Inca Trail

There are thousands of trails used by the anchient Inca people that extend over the entire Andian mountain range of South America. We hiked a 47km portion of one that starts in the sacred valley and ends in Machupichu. The trek was part of a 4 day tour which is now required to trek this part of the Inca trail. The trek began early tueday morning when a bus picked us up at our hostal. Four hours later we were at the trailhead and began the trek. Willbert, our guide gave us a lecture on the various plants along the trail along with some hallusinogenic species. These were used to ¨communicate with the gods¨. I was disapointed to learn that this experience was not included as part of the tour I got. The tour we were on consisted of 17 porters, a cook, an assistant guide and Wilbert, also 15 other American, British and Irish trekkers.



The trek went like this: the porters would run ahead of the group, set up the tent, cook food, take down everything and do it again for 3 days (the forth was in Machupichu where we ate inflated tourist food). They did this all in sandles mostly and with 50lbs loads. That was quite awsome. So, we had all the meals prepared and coca tea served in the mornings. It was weird to have people wait on you like that.

The trail was very cool! We hiked over three mountain passes, one over 13,000 ft.



and past numerous inca ruins and archeological sites. It seemed we were always stopping to rest and getting the word on the places from Willbert who was very knowledgable and a funny guy.

Was the Trek challenging? For some it was hard. One group member was from sea level with bad knees and a crippling fear of heights. He said it was one of the most challenging trips he was on. I would say it was a walk through the Andies, which can be very steep but since the porters carried all our stuff it was not any more challenging than and easy peak in Colorado. Did I mention that they sell water, gatorade, snikers bars and even beer along the trail!

There are many high glaciated peaks that appear at times. here is one nearest to Machupichu.



So, Finally at the end of the third day we arrived in Winya Wayna and since we were a group of Americans, British and Irish hikers we finished off a table full of beer bottles. The group was cool and everyone had a good and memorable experience.

For the finally of the trek, we got up at 4am to hike the 2 miles to the gates at machupichu. We arrive and the mithical city was covered by a cloud. Not to worry ten minutes later the cloud cleared and it looked someting like this.



We got a guided tour from Wilbert and later James form England and I climbed the steep stairs to the top of Whuaynupichu (the mountian behind Machupichu in the photo) This was my favorite place, mainly because of the over one thousand feet of exposure. These people built a city at the very top of this cliff. They must have been expert riggers or many died because the terraces and buildings were built to the very edge to of the rock.



Austin and I are now hanging in Cusco for a few days. We may go to Pisac in the sacred valley tomorrow and see what else is going on. Probably eat a lot of food and have a few beers aswell.

Chiao!

Cusco

Cusco is awesome. we arrived yesterday after over 24 hours of travel. I finished one novel and 1 hour of sleep. As we flew over the Andies yesterday morning I could hardly stay awake but I was amazed with these mounains. They are very remote, unihabited for the most part, also very dry. Just snow capped peaks and dry barren terrain. I can not wait to see the cordillera next week. We leave for a 4 day trek on the Inca Trail to Machu Pichu tomorrow. This is also very exciting. Cusco is busy and there are many people and resturants everywhere, but apart form eating food I find there is not much else to do, im glad the food here is cheep. We spent yesterday catching up on sleep and later met some argentinians in the plaza at San Blas. San Blas is a district of Cusço on a hillside and know for its artists and good bakeries. Our hostal is located here two blocks from the main square. It is very easy to walk anywhere you would want to go. This afternoon we took a hike to an Inca ruin called sacsayhuyman(sp) on top of a hill overlooking the city. It was a short but steep hike and we got a guided tour of the place from a local pçeruvain student from the university. She was studying tourism and english. This place has much of both as there are tourists everywhere an many of them are european, british and a few americans that all speek english. From these ruins you can see the surounding mountains, which are composed of huge antiform and synform strata and also devoid of vegitation so you can see all of the structure. It´s stunning! The Inca ruins are very impressive also by the way. tonight we will likely check out some of the numerous pubs and night spots. The beer here is also quite cheep, about 1.50 USD for a peruvian brew called Cusqueno. It tastes something like bud but maybe a little better. The weather here is very mild and pleasent with temps in the 70 during the day and 40 at night. also, Austin has been measuring the cloud temps, which come in at about 2 dergree F. for those who know what that means. Austin has downloaded some of his pics to his website found at www.mostlyweather.com. Check them out if you are curious. I will write again in 4 days and tell ya´ll about Machu Pichu. Chiao!