Best Things to Do at Machu Picchu

Explore the citadel itself. Terraces, temples, and residential sections spread across the mountaintop — see our tickets guide for circuit options.

Hike Huayna Picchu. The peak overlooking the citadel in classic photos, a separate, strictly limited ticket.

Trek the Inca Trail. The classic multi-day approach — see our full Inca Trail guide.

Explore Ollantaytambo. A Sacred Valley town with its own impressive Inca ruins, worth a stop on the way to or from Machu Picchu.

Visit the Sun Gate (Inti Punku). The original Inca Trail entrance to the citadel, offering a classic elevated view.

The Sacred Valley's other ruins

Pisac and Moray, both within reach of Cusco or Ollantaytambo, offer significant Inca terracing and ruins without Machu Picchu's crowds or ticket restrictions.

Cusco's own significant sites

Sacsayhuamán, a massive Inca fortress overlooking Cusco, features some of the same precise stonework as Machu Picchu without requiring the same travel logistics.

The San Pedro Market

Cusco's central market offers a genuine look at local daily life, alongside stalls selling everything from fresh juice to alpaca wool goods.

Rainbow Mountain

A separately located, colorfully striated peak that's become popular enough to warrant its own dedicated day trip from Cusco, distinct from the Machu Picchu route entirely.

The Cusco Cathedral

A striking colonial-era cathedral built partly from stones taken from a dismantled Inca structure, blending Spanish Baroque architecture with subtle indigenous artistic touches inside.

Chocolate and coffee experiences

Several small museums and workshops in Cusco offer hands-on chocolate-making classes using Peruvian cacao, a lighter, food-focused activity between more demanding sightseeing days.

Q'eswachaka rope bridge

A traditional Inca-style rope bridge, rebuilt annually by local communities using ancestral techniques, offering a living connection to pre-Columbian engineering beyond the ruins themselves.

Moray's agricultural terraces

Circular Inca terraces once used for agricultural experimentation, each level creating a distinct microclimate — a genuinely different kind of Inca site from the citadel or fortress ruins elsewhere in the region.

Maras salt mines

Thousands of small salt pools carved into a hillside, still worked using techniques dating back centuries, and easily combined with a Moray visit on the same day trip.

Whichever combination you choose, the Sacred Valley alone could fill several days beyond the citadel visit itself if ancient Inca engineering genuinely interests you.

Pisac Market

A well-known Sunday market in the Sacred Valley selling textiles, ceramics, and produce, combining easily with a visit to the nearby Pisac ruins on the same day.

Whichever of these you add, most combine naturally with a Sacred Valley day rather than requiring a separate dedicated trip.

Between the citadel itself and everything nearby, most visitors leave wishing they'd had one more day.