day 3: Cusco
As my husband and I were still adjusting, we spent a lot of time sleeping in, taking naps, and reading books. It was actually quite nice! We still made it out to explore some on this day. One of the most recommended areas in Cusco is the San Blas neighborhood, known for its art and restaurants. One of the more famous streets, Calle 7 Borreguitos, was right near our Airbnb. If you are staying elsewhere I would recommend starting your exploration of the area from Mirador de Sán Cristobal so you can walk downhill. From the Mirador, you can follow the road by the cool llama graffiti towards the picturesque street!
Afterwards, we were on the hunt for my husband's favorite meal: Peruvian chicken. He eats this all the time back home and after perusing Reddit we found a place called Los Toldos Chicken. This was by far the best meal we had in Peru. It was off to a good start when we sat at a table next to another American couple who asked how we had found this place (it was recommended to them by a local), that this was their second time there that trip, and that it was the best food they had had in Peru. While they have other menu items, the primary option is the chicken (quarter, half, or whole) with fries. It was the tastiest, juiciest chicken we had ever had and the sauces to go with it were great. The fries were also so good. Highly recommend!
With full stomachs, we visited the Catedral del Cuzco and Qurikancha. The former is a cool Spanish church with great art, the highlight being a depiction of the last supper with the local delicacy of guinea pig (cuy) as the meal. The latter was an Incan temple, the most important of the empire. After the Spaniards conquered the empire, Qurikancha was turned into a church and convent. It was a very interesting juxtaposition of cultures. We did not have guides for either of these stops--the signage was pretty good in both--but guides are always available right outside for a really decent price ($20-30). We considered exploring other museums, such as the Pre-Columbia Art Museum or the Machu Picchu Museum, but ultimately decided to take it easy the rest of the day.
Day 4: Cusco
Since my husband was feeling better altitude-wise, we decided to book a tour of the Incan ruins surrounding Cusco. We booked these tickets the day before and chose it because it was only half a day and did not include the two things we did the day before. Before our 1000 pickup, we grabbed some breakfast near Plaza de Armas at CercanÃa Pan y Café which was very good! There are a lot of cute bakeries in this area that are also recommended, including Ruru and Cafe D'wasi.
Our tour was great! The stops were pretty quick, but our guide was super informative. The tour was conducted in both Spanish and English which was really impressive; our group included tourists from America, Brazil, and Colombia. We visited Sacsayhuaman, Q'enco, Puka Pukara, and Tambomachay. While the Spanish ransacked these sites for stone when they conquered, they are still structurally intact and you can easily visualize how they once were with the help of the guides. Sacsayhuaman is the largest ruin and is a great example of how the Incans could tightly fit together stones without mortar. We probably could have spent more time exploring Sacsayhuaman and Tambomachay because of their size and ability to climb around and explore, which you could do by hiring a taxi for the day.
After getting dropped back off by our Airbnb, we wandered back through San Blas and eventually down to Triunfo Street for some fun souvenir shopping. For an early dinner, we were craving something different and went to KION Peruvian Chinese. My husband said it was the best Chinese food he had ever had! Their Min Pao Kion was superb. Apparently in Peru, Chinese-Peruvian fusion cuisine is so popular that it actually has its own name: Chifa. We spent the rest of the day taking it easy!
Day 5: Sacred Valley
To tour the Sacred Valley, I pre-booked this tour that hit many of the main sites because it ended in Ollantaytambo where we had a train ride the same day to Machu Picchu. We loved this tour! We got picked up around 0630 near Plaza de Armas, but the also do pickups from nearby hotels. Our guide Alejandro was the best and made sure we made it to our train on time, which was quite easy to do. My biggest regret was not spending more time in Ollantaytambo. This town was so cute. Several other people on the tour were staying in OIllantaytambo for the night before heading to Machu Picchu the next morning; instead, we took the train that day and spent the night in Aguas Calientes (also known as Machu Picchu Town).
