Ollantaytambo



We drove for hours through the most beautiful country side either of us has ever seen.  Purple, pink and golden rod wild flowers carpeted the ground, families tended to their small farms or played soccer in the dirt roads, and snow-capped Andes mountains guarded the background.  I wish I could have stopped the bus to take better pictures



Ollantaytambo is a small town nestled in the Andes mountains, surrounded by Inca ruins, filled with lovely Peruvians. 

It was in Ollantyatambo that all the teams of IdahoCondor met together and set up a one day clinic in a large room.  Half of the room was medical, the other half dental.  People were lined up hours before hand. 

Ollantaytambo will always be remembered by us as the place where Bryan performed his first tooth extraction!  After studying for so long about dentistry, he could hardly contain his enthusiasm to perform the procedures, complete with administering local anesthetic (something he has done many times before).

 

 

I was able to assist one of the fifth year dental students from Peru.  She had me do all the suctioning and hold the light



Ollantaytambo was known to the Inca people as the entrance to the jungle. In the picture above you can see some of the storage houses on the mountain. The lay people were expected to keep these filled with food for the Inca military. It is said that these storage buildings could hold up to 7 years worth of food! (not too sure how they preserved it though)

Peaking out from one of the store houses.