Day 11: Out and About in Cusco

We spent our last day in Cusco having free time. We saw lots of depictions of the God of the Sky (condor), earth (puma, and underworld (serpent). We found a local mall and Home Depot when we were looking for alpaca jerky.  Finally, we found Andy an Inca Kola shirt so he could remember his "love." What an awesome trip it was. The pic of Andy asleep on our way home in the airport, he is using our hand woven blanket we bought from the women's weaving coop in the Sacred Valley.

The main plaza in Cusco

Day 10: Rainbow Mountain

Our last hike of the trip was also our highest. It was over 16000 feet. It was the first time in the trip that the altitude affected me. For about the first 30 minutes or so, I felt like I was gasping for air if I took any more than tiny steps and  had to keep myself calm because I thought I might hyperventilate. I acclimated though after the first half hour or so. It took us about two hours to talk up to Rainbow Mountain and about 35 to get down. The colors are from the minerals in the dirt and vary based on the seasons and rain.

Day 9: Wayna Picchu

The  original bridge to enter Machu Picchu... .eek!

After exploring Machu Picchu some more, we hiked up the mountain on the other side of the ruins called Wayna Picchu. Andy didn't like the height at all but he was a trooper and went up with us. 

Day 8: Inca Trail Day 4

Today we started before the sun so the porters could make the first train back to the start of the trail. Unfortunately the only way into Machu Picchu town or "Aguas Calientes" is by train and it is privately owned. They do not want the porters riding with the tourists so they are only allowed to take the first train down of the day when the train goes back empty after bringing people up. It leaves at 6 am. We had to wait for about an hour and half after the first 20 minutes of walking for the passport checkpoint to open up at 6. Its a sad system. They were checkpoints all along the way we had to clear with our guides because the Inca trail is highly regulated now. You cannot do it without a guide, permit and they have to make sure you don't stay behind in the forest. The sunrise as we descended into Machu Picchu valley was beautiful. After crossing the sun gate to watch the sun hit Machu Picchu we toured for about an hour and then headed to our hotel for a shower and more food! We hit the hot springs that night and had a great sleep since the next day we were headed back up for more hiking :D.

Day 7: Inca Trail Day 3

Day 3 was our longest day. We hiked for 5 or 6 hours and stopped for lunch. We saw several Inca sites along the way and left behind the arid high desert for the high jungle and cloud forest. This is the part of the trail with steep cliffs on one side and I kind of freaked out in the picture where Andy put me on his shoulders and started getting closer to the edge for a better picture. It was a LONG way down! For lunch our porters had a great surprise for us! Two cakes! This whole time the chefs cooked everything on propane stove and we were very well fed. The porters carried 7 kg each for us plus our tents mats and sleeping bags and then all the food, chairs, propane, and any and all other gear. They are amazing. Below there is a photo of us at the summit of the cloud forest with all of our porters and guides. For the 16 hikers,we had 19 porters and two guides. Kiki on the left was the head guide and Elias on the right the assitant guide. They took excellent care of us. We couldn't converse with the porters since they only speak Quechuan, the language of the native villages in the mountains but our guides translated for us some. It rained in the afternoon and then it poured! Considering the great weather the rest of the trip we felt very fortunate but I wouldn't love to see some of those rainforest vistas as we descended in the afternoon. It rains 95% of the time and is almost always cloudy so I guess many people don't get to see it. We headed to bed early because our final day of the hike started at 430 AM!

Day 6: Inca Trail Day 2

We started the day before dawn and had a warm breakfast of porridge and pancakes. This was our highest day where we reached the summit of "Dead Women's Pass" at 13828 ft. We stopped twice for a longer break along the way and it was FREEZING the closer we got to the top, but we decided to wait a few hundreds yard short of the top for the rest of our group. We got to reach the summit all together. The worst part for me was that after we reached the top, we still had to walk about two hours downhill. It was super steep. The uphill was basically stairs and switchbacks the whole way but then the downhill was just straight stairs down. I was very grateful Amanda loaned me her knee brace because the downhill hurt with every step. Andy however RAN down the mountain and beat everyone to our camp for the night by a good hour and a half!

In the middle of the previous picture you can see the valley where we had lunch... Yes... not where we started... but where we had lunch. We basically walked up stairs straight up all the way from that valley. OUCH!

Right by Andy's sleeve in this pic you can see a red tiny dot.... that is our base camp for the second night and the pass at the top is what we came over on day two (the one with snow :-0 ). You can see the trail coming down to in the vegetation line. We climbed back up the other side the next day.... YIKES!