Joaquin Randall

Ollantaytambo, Cusco

Joaquin Randall runs El Albergue, a family-run hotel in Ollantaytambo that has been in operation since 1975. If the walls could talk at El Albergue! The history and mood of this inn remind me of a mix of Casablanca, Fawlty Towers, and Out of Africa—full of love, humor, adventure, and drama.

El Albergue sits within the Ollantaytambo train station—the last stop before reaching Machu Picchu. Its facade faces the train tracks, and the buzz and excitement of the travelers is felt within the hotel. The overall atmosphere at El Albergue Inn is one of warmth, charm, and an ever-present sense of adventure.

Joaquin took the reins from his mother, Wendy Weeks, and has folded in his passion for environmental stewardship to the core of El Albergue. We sat with Joaquin in the garden, as the water from the Incan aquifers gently flowed nearby, discussing his vision for a sustainable future and the difference between a traveler and a tourist.

Where were you born?

I was born here in Ollantaytambo, Peru.

And when you say “here,” you mean literally right here… was it a home birth?

Yeah, well, actually, I was born here in El Albergue, which is my family home, and that was in 1979. It was a home birth, and my father was actually the midwife... mid-husband? (laughs).

It was a very different place back then. I feel that "here" is now, but back then, it was very different. Ollantaytambo has changed. Tourism was nonexistent, and it was basically a farming community with no potable water, electricity, telephones, or anything of that sort. So, physically, it is the same place, but in so many ways—technologically and culturally—it has changed enormously. Physically, I was born here, but now, it is not the same place.

Well, the world has changed...

Yes, the world has changed overall. I think the world had already changed back then, but Ollantaytambo hadn't.

It was still a time bubble...

Yes, very much so.

Well, since you mentioned it, that was one of my later questions: culturally, how has it changed?

I think the multiple waves of people coming here from diverse backgrounds have influenced this area. It’s changed many aspects of life—not the essence, but it has expanded the ways of life. There are people who’ve moved here to the Sacred Valley who don’t even speak Spanish, much less Quechua.

When I was born here, the population was mainly Quechua-speaking with strong local traditions and farming customs. That was the essence of life in the Andes. Since then, the economy has diversified, the fiestas have evolved, and community traditions have changed. Even religions have changed. Many people in Ollantaytambo were Catholic back then, but now many have converted to evangelical Christianity. The population has exploded; I think there were about a thousand people in the village when I was born, and now it is over 5,000 or 6,000. Compared to the 50,000 or 60,000 living in Urubamba, that may not sound significant, but it is.

How was growing up in Ollantaytambo?

It was a special place; we had these two worlds—one inside the walls of El Albergue. My mother, Wendy, and her husband, Randall, as he was known, came from the US, and they had two sets of business partners—a Canadian couple and a British couple—each with their own kids. The Hollands were the Brits, and the Dirks family were the Canadians.

So we kind of had our little commune of sorts and were just trying to make ends meet. My father was a writer, and my mother, who is a painter today, were trying to find an alternative life away from the United States, from whatever the rat race of the capitalist world was.

And where were they from in the States?

My mother was raised in Seattle, and my father was raised in California. The Pacific Northwest for my mother and California for my dad, and they met in California and traveled over the course of two years through Latin America before settling here.

So we had this international, foreign kind of enclave here. My mother never liked the term "hippie," but I guess it might have applied.

And the Brits and Canadians, what happened to them?

They went back to Canada around ’87 or so; the Brits moved to Cuzco around the same time, and in the 1990s they moved to Australia.

And are you still in touch?

Yeah, we are still in touch. Maxi Holland lives in Lima now, and his four siblings live across the world in Australia and Spain. One of them I was talking to yesterday; he is in London now. The Canadian girls live in Canada. So yes, we are still in touch; we've been to each other's weddings.

So we had that commune, and the other side of growing up in Ollantaytambo was growing up amongst Quechua-speaking children. We went to the public school here in Ollantaytambo. It was a very different time in many ways. Most kids' families were farmers. We would go to the primera lampa or segunda lampa—that was how we would do the fundraising if your class wanted extra cash for a class trip or something. All the kids would be taken to someone's farm to provide labor. That was mountain living back then. A lot of people here still live like that. It's this kind of bucolic farming community where you get up early, work on the farm, start drinking chicha, and eat traditional food…

Here is Fortunato [Fortunato walks by], who I went to elementary school with—we’re still friends. So many of the people in town—we've known each other since we were born. I was a foreigner to some extent, and that was my identity. I had that tag on me—I was a “gringo,” but I was also born here and lived here. At some point, they realized we weren't going away (laughs).

