Pilgrimage Places

by Robert Scheer

It’s risky to write about little known sacred places. I worry about bringing them to the attention of people who don’t respect Mother Earth. Hordes of careless tourists have nearly loved Stonehenge to death, and I’d hate to see that happen to other sites. Already, the mystical atmosphere of two places near Sedona, Arizona is at risk from commercialization, as is Newgrange in Ireland. A few years ago there was a proposal for a cable car and luxury hotel development at Machu Picchu that, if it had not been stopped, could have transformed Peru’s greatest Inca sanctuary into an exclusive playground for the wealthy.

It’s not a new phenomenon. During the Middle Ages, pilgrims to Jerusalem had to be warned against “chipping off fragments from the Holy Sepulchers.” Today’s vandals include not only hooligans who paint graffiti, climb over barriers and jump on top of fragile megaliths, but also well-meaning souls who bury foreign crystals, hoping to “heal the Earth” or light candles, not realizing that soot and wax are as harmful as spray paint.

I share the following information in hope that visitors to this pilgrimage web site can be trusted to honor and respect Mother Earth’s most precious treasures.

My closely guarded secret place is Pisac, in Peru’s Sacred Valley. It’s hard to get to and the meager infrastructure can barely cope with the handful of tourists who now find there way there. But for me it was the most moving of all the sites I visited in Peru, including Machu Picchu.

The village of Pisac (or Pisaq) is about 20 miles northeast of Cusco, and the bus trip takes less than an hour. Markets are held in Pisac’s main square on Sundays, Tuesdays and Thursdays, and those are the days when you’re most likely to encounter other tourists at the Inca citadel high above the village. There are two routes up. One is on a rough, steep, narrow path, that takes about half an hour. The other is even steeper, rougher, longer and more scenic. As you hike up the grassy trail you may see a Andean hawks or condors soaring overhead. Looking across a steep gorge, you can see distant hillsides honeycombed with ancient Inca burial sites. Eventually, you arrive at a trapezoid shaped arch whose massive stones were precisely cut and fitted together without mortar. Once only priests and the Inca royal family were allowed through this magnificent portal. Before going in, we paused for a moment, respectful of the sacred space we were entering.

The narrow path continues with dramatic views down to the Urubamba river. After you pass through a small tunnel, the main temple area appears in the distance, a triangular, terraced plateau surrounded by even higher mountains. Beyond the complex of roofless stone buildings, an outcropping of bedrock is carved into an Intihuatana, a “hitching post of the sun.” Pisac is much like a miniature Machu Picchu. As I sat near an ancient stone wall, in the clear air of the Sacred Valley, I began to understand why such an elaborate citadel had been built here. The Inca name for a mountain spirit is Apu, and at Pisac I felt the power of the Apus. No matter which direction I faced, each of the surrounding mountains seemed to be beaming its energy down toward the Intihuatana as if it were a satellite dish. Perhaps that’s what it is, a kind of mystical link between the terrestrial and celestial forces, built more than five centuries ago. Whatever its purpose, in Pisac’s highly charged atmosphere I felt as if I were nestled in the palm of an enormous hand which could easily crush me, but chose instead to nourish, inspire and love me!

If you make a pilgrimage to Pisac or any other sacred place, if you should feel moved to give thanks in a tangible way, please heed the advice of Britain’s Save Our Sacred Sites organization. They suggest honoring ancient sites by picking up litter. If you must leave something behind, let it be a prayer of thanks.

Robert Scheer is travel writer who specializes in pilgrimages to sacred sites and places of power.