Hi. I'll be going to Peru (Cusco, MP, Sacred Valley) in August. After spending 1 night in Cusco, we are spending 2 nights in Urumba before continuing to MP and then returnign to cusco.

We usually prefer to drive ourselves. We find that this is much cheaper than taking taxis and gives us more flexibility.

If we rent a car in Cusco and drive ourselves to and around the Sacred Valley, what would we do with the car while we are at MP? As of now we are taking the train from Ollanta and returning by train to Cusco....

Do a search on this board for the trip report titled: "Our report from one week...."

They rented a car on edge of Cusco and liked driving it to Sacred Valley, found secure parking at hotel in URu or Ollan. .. .

I say more power to em, but I wouldn't have liked to have been among the few "little guys" on those roads (good but 2 laned) with buses and trucks. ..

i wonder what the cost difference is, as we'll be paying for 2 days we cant use car, as opposed to taxis, having them wait at places.

We hired a driver for a couple days. I think the cost was perhaps $50 a day. We too alwasy rent cars and drive ourselves, but for the Sacred Valley this was a nice option. He knew the area and all the roads. We got by with his little bit of English and my little bit of Spanish.

I think the Sacred Valley is wonderful for driving, but you've identified the problems with having a car. You have to rent in Cusco. Cusco is an awful city for driving, plus it's totally unnecessary to have a car in the city. Then you have the problem of what to do with the car when you go to MP. I'd skip the car rental. I've done it, and I wouldn't bother with it another time.

How do you go about hiring a driver? Would we do this in Cusco?

I am wondering about this question myself. How easy is it to just ask someone at your hotel in Cusco to help you hire a driver to take you to Sacred Valley and then return to pick you back up?

Also, there are buses that leave from Cusco and are very inexpensive. The roads are not that great, at least when we were there, so this was qutie pleasant. Comfortable seats. Plenty of time given to photograph and visit.

You can see what we did, at
http://www.andrys.com/indox.html

Ollantaytambo, Sacred Valley.
Machu Picchu.

We took a train to the city just below Machu Picchu and took the regular bus that winds up the curving road to the top of the site.
GORGEOUS. Very bad road for a car and I think only buses are allowed up.

- Andrys
--
http://www.andrys.com/indox.html

Search for my post in the Peru forum "Highly recommended taxi driver in the Sacred Valley of Peru".

I bet getting taxi is cheaper than renting a car -- gas is probably close to $7 USD a gallon there.

We typically like to drive ourselves, too, but we just took public buses everywhere around the Sacred Valley, and to and from Cusco). It was cheap and easy and they run all the time.