Things to do in Cusco, Peru: One day three ways

PENNY PINCH

Locals say sugar is the answer to the altitude so start with sweet, Cusco-style coffee and pastries at Cafe Ayllu, Calle Almagro 133  ($6). Get your bearings in the main square at Plaza de Armas and get a feel for the city's colonial past at Cusco Cathedral . Take a dinner class with Cusco Cooking, where you'll learn how to make classic local dishes (cuscocooking.com, from approx $40 per person). Peruvian grape brandy is served in many cocktail variations at Chilcano Pisco Bar (Calle Plateros 326,  $25). El Balcon is a quiet place to crash in a lovingly restored pre-colonial house (balconcusco.com, doubles from $80).

TOTAL: $165

SPLASH OUT

Have an early gourmet breakfast at Cicciolina, with fresh bread from the in-house bakery (cicciolinacuzco.com, $30). Pop into Planetarium Cusco, an offbeat attraction that superimposes Incan cosmology and astrology over modern maps of the constellations (planetariumcusco.com, $12), before boarding the Belmond Hiram Bingham luxury train to Machu Picchu. Nobody comes to Cusco without making a pilgrimage to those spectacular mountaintop ruins, and this is by far most comfortable way to go – in a plush observation carriage with fine food and wine included, followed by an expert guided tour of the site (belmond.com/hiram-bingham-train, round-trip from $700 approx). Squeeze in a massage at Inca Spa (incaspa.com/en, from $50 for 30 minutes), then settle into a patio suite at Inkaterra La Casona, a beautifully restored colonial manor house that once hosted the revolutionary aristocrat Simon Bolivar (inkaterra.com/inkaterra/la-casona, from $560).

TOTAL: $1360 approx