Our first stop was the Incan ruins in Chinchero. The day started with a lot of rain (and it was quite chilly!) so much of these ruins were covered in fog. Like our other tour, our guide conducted everything in both Spanish and English, with my husband and I actually being the only English speakers on the trip. It was kind of nice to have the guide to ourselves at times! After the ruins, the tour took us to a traditional weaving demonstration and store. This was one of our highlights! The ladies putting on the demonstration were so nice and it was so interesting learning how they use different natural dyes. They had so many items they made for sale at insanely good prices. Lots of the alpaca wool items in Cusco are from nicer shops and usually $200-300 for a good sweater (it will last forever, though). The ones here were more $25-50. My husband bought two sweaters, I bought one, and we both wish we had more time to look around and buy more!
Back in the tour bus, we drove to Moray. This site is made up of circular terraces that were used by the Incans as an agricultural laboratory. It was so cool! Our other highlight of the tour was the stop at the Cusco Imperial chocolate shop. They let us taste a variety of flavors, particularly ones with salt from our upcoming stop at the salt mines. This chocolate was the best either of us had ever had! We bought several bars to take home, our favorite flavors being coffee and lucuma (an exclusively South American fruit that tastes like maple). Sadly, they do not ship internationally so if anyone is going we will pay you will to bring us back more! Next up was the Maras salt mines, unique to other South American salt mines because they are completely outside. The tour has an included buffet lunch at a cute spot that was pretty good before heading to our last stop of the day, Ollantaytambo. Others on the tour went to Pisac afterwards, which we would have loved to do but honestly this was already a very long day. Ideally, Pisac would be seen on a separate day trip of its own from Cusco.
Ollantaytambo is an adorable town that is dominated by the Incan ruins in its center, our favorite of the day. The town seems to have retained more of its Incan roots with a large market set up in the center, water channels cutting throughout the streets, and surrounded by the mountains and Urubamba river. After exploring the main Incan fortress with our tour group, we split off and walked to the train station. The tour bus was small and only had room for us to bring backpacks which we used for our overnight clothes; we also were paying for our Airbnb back in Cusco where we left our suitcases. We did this because the price wasn't bad, but there are services that will ferry your bags to Ollantaytambo for you, which might be better for more than one night in the area.
We took the PeruRail train that departed Ollantaytambo at 1537 and arrived in Aguas Calientes at 1702. We rode the Expedition 603 there and the Vistadome 32 back and honestly, I didn't notice too much of a difference. The Vistadome was slightly more comfortable with slightly larger windows, so if the price isn't bad I would recommend it. The train ride there was hands down the best ride of our life. The views were stunning as the tracks follow the Urubamba river the entire way further into the valley with dramatic mountains, waterfalls, and even more Incan ruins outside our windows.
After arriving in Aguas Calientes, our Casa Del Sol Machupicchu hotel picked us up from the train station to walk us to check-in. The town is quite small (and hilly) and easy to navigate, but it was nice to have someone showing us the way. I highly recommend the hotel! It was super comfortable and our room had windows that opened right up to the roaring Urubamba river. We loved the vibes of Aguas Calientes as we walked around at night--lots of energy and people out and about with the river as ambient background noise. While the food in this town leans more towards overpriced and touristy, we really enjoyed our dinner at Chullos.
Day 6: Machu Picchu
Our bucket list day! I booked our entry tickets about 3 months before and had no issues. I purchased them myself from the Ministry of Culture website and while it was a little confusing, my grade school-level Spanish and Google Translate helped me navigate it just fine. We knew we wanted to hike Waynapicchu (also seen as Huayna Picchu), the famous mountain situated behind the ruins, so we chose circuit 3-A; most tour companies recommend circuit 2 if you do not want to do the hike. More on this later, but the hike is very challenging yet so worth it. It was the highlight of our trip! The total for two tickets purchased by ourselves was approximately $125. We also pre-booked a tour guide that picked us up from our hotel around 0600 for our 0700 entry and helped us navigate all the bus lines. We pre-booked our roundtrip bus tickets as well, but only the day before. They are $24 and definitely worth it; you can hike up to the entry, but it is steep. Bus tickets basically have to be pre-booked, but can also be purchased in person the day before your entry if you are in Aguas Calientes. The bus tickets did not need to be printed, but I would very much recommend having your Machu Picchu tickets printed. You also must have your passport!