My father passed away when I was 11, and that was hard for us. My brother lived in the States by then; he was 13. But I was living here with my mom when he passed away, and we just stayed here. Except for the few years I went away to college, I've been here in El Albergue all my life.

I suppose where you are born and where you grow up are imprinted on you for life…

Yes, Ollantaytambo is exceptional. There are a lot of places you can consider generic in some way or another, but the historical nature of Ollantaytambo—with the Inca archaeology, the Quechua culture, and the contemporary culture—is unique. Add to that its proximity to Cuzco and Machu Picchu. People came here to study this area, so I grew up with people fascinated by the Andes, the people, the language, the music, the archaeology, the history, and the traditions. I met many anthropologists, historians, architects, and archaeologists.

Do you speak Quechua?

I speak enough Quechua to make a fool of myself; enough Quechua to get by. I'm not fluent in any way.

They say language is a bridge to a culture. Do you think you have a different worldview because of the Quechua you speak?

I don't think I'm fluent enough for it to be deeply ingrained in my mental processes, but I did grow up bilingual with English and Spanish. My understanding of Quechua is enough to know there are some grammatical nuances that really change the way you perceive the world.

Or certain words…?

Well, one thing I came to understand through language is that the mythological nature of history in the Andes is actually reinforced by the Quechua language. The language does not allow for the factual transmission of events. In Quechua, if you weren't a witness to something, you basically can't say for a fact that it happened. You have to relate it as hearsay. So historical facts become hearsay quickly because unless you were really there, the grammar changes. In English, you can say, "Christopher Columbus sailed to the Americas in 1492." In Quechua, you can't say that. Literally, the grammar would be incorrect; you have to say, "It is said that Christopher Columbus sailed to the Americas in 1492."

That's fascinating…

So that switching grammar, you have to do that every time something happens. In English, I know my wife is coming back from Cuzco today, but I haven't seen her arrive yet. Since I have not witnessed her coming back, in Quechua I can't say that. If I see her coming, I say “hamunmi," and if I just know that she's coming, I have to say “hamunsi.”

So "mi" and "si" are the qualifiers.

That's the interesting thing I like about Quechua grammar. I probably got some parts of it wrong; a linguist would be able to explain this a little bit more, but I did study some linguistics in college.

And where did you go to university, and what did you study?

I went to Tulane University in New Orleans. I was in the Latin American Studies department, and my focus was on sustainability and development, basically.

So you would go to the US for holidays. How often would you go?

When we were young, we would go every couple of years or so for a month or two. My parents thought it was perfect for us during our Peruvian summer holidays, so January and February. We would go to Seattle in the middle of winter, and they'd put us in school.

It was a good way to take in American culture and not be entirely foreign. It would be one thing to go from Lima to the US, but to go from Ollantaytambo to Seattle was such a shock.

And how was your adaptation?

Seattle was hard for me because I came out of Ollantaytambo where I was kind of a big fish in a small pond. In Seattle, I was kind of anonymous. Nobody knew me, and everyone had their friends and was in their comfort zone. I was like a fish out of water suddenly. So I finished high school in Seattle and then actually traveled for a year. I went traveling to East Africa.

How was that?

That was good. It was a little humbling because I thought, "I'm from Peru, I'm 18 years old, I can handle the third world." But I woke up in Nairobi one morning next to this African market and thought, "Whoa, this is very different. This is not Peru at all." It was an amazing learning experience. I've always kind of been a foreigner in my own home, but there I felt completely foreign. I had to learn to travel, to get to know new cultures, new languages, new locations… but it was a good experience.

How was doing a gap year back then, pre-internet and cellphone days?

Yeah, there were a few backpackers along the way. Everybody was still traveling with a Lonely Planet book.

Information and connectivity weren't instant…

Yes, you couldn't just write someone and be like, “Hey, tell me how things are there.” You would just show up and find out for yourself. But it was a great experience, really eye-opening in a lot of ways. It was very liberating because I think that's actually the only time I’ve been distant from Ollantaytambo, and I was free from Ollantaytambo—probably for the only time in my life. I would spend months without even thinking about this place. I would send a postcard once every month or two, and that was it.

Back when postcards were mailed…

Yeah, now with my kids, I need to know if they moved from one part of the town to another. I don't think my mom even knew what country I was in half the time when I was in Africa.

How was it growing up in a hotel, and such a picturesque one?

