The Inca Trail to Machu Picchu

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So we arrived in Cusco a few days ahead of the start of the Inca trail to acclimatize to the altitude. This meant we had some free time to explore this beautiful city. With a current population of 349,000 Cusco use to be the Inca empire’s capital city. Today the Inca history is visible everywhere from the cobblestone streets to the walls and buildings built without mortar. Discovering the streets and visiting the Inca museum to learn more about this civilization was fascinating and Cusco will defiantly be a city that I will always remember.

The night before our trek started we stayed in a village outside Cusco called Ollantaytambo in the Sacred Valley where there are yet more Inca ruins. Again another quaint cobbled street village which was very picturesque.

The Inca Trail to Machu Picchu

The Inca trail is the famous trek that was a pilgrim for the Inca’s. It is only 43km in distance but reaches a peak of 4200m and moves over many mountain peaks and through the jungle. It is spread between 4 days and 3 nights of trekking and camping. Before we started the trek we were given a brief of what we should expect and what we need to take. We were each given a duffle bag with a 6kg weight limit. 2kg was to be taken up by your sleeping bag and 1kg by your inflatable mattress leaving only 3kg of space left for 4 days of hiking! This was the first challenge that we all had to overcome….what did we ACTUALLY need to take. After many visits to the scales the check the weight of our duffels we all realized that only 1 or 2 tops would be all we could take….we were in for a smelly few days!

Day 1

We started from what is known as kilometer 82 at Piskacuchu. The first day was only 11km and was over very flat terrain. We were all in high spirits and the sun was shining despite being warned of 4days constant heavy rainfall as we were in the rainy season! We soon learnt that for the 12 of us in our group we had two guides, 18 porters and 2 chefs accompanying us!!!The porters were running past us on the trail carrying various bags on their backs filled with everything we would need (each had a limit of 20kg). Our guides soon told us about how some of the porters in other companies are treated but how G Adventures look after their’s. It was easy to spot which porters were not with G adventures as their bags and shoes where in really bad condition. The porters deserve so much praise though….its incredible what they do over the 4 days and no matter how hard we found things, it was a lot harder for them! Our first stop was for lunch in one of the valleys where we got to sample the food that we would be eating over the next couple of days….it was amazing!!! The table was laid waiting for us and we had 3 courses, soup, meat dish and dessert and we all agreed that the food was better than in some of the restaurants we had eaten in in town! After a short time to digest the food we hit the trail again to make it to our first camp site. On the way we past some ruins and started to learn more about the history of what we were undertaking. When we arrived at the campsite the tents were already up and there was warm water waiting for us to wash our faces, it was great. We were then informed that each day we would have tea before dinner and so headed for the dinning tent. Before us was hot chocolate, coffee, tea, crackers and ……..popcorn! we were in heaven, it was great! Dinner later was again 3 courses, we were all stuffed! (so much for my idea that I would lose some weight on this trek!) Once tucked up in our tents the heavens opened and there was an impressive thunder storm, but luckily our tent did not leak and I slept really well!



Day 2

5.30 wake up call meant that we were at day two which is renowned for being really hard. The obstacle that awaited us was 1200m upwards to reach the top of Dead Womans Pass at 4200m. Again the sun was out as the thunderstorm had long moved on. After a breakfast of porridge and pancakes with toffee sauce(!!!)off we went on what seemed like a never ending staircase upwards. It was unrelenting. I was with two guys at the front walking at a good pace. After 3 hours of trekking with some well deserved rests in-between we eventually reached the top of Dead Woman’s Pass (named due to the silhouette formed by the mountain resembling a woman lying down, rather than that woman die doing it!) We waited at the top for over 2 hours for the rest of the group to make it before having to descend 600m in height down another set of stairs to our campsite for the night where we had our lunch, tea and dinner, all completely different menus to the day before and just as tasty and filling! Camping close to the cloud forest meant that that evening we were soon surrounded in the cloud and another thunderstorm took place in the neighboring valley.



Day 3

Know as the Gringo killer and with all of our bodies aching for the day before we were a bit apprehensive of this day. It is termed the gringo killer as after climbing a small peak for about an hour you have to descend steps downwards for 2hrs which can really kill your knee’s! However, having said that none of us seemed to agree with this name. After the initial peak was reached it was a great downwards walk and the views as they have been for the last 2 days were amazing. When we had our lunch stop we were then also allowed our first glimpse at Machu Picchu Mountain. It felt so close and we all felt such a sense of achievement, we then couldn’t wait to get there. That night camp was just 6km away from Machu Picchu. Again on this day we had past many other ruins and you could feel the anticipation in the air for what was to come when we reached Machu Picchu. It was this evening that we were also treated to the luxury of our first hot shower so that we could look half clean in our photos the following day and no longer smell!! (on day 2 there was a shower, but only with freezing cold water from the river which most of us declined!)



Day 4

The race was on…..there was 7 groups camping in our campsite and we all wanted to be the first to Machu Picchu! The control point to let us on the final part of the trek didn’t open until 5.30, but we agreed to wake up at 3 to try and get to the front of the queue at the control point. We arrived there at 3.50 and unbelievably there was already 1 group in front of us!! We then had to sit there in the dark and wait until 5.30. Whilst waiting we could see as the sun started to rise that we were not blessed with the same weather as the last 3 days……we were still in the cloud forest and the clouds were not lifting, just raining on us instead….so for the first time our rain ponchos came out. Finally at 5.30 we were let through the control gate and started towards the sun gate in our ponchos. The sun gate is the first place where you get a glimpse of Machu Picchu. After 45minutes of continuous walking we reached the Sun Gate only to find that Machu Picchu was hidden in clouds and rain…..not a great feeling after having trekked for 3 days to get there! But nevertheless we kept positive for the weather as it was still really early! 45mintues walk from the Sun Gate you reach the ruins of Machu Picchu and finally the clouds had started to lift and we got our first glimpse of the ruins, and what a breathtaking sight it was, amazing!! After some group photo´s we had a tour of the ruins and then free time to roam and take as many photo´s as we wanted. Unfortunately you are never alone here. The bus and train loads of people soon start filling the place up but that still doesn’t detract from the magic of the place. I took loads of photo´s but can only bore you all with a couple on here, so hopefully these ones do it justice!

At 1pm we had to head down to Aguas Calientes where we had a quick bite to eat before catching a train back to reality..... We had two remaining nights in Cusco where we celebrated in the bars our sucess of surviving the trek before heading to our next destination, Puno and Lake Titicaca!

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Photos

At the beginning
The group full of enery and anticipation

At the top of Dead Womans Pass
After about 20minutes rest so that my heart and lungs could recover!