At the entry for Machu Picchu, there are bathrooms (2 sol entry), luggage storage (5 sol/bag), and a few restaurants and snack stands. Our guide helped us navigate the lines for the correct route and then we were in! Because of our early start, there was still a lot of fog covering some of the views and provided a very cool perspective. As we were there, we gradually got to see the fog rise with the morning sun. For circuit 3-A, you get to wander some of the primary ruin areas including the royal palace, the main square, the school area, and the sacred rock. Our guide was great and was able to point out so much Incan engineering and unique architectural designs. After the sacred rock, our guide took us to the Waynapicchu entry and left us for our trek!
The hike is about 2.5 miles roundtrip with 1,000ft of elevation gain and the path is almost entirely stairs, some of which are incredibly narrow. It took us about an hour to get to the top and 40 minutes to descend. Thankfully we were semi-used to the elevation by this time but we were still constantly stopping to catch our breath. Our legs were shaking! With our 0700 entry time, we started the hike at approximately 0845 and it was not crowded at all; on our way back down around 1030, it had become very crowded. At the top, there are more Incan ruins since the mountain was used as a temple to the moon. Since we could barely walk (lol), we enjoyed sitting and soaking in the views of Machu Picchu from above. Near the top, we ran into a stray dog who had hiked all the way up (and was way better than us at it). He took a nice nap in the sun and we later saw him again down at the entry! While the views of the ruins are amazing, the surrounding views of the mountains are just as stunning. The sun had come out in full during our entire time at the top, but around the time we decided to descend it had started to rain a bit. Back at the Machu Picchu entry, it was raining pretty hard and did not let up much the entire afternoon. At the entry, we grabbed a snack before waiting in the loooong line for the bus back down. It took us a long and wet 45 minutes to get on a bus.
Once back in Aguas Calientes, we had about 3 hours before our train back to Cusco. We picked up our bags from the hotel before grabbing a well-deserved lunch. After lunch, we also really enjoyed coffee and a pastry at La Rivera. We had a lot of fun shopping in the main mercado for souvenirs before heading to the station for our train that departed at 1643. The ride all the way back to Cusco is much longer than the ride from Ollantaytambo, getting us back at 2123. We didn't miss having dinner because of our late, large lunch but we did appreciate having some snacks with us. PeruRail does sell some snacks and drinks on board. Once back in Cusco, we took an Uber back to our Airbnb for the night!
Day 7: Cusco to Lima
Today was our day to sadly leave the Cusco region. We easily could have stayed another day or two and done other day trips, such as Rainbow Mountain or Humantay Lake, but doing more intense hiking right after Waynapicchu would not have been a good idea. So instead, we had decided to head back to Lima this day to explore the city. Our flight was not until 1330 so we had a nice, relaxing morning. Before checking out, we walked through Calle 7 Borreguitos one last time and got some delicious empanadas and other local baked goods. We took an Uber to the airport, which is quite small and you definitely do not need a lot of time to navigate. Our LATAM flight left at 1330 and landed at 1500.
Our original plan was to catch an Uber to Miraflores to explore and spend 2 nights at the Hilton Garden Inn. But unfortunately the weather for our time in Lima was not looking great and we were pretty exhausted. The previous day we were able to change our flights to depart one day earlier than planned so instead we spent this night at the Wyndham Grand Costa del Sol (the one within walking distance of the airport). It was so nice to relax in this fancy hotel and we had the most delicious dinner at the attached restaurant--it was surprisingly one of our favorites of the trip!
Day 8: Lima
Instead of our planned day in Lima, we flew back home on this day. We flew American Airlines and our flight to Miami left at 0600. After a layover, we ultimately got back to D.C. the same day at 1830.
Our very original plan for this day had been to do a day trip to Paracas and the Huacachina Oasis. We ultimately decided to cancel this before we left for Peru because we were concerned with how early the tour started (0540) and how long of a day it was (return back around 2300). In retrospect, if this was a top desire of ours, I would have put it at the beginning of the trip so we could have "recovered" during our more restful days acclimating to Cusco elevation. Since we had cancelled that, we were instead going to wander around Miraflores and Barranco, eat good food, maybe hit up a museum, or possibly do a boat tour.
Day 9: Depart
Our flight for this day would have been at the same time: 0600. From Miraflores, it would take approximately 40 minutes to get to the airport. This meant it would have been a very early start to our day, but one can always take a nap on the plane!