Machu Pichu- Inca Adventuring!

When I think of Peru I think The Emperor’s New Groove which is one of my most favouritest Disney films and I dream of llamas and emperor Cusco and lots of green cartoon hills. However, I have learned that not everyone is a fan of the movie (how could they not be) and most people think of the old empire of Machu Pichu and it is the pinnacle thing to do when visiting Peru. As a tourism officer told Roman, “We don’t charge people for visas to enter Peru, we just charge them for Machu Pichu", and yes, charge you they do.

Roman had done some extensive researching online about the Macho Pichu thing and from this we decided that instead of doing the official Inka Trail (which can cost anything upward of $500) we would to the Inka Jungle Trek which was a four day adventure, for less money where you walk AN Inka trail if not THE Inka trail. The day we were set to start out we waited outside our hostel at the appointed time of 7.30am. After waiting for 45 minutes we finally concluded we were forgotten and at this moment a very very very short woman arrived in a taxi (we were staying on the smallest one way street in the world) and got out, got us, hailed another taxi and took us to another part of the city where we got on our bus and which drove us bumpily into the Andes. The bus wound around bump and curve and curve and bump and amazingly the German sitting next to us fell asleep with his head lolling in front of him and sometimes on my shoulder. We wound up and up and up through these mountains for a couple of house and the fog and cold slowly descended upon us and at the top of the mountain the bus stopped and I put on all the warm stuff I owned and some knee and shoulder pads and helmet and got on a mountain bike to wiz down these hills. Well we wizzed down the mountain and through the cloud we were in and it was amazingly beautiful yet very wet and as it was donhill it wasn’t really cycling but really braking (which gets painful on the hand after an hour or so of it  and we cycled through little river and through other little river and the rain came and soaked us through and we continued for what seemed like HOURS until we arrived at a stop next to a waterfall and construction was stopping everyone at this place in the road for another hour and a half. Fun. Many people were there and it was a bit festive with guys having a rock throwing competition and taking pictures and Argentinians jumping under a waterfall (a 60 year old man and his son, what a legend).

We finally continued on to our hostel that night (this time drier and in the van) and arrived in Santa Maria which is a beautiful little Andean town. We walked around looking for amusement and found a trampoline which we tried to get onto until a man shouted at us to give us money. Then we saw

some kids and a volleyball net and we asked to join them and thus ended up playing volleyball in the Andean sunset with what I came to understand to be the catholic girl’s orphanage. They were pretty good volleyball players and I think this may be thanks to the Italian girl volunteering there (Italians are mad volleyball players) but nevertheless we were impressed and sad to leave our little orphan girls, and a part of was thinking of abandoning the trip and just staying there to practice Italian and play Volleyball atop an Andean sunset every night. 

This story may have been cooler had I given into that desire yet the next day found me and my group beginning out trek along a beautiful river and through lovely forests. The 16 other people of our group compromised of 4 Irish men,2 Canadians, 2 Italians, an Australian, 3 Americans, a German and an

Israeli and they were all great. Well mostly. I never learned the Irishmen’s names because they were somewhat insular and one of the Canadian’s was sick most of the time, didn’t even try the cycling, and didn’t seem to like life much in general. But otherwise they were excellent. The Italian couple had only got married 2 weeks before. They were in their late thirties and in their cute accents she told the story that a little while ago they were drinking lots at a party and she said “Why don’t we have a party and get married?” and I guess he said yes so they had a party and got married and were going home in a few days to have another party for their friends and we were all invited! I went through the logistics of flying to Florence for a wedding party and realized it was somewhat impractical … Otherwise the Americans were rad, a hilarious Thai-american named Laty who was a choreographer and girl who does some rad volunteer nursing projects and made me regret my squeamishness and consider nursing for a moment. The Australian was on his way after Machu Pichu to go on a 7 day Ayahuasca journey in the mountains with an Ayahuasca guy who was apparently not a shaman but he knew his stuff. For those who don’t know, Ayahuasca is a hallucinogenic made from the Caapi vine which many Peruvian people take for certain rituals and such. Our guide told us that on the drug ones memories become incredibly clear and thus people take it to remember those who have died and to keep them alive in a sense. Many people come to Peru to have a kind of spiritual experience on the drug and I have heard of doing up to 6 month journeys, taking it every 2 days. One of the things I know about Ayahuasca is it makes you throw up and I think it’s supposed to. Thus throwing up every second day for 6 months must be rather tiring. 

Anyway, our guides name was Guido which was fitting and he was nice enough. He showed us some Inka berries which made war paint and the coco plantations which is a pinnacle part of the Andean person’s life. The coc

a leaf is to the Peruvian, or Bolivian is an integral part of their lives and they use it for everything, energy, altitude sickness, ailments, skin diseases, sexual drive and of course, making cocaine. As soon as you get to a place of high altitude one is supposed to chew the leaves as it cures you of altitude sickness. I tried it a few times and wasn’t too excited about the dried leaves in my mouth or the taste of it in tea form. Luckily my altitude issues lasted only a few days. Yet the Peruvians are always chewing it and spitting it out and the older people have green teeth because of years of use.

Anyway it was a beautiful day and we ended the day pulled in a little box high across a raging river which was kind of thrilling (the grumpy Canadian girl wrapped her face in her hood, closed her eyes and cried) and the Italian man got out of the box exa
lted as he felt he had conquered his fear of heights And then we walked down to huge hot spring pools


where tons of tourists were soaking their day away. I found a child to play with who got very annoying after a while and wanted me to throw her across the water again and again, again and again and then tried to get us to buy stuff at her mom’s shop. Even the kids have agendas! Ah it sucks being a tourist. 

