Machu Picchu // The Young Mountain

    The wake up call for the day was by far my least favorite part of this adventure. After barely having had slept the two days prior with all of the travel, I was wiped out and the alarm going off at 2:30AM did not put a smile on my face. Elise and I munched on a couple pieces of bread because nobody serves breakfast at 3:00 in the morning and we figured we should try to at least fuel up a little bit. Our tour guides picked us up around 3:15 and we had a one and a half hour bus ride to the train station at Ollantayambo. We met a son and father who were traveling from Philadelphia who were doing the tour with us and we spent most of the journey chatting with them and marvelling at the beauty of the train ride. The train ride was about another one and a half hours, but the scenery made it go by quick and we even got served complimentary tea. I had mint but they also offer coca, the traditional tea used in Peru often times to help people cope with altitude sickness. One minute everything was brown and dry, and the next there was bright green jungle life springing up around us on all sides.

    When we arrived at Aguas Calientes (the town just below Machu Picchu) we were greeted by our tour guide Hector whose native language was quechua (Incan language) but who also spoke Spanish, English and Portuguese. He was the sweetest man and I am so glad that we booked this trip through a tour company because if we hadn’t we would have missed out on learning so much cool stuff about the lost city. Hector taught us about the site and even taught us some quechua phrases. Aside from having such rich cultural history, Machu Picchu was simply breathtaking. The green jungle was beautiful and the sheer precision and effort put into building such incredible structures so long ago was astounding. BONUS: we even got to see a baby llama that was just four days old roaming around with its mama.

    We just went up to the Machu Picchu city and we didn’t do any of the other hikes since that wasn’t included in our particular tour. However there are a couple of hikes you do such as Machu Picchu mountain, Huayna Picchu and the Sun Gate. Machu Picchu means “young mountain” and Huayna Picchu means “old mountain” in Quechua. Only 400 people a day are allowed to climb Huayna Picchu daily so people have to book the trip months in advance. The Machu Picchu hike is longer but slightly easier and they only allow a set amount of people up every day as well. Huayna Picchu is known for being a shorter hike, but much more difficult due to the fact that it is so steep but it is also supposed to be immensely rewarding with the view. Some of the tour guides who do it multiple times a week have been known to do the entire hike in about 20 minutes which is absolutely unheard of for your average hiker.

    When we were done exploring we returned to Aguas Calientes where we ate a huge buffet lunch (we had barely eaten in 2 days) where we even tried alpaca meat which surprisingly wasn’t bad at all. Hector claimed that alpaca meat had no fat and no cholesterol but we aren’t entirely sure that we believe him. We strolled through the market and made a purchase or two. Although the town has a lot of tourists and the prices may have been a bit higher than in other spots, we still got pretty good deals on the things that we wanted. We hopped on the train when we were done and took a four hour train ride to get back to Cusco. After about fifty minutes in traffic our bus finally got back to our hostel where we promptly fell into deep sleeps with happy hearts and full spirits. Machu Picchu is the kind of place you think that you’ll only ever dream of going to and now that I’ve actually gone, it still seems like a bit of a dream. It is a check off of my bucket list and a truly unforgettable experience. Maybe I’ll even come back some day and hike the Inca Trail.

Chao por ahora,

Claire