The hotel was different back then because we had a lot of people who would come and stay for longer periods—artists, writers, and historians. For most of my childhood, we had six bedrooms with a shared bath. It didn't feel like the bustle of activity we have nowadays. It was very much a backpacker establishment, although the type of backpackers we had then didn't feel like the backpackers of today. They felt more like travelers, whereas now you see a lot of tourists. They were multi-year adventurers.

That's interesting, the word "travelers" versus "tourists."

I think there’s a huge difference.

How would you differentiate them?

Well, I think a tourist is going on a vacation; it has a beginning and an end, and a purpose. Then they go back to whatever their life was.

I think a traveler is open to the idea that this adventure might change their life forever. It’s a different mindset: I might stay, I might go home, I might start a business, I might die. Whereas most tourists have this certainty, with a beginning and an end date, and then they go back to normal life.

Like a pause.

Yes, a little pause. Whereas travelers back then were people who probably sold their home and their business, or never had one and were just making their lives. There was a level of excitement to that. They weren't just here as observers; they were actually living here and traveling.

Like your parents?

Like my parents, yeah. And a lot of them worked or stayed for prolonged periods. That was fun. And there are still some of these types of people nowadays. You’d meet people, and then they'd go. One thing that's been hard for me living here is that a lot of people, even the travelers, would end up leaving, so establishing long-term friendships and connections with a lot of people has proved difficult. I had this illusion when I was a kid that we would all grow up and just live here—all the families. Basically, eight of us were born here at El Albergue. I'm the only one who stayed and actually made a permanent life here.

Ollantaytambo feels much more authentic and local to me than Urubamba. While Ollantaytambo has gone from a population of 1,000 to 5,000, Urubamba has...

…exploded.

Yes. When I was there, I was also surprised I didn't meet many people actually from Urubamba. Here, I think most people are originally from here.

I think because Ollantaytambo is an archaeological site. Behind you, there’s a stone wall; these are all Inca terraces. There's very little opportunity for urban expansion. You can't get a permit to build in Ollantaytambo, essentially. So most of the construction here is illegal. The only people that feel comfortable doing that are the locals. A foreign business owner is not going to risk getting sued by the government. If Ollantaytambo were not such a significant archaeological location, we'd probably be a larger town than Urubamba. It’s been sufficient to dissuade tons of people from moving here.

It’s a blessing that it’s been declared Historical Patrimony…

It’s a blessing in disguise, I suppose. You have this tight-knit community here where people love it so much and identify with the land. Like Paucartambo, the center of Paucartambo is still owned by the old families of Cusco.

Ollantaytambo is special… and if I could tell you a story of how things work here: There is a fiesta coming up. We have this whole network of relationships that allow you to build the facilities for the fiesta. If you are in charge of carrying a part of the festival, you are called the carguyoq. You accept the charge. Once you take that on, you are responsible for hosting a dance group and the musicians and all these guests during the four days of the festival. In order to do that, you are expected to put out everything you have—the best of your resources. They really expect you to invite all of your friends and family to your home and share with them big meals all day—breakfast, lunch, and dinner. And the only way you can afford that, traditionally, is by having other people support you. The way you get that support is by having family relations and also extra relations through compadrazgos. So the more compadres, padrinos, and ahijados you have, the larger your network of people that you can draw from to help you in an event like this. And the same goes for working your home or building your farm. Even in 2023, people understand the importance of this network of support. You can count on these people to come and help you when you need it. It’s this ayni kind of tradition.

The ayni is still very much alive here. For the fiesta, you need to go to your compadres a couple of months ahead with a jurk'a bread—which is a special bread that is made just for the jurk’a—and you take the bread and beer, wine… and you invite those people to join you during the fiesta. They will say they will be there for you, but they will not just be there; they'll bring a sack of potatoes or a few cases of beer, or they'll offer to help and cook.

Are you padrinos to any people?

I have multiple godchildren and compadres, and I also inherited the compadres and ahijados of my parents. And because my dad died, I actually had to stand in for a lot of these events, or my mother. So I would be the padrino for their weddings, and these people are 15 years older than me, but I would still be the padrino. I would be like, "But I’m a child next to you!" (laughs) They still call me padrino.

What would you do if you didn’t have El Albergue?

I'm not sure exactly. I'm really into environmental work now. During the pandemic, we actually started our own environmental program. It's called Valle Sagrado Verde (vallesagradoverde.org), and you can see the work that we are doing on the website.

Can you summarize the work you are doing?

