After our inspiring (and physically tiring) day at Machu Picchu we opted for a slow day and decided to do a stop in Urubamba, half way to our next big stop Cusco.
I was keen to see one more sight of the sacred Valley – no, no more ruin but something even older: the salt mine of Salineras.
Benefiting from a highly salty spring emerging from a subterranean mountain stream, locals have been “harvesting” salt here for centuries, even before the Incas.
This little stream is then fed into hundreds of ponds, where the water evaporates and leaves the salt crystals behind. As ponds are at different stages of evaporation, it makes for a pretty photo shot, especially in sunlight. No good timing for us, as we had our first rain for a long time, just as we entered the taxi towards Salineras. But an impressive sight nevertheless:
The salt ponds are owned by several local families and the area is maintained jointly by the whole community, unchanged since Inca times.