We went on to the next town for the night and watched a very emotive video at supper time about ziplining the next day. Roman and I were opting out of it because we “love to hike so much” which in reality meant we didn’t want to spend the extra money. However, grumpy Canadian had paid for it but decided not to do it after the frightening box experience and the Australian jumped on the opportunity to take her free spot. We were kind of jealous, but kept it quiet and went walking for the day with our guide, the Italians and the German and had a nice quiet day for a bit. When we met up with our group for lunch we were only too pleased to hear that the promotional video had been a lie for most of them and they only got to do 3 ziplines and spent most of the morning waiting around at the restaurant. I don’t know how well Roman and I held back our glee at their misfortune but yes, sometimes it is difficult to always have to travel on the cheap and deny yourself all those fun adventures stuff that everyone else gets to do as they didn’t decide to travel for an undefinable amount of time.

After lunch we began walking on the train tracks to Aguas Calientes which is the gateway town to Machu Pichu. After walking for a bit I remember I had left my hat at the restaurant and ran back to get it. I was only wearing my bra and my shorts and some Peruvian construction workers stopped me,
took out a surprisingly fancy camera and asked for a photo. It was my first photo op in South America and after this happening almost every day in Korea I was only too happy to have a little bit of my former fame and identity back. I continued on the way and enjoyed a moment on my own. It was a beautiful walk, the trees were exquisite, the mountains dramatic, the water clear and luscious. So little time had I had on my own in the last few months I soaked in every moment, listened to all the sounds and appreciated the incredible scenery.

Finally, we arrived in Aguas Calientes which is a tourist town of madness. Prices are hiked up and everything is a restaurant and hostel or hotel and “specials” are shouted about everywhere and all you can hear is English. It was a bit like Venice really, you are in Italy geographically but really you are in a hustling bustling global community with English shouted in different accents all around you. We enjoyed a happy hour which is 4 drinks for the price of one (yet 1 is the price of 4 drinks so it’s no deal really) and enjoyed the first really hot shower we had had in what felt like a year (Hot showers are ALWAYS touch and go in Peru and if you find a lukewarm one you are doing quite well). We had our final dinner with our group and then opted for an early night as we were waking at the glorious hour 3.45am for our trek up the mountain. 

We met some of our friends early and bought a coffee from an intelligent opportunistic vendor and started our journey. They checked our tickets and passport at the bottom of the mountain and started walking up. And up and up. It is an hour and a half of steps, steps and more steps. Big steps forever going up. Our guide had told us the walk takes from 45 minutes to an hour depending on your fitness and tha was enough of a challenge to make us gun it. Without stopping we huffed and puffed and the more we climbed the stronger we felt, so dark it was and the sun

started the rising and the dramatic mountains fell all around us as we saw the most wondrous of plant life and we got to the entrance of Machu Pichu in just 50 minutes. What heroes! We were right in the front and we waited for the grand opening. Well they checked our passports and then we were in and up some more stairs and around a corner and THERE IT WAS! Machu Pichu before our very eyes, we were in all those postcards, we were those pictures, it seemed unreal and here it was and! There was a million people. They kept coming, it was hard to take a picture that looked like it was just you there because tthye streamed in and in and in and in. We tried to eat a little food and their were all these guard people who kept on shouting at us telling us no eating and all this so we used our school day tactics and ate covertly and waited for our Guido- guide. 

Guido took us around and told us all kinds of interesting stuff, about Hiram Bingham (the guy who found the place) and well, to be honest I don’t remember much of what he said. But we followed him around and he said things about the place where the Inca ruler addressed the people and how the priests lived further up , near the sun as the sun was all important and about how the buildings are all but perfectly, the stone cut perfectly so that it fits atop each other and no cement or something like that is needed. Still today people do not know how to create these perfectly slanted stones and buildings. 

Guido talked a while and then he went and we rested a little bit and then it was time for our ext trek- Mount Machu Pichu. So the thing most people want to do when they go to Machu Pichu is hike Huayna Pichu because that is the mountain you see in the background when you look at a Machu Pichu postcard. It

also has some more Inca ruins to see up there. But it’s another one of those things you have to book months in advance which of course we didn’t do. Thus we hhiked the mountain on the other side, Machu Pichu mountain so we could see that view one sees on the postcard. Well it was more steps and steps and big steps and this time we werenot so motivated by the sunrise and huffed and puffed and at times I crawled up that mountain. An hour and 10 minutes of this excrutiating pain we arrived at the top to see a view that made every aching step worth it, glacial mountains in the distance, macho opichu small down below, all this tall peks, so much more pointy than the plateaus of the mountains back home. We had a picnic of joy at the top without the grumpy security guards shouting at us, and a nap and soon we were told it was time to go down the mountain. We stepped slowly down to the ruins and slowly and surely we walked around the ruins, overhearing interesting facts from other guides and stalking the llamas in the field. It was getting later in the afternoon an it seemed that all the tourists, after spending a ridiculous amount of money to get to and get into Machu Pichu they took some pictures after sunrise and then left and so the place was quiet w8th asome lingering people enjoying walking silently through the ancient place. 

It was time to go back down the mountain, have some supper and get non the train and a bus to go back to Cusco. We walked back down the millions of steps, somewhat elated after such a beautiful and worthwhile day. Funnily enough, considering I was one of the most un-amped person about the Machu Pichu thing itself I felt in the end I was the most unenthusiastic about the experience which just proves the (somewhat depressing) adage: Always greet everything with a manner of premeditated disappointment, and you will almost always be pleasantly surprised. And in this case, I was blown away.