We do conservation, restoration, and reforestation in natural areas in Ollantaytambo right now. We are also expanding to Cusco province, from the Valle Sagrado starting in Puno La Raya and going all the way down to the Pongo de Mainique. I'd like to see it go from 500 meters of elevation up to 4,500 meters in La Raya. Right now, we've been planting trees, and we have a nursery in the hotel.

How do you choose what trees to plant?

We did a survey of the area to see what trees are in it. Basically, we just go to the mountain sites and collect the seeds from the trees that are there. Then we start those in our nursery. So far, we have planted over 1,500 trees, and hopefully, we'll have around 50,000 trees available to plant by the end of this year.

We had over 6,000 trees on this mountainside here. There was a fire that went through last year, and those trees that were already two years old—it burned that entire section of reforestation. It was devastating. We are going to plant more trees here. Then, when we went back, the trees that we planted were already shooting up new sprouts, so they survived. Because the roots were already two years old, they were strong enough, and the rains that came helped them recover.

They are probably going to grow back even better...

Yeah.

And how do you choose the land? Is it government land?

So we work with the communities, and they identify the land where they want to plant trees. Now we set up fire brigades that are essentially the stewards of the land, preventing fires. I like that term "steward" because they are protectors, and just anybody can be a steward of the land.

Now we are doing this thing where we are actually pruning and trimming the trees in forested areas to make them more resilient to fires and to help them grow faster and stronger. That's a pilot program, so we'll see the results of that.

Here we are up on the mountainside, and mainly it's just the cattle and the ranchers.

Are you into Inca cosmology?

I have some interest. My father was very much obsessed with it—in cosmology in general, not just Incan. That was really his thing. I do like the ideas behind the relationship between Andean people and nature and the land. I love the fact that the mountains, the sun, the moon, and the lakes are the sacred objects. So as far as religious processes, it helps you keep yourself grounded and connected. Instead of having a religion that is otherworldly, it's a religion that's actually designed for this planet and from this planet. Whatever the thinking is behind that. But I’m not especially a religious person…

“Not religious”…?

Not institutionalized religion, a system of beliefs. I think the Incas walked the line where everything is just one, and your belief system is not separate from your everyday actions. So religion was connected to farming and to agriculture and to life. And life was connected to your belief system. So it has this natural cycle of understanding who you are and how you live and how you connect to nature, and the world we live in provides everything that we have.

I think the pandemic made people connect to that type of philosophy. A lot of people fled Lima to be more connected to nature…. And this segues into my next question: how has technology affected tourism or traveling; and are you nostalgic for the days before the internet?

I just heard the statistics that 70% of travelers to Peru are now independent travelers. So most tourists used to travel with tour companies; nowadays anyone can book a train, an airplane ticket, and a hotel directly. So that's driven a huge change, with a lot of independent travelers, and a lot of people making their plans at the last minute.

So it's cutting out the middle man...

Yeah, in a way. Am I nostalgic? I'm nostalgic for an age where we didn't need so much. And I think global capitalism has told us that being successful is having a large house, a large car, and lots of stuff, and toys, and all these things. But I think that if we draw back or cut back the amount of things and the amount of stuff that we have, it will help us have a better relationship with the world and with nature. In a way, I miss that. We needed so little when I was a kid. We had no technology... I think we had a radio.

Are you optimistic about the future?

I am cautiously optimistic about the future. I think we are in time to avoid some kind of massive calamity, hopefully. I mean, there's a good chance that this could end up in a catastrophe, but now the way things are shifting, even the conflicts that are appearing today, are a recognition of a need for change.

I agree…and I feel that we are going through a beautiful shift.

It's not really beautiful [laughs].

I think it's beautiful because I feel like people are waking up. I interviewed Jane Goodall in Cambodia in 2000 and I asked her if she was optimistic about the future. She said, "Of course I am,” and proceeded to tell me a beautiful story about a community of kids that were charged with cleaning up a small lake that was terribly polluted. It was basically a dead lake—no fish, no plant life… they handed it over to the kids to be the stewards. And within months, the lake was thriving. It was restored, full of fish and plant life. She said: “Nature always recovers if you give her a chance.”

I think people are waking up little by little…

Last question: What are your favorite places as a local?

I love just walking on mountain paths—you don’t have to go far. Just get out of town. Just get on a bicycle or go for a walk… go for a hike…

There are ruins all over. Even in Ollantaytambo, where we see thousands of tourists coming through every day, there are endless areas that are not visited by any tourists. I don’t have a specific place; just to get off the beaten path.