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Published: November 30th -0001
Our bus to Cusco was cancelled and no-one told us so we had to wait for several hours in Puno for the next one. We finally arrived in Cusco at 9pm and we were starving, the first thing we did was look for food. Along the way we met some hippis, Alex and Antonio, they made us some gifts and took us to an english restaurant called the Real MCcoy. We had jacket potatoes with cheese and beans, it was so nice to have food from back home. The hippis sat with us throughout the meal and there was a bit of a language barrier but we got by. The next day the hippis took us on a tour around Cusco, they showed us the plazas, the twelve sided rock and took us to a great view point. The hippis introduced us to all their friends, played music for us and we drunk che cha with them which is the Inca beer. It was disgusting!!! From there we watched the sunset and see Cusco lit up at night.
From Cusco we did the Inca Trail so we spent our time getting last minute bits and visited the crafts market. On
the 18th June we got up at 5 o clock to go on the Inca Trail. We were both worried as people had told us how hard it was and at altitude even walking down the street could be hard work. On the bus our guides introduced themselves as Big Willy and Little Willy. We stopped at a place for breakfast and bought walking sticks and coca leaves. That day we hiked for 6 hours between the mountains and past rivers. We visited a ruin and stopped for lunch on the way. The porters run past us with 20kg on their backs in order to set up camp before we got there. The views on the trek were amazing there was a great big volcano which we cant remember the name of but was very beautiful and we passed Inca huts where people to this day still live. We reached the campsite late that afternoon and rested until dinner.
The camping was luxury camping. They woke us up half 5 in the morning with coca tea. That morning the porters said a little speech introducing themeselves to us, some of them even have two wives!! Today was the hardest
day of them all, it was an 8 hour hike uphill. We hired an extra porter to carry our things. At the beginning of the day Big Willy showed us the highest point of the trek which we were to reach that day. Dead Woman´s Pass. It is called this because it looks like a women laying down screaming. Our hike that day took us past forests, up inca stairs and then a steep climb to Dead Woman´s Pass. It was so hard especially because of the altitude, but the only way was to find your pace and keep on going otherwise it would make it worse. We stopped for a snack to give us energy for the last leg but not lunch otherwise it would make it harder to do the trek on a full stomach. We reached Dead Woman´s pass relieved and shattered. We had a group picture to prove we made it and rested for a short time. For the last hour or so we walked down hill. This is where our walking sticks really came in handy. We reached the campsite and all the porters clapped which was really nice. Our guides on the way were
very encouraging, every time we reached the top after a hard climb, Big Willy would high five all the group. Without the guides encouragement we probably would not have made it.
The group we were with were very nice, everyone helped each other. There were 2 germans, 2 americans, a canadian, 4 new zealanders and an older english couple. We slept that afternoon because we were so tired and then woke up for dinner. Again it was amazing views, we were above the clouds and could see them coming in towards us, at one point we were even in the clouds.
The next morning again we were woken up at 5.30 with coca tea. This day was the most fun. We walked up for hours until we reached the spot where Big Willy made his sacrafice to the Inca gods. We all had to carry a small rock from our campsite to this spot where we laid the rocks together with six sweets, two of each colour which represented mother earth and coca leaves. Each of us then carefully placed our rock with the sacrafice. We then started walking down to more Inca ruins where we challanged Big
Willy to run up the steps of the ruins. The steps were very steep and took several minutes to climb but he did it in 18 seconds!!! He gave us a talk about the ruins and we then continued on our journey. We walked through a jungle area with all sorts of weird trees and through Inca caves. The path on which we were walking on was built above the ground by the Incas. If you looked over the side it was a cliff drop and we were warned to stay to the inside as the porters had been known to knock people off the edge. The path went through a valley and we started our decent down 2000 steps. They were Inca steps and either huge or narrow and it was quite dangerous. Big Willy and Little Willy were racing down the steps and did it in 15 minutes but took us 1 hour. We then run and jumped down the last part of the trek it was really fun. We were the first to reach the campsite and we headed off to have the only shower there was in 4 days. That evening we looked at the stars
which were beautiful. Our guides put us in the the tent next to them so they could talk to us during the night and Big Willy and Little Willy started hitting on us trying to get us to stay up drinking with them that night.
The next morning we woke up at 3 o clock and started walking in the dark with our torches to Macchu Picchu. Today was the 21st June and winter solstice a very special day in the Inca calender. We arrived at Macchu Picchu at 6am and watched sunrise over the mountains. There were hundreds of people there and on that particular day the sun rose at special points on the ruins within Macchu Picchu. It was fantastic to see and we felt honoured to be there on that day. Big Willy then gave us a tour of the ruins which were unbelievable. The tour ended and we had the opportunity to explore the ruins. We stayed and relaxed, enjoying the views. We then got a bus to Aguas Caliente where we met with the group for lunch. Right outside the restaurant was the train tracks and we watched the old trains go past. After
lunch we went to the hot springs with one of our guides. We did not spend long there because they were not very nice and smelt. The only good thing was the music. We then got a train back to Cusco which took hours. The train had to come down the mountain and did so by zig zagging backwards and forwards stopping everytime. It was so boring but it did give us great views over Cusco.
When back in Cusco we said goodbye to our group apart from Dustin and Amy who were in our hostel and arranged to meet up with some of the group for Inti Raymi Festival. We really enjoyed the Inca Trail, we would recommend that anyone who gets the opportunity does it. It is one of the best things we have done if not the best. For two people who have never camped properly before we had a great time. The food throughout was the best we have had so far in Peru. Every morning we were given a snack bag, had plenty of coca tea, which helped with the altitude and had popcorn and biscuits. We had pancakes and porridge for the breakfast
and the meals for lunch and dinner were soup, a main dish and desert. It was so good, it would rival most restaurants in London and the cook and the porters did such a good job. We were happy for the pain to be over as we were both in agony but not for the experience and we would both do it again in the future.
Back in Cusco Inti Raymi Festival was coming up on the 24th June. There was a parade everyday each one in a different plaza. Young boys would carry religious figures meant to be saints out of the churches. They were so heavy with 20 of them carrying it they were clenching their faces in agony. That evening there was a big festival with fireworks in the main plaza. We met up with Dustin, Amy and little William, we watched the fireworks had local beer and danced salsa in the street. Whilst in Cusco we visited several markets. The meat was just hanging up, not refrigerated and there were frogs in buckets being sold. We also visited some great restaurants including a mexican which we went back to several times and one with lots
of kids toys everywhere even though it was not a kids restaurant. Our local bar was Ukukus, it did great cocktails and had a live band every evening and later turned into a club where we could dance salsa, samba and reggaton.
On the 24th June we had an early start and climbed to sexy woman which are ruins where the main festival was held. We were there early so we could get a decent spot to sit. As time went on more and more people came and pushed in front. The old man in front of us was funny as he kept on yelling at people but made friends with us. To pass the time we tested out the local street food and ate so much that morning. As the festival began part of the crowd stood up and shoved there way forward. Everyone was chucking food and bottles at them and gradually it become chaos. We ended up not seeing that much of the festival but it was a great atmosphere. We went back to Ukukus that night and watched a hippi band who played some traditional peruivan music. It was a great night. The next day
we left to go to Huancayo via Lima.
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Mum J
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Long Live The Hippies!!
Hi Girls How fantastic the amazing Inca Trail sounds! I want to go there too!! The two of you should be so proud of yourselves in achieving this adventure so far, and the way in which you have wrote it - I feel like i'm on it with you. Keep on enjoying it and look after each other. Love you loads Mum J XXX