Well I am happy to announce my return from the Trek. I know that some of you are disappointed in me having survived. But you will be happy to know that I didn't make it out of there unscathed haha. Yes Chase has been maimed in his battle against the forces of nature. Mostly through his how stupidity and bad luck. On my last day of the trek I slipped on one of the steps and sprained my ankle. But as a true trekker, I continued on the trial for another 2 hours, and then hiked up the imfamous Waynu Piccu mountain as well haha. In hind sight this was probably not the best idea as i am now house ridden for the next 2 days but the victory and the view from the top were worth it haha. So that pretty much covers what I have been doing for today, I watch the entire 4th season of Weeds and I talked to a few people online and sorted out some paperwork and travel stuff for my trip to the jungle. But enough of the boring stuff I'm sure you all want to hear about the jungle.
Well as most of you know I had a surprise on Tuesday when I found out that I was leaving that night. Everything went smoothly and we arrived at our campsite around 9 or 9:30 PM. We went straight to sleep and woke up around 5:30 or 6 AM the next morning. We finished getting our gear ready and made our way to the first control point. There are a few of these control stations along the trail to monitor who is there. After passing the control station we walked for about 2 hours or so and came to our first set of ruins. These ruins are located at the bottom of a valley and are actually not part of the trek, but our guide said that we had time so he took use along a local farmers trail down to the ruins and we spent about 2 hours there. Then it was back to hiking . We were on the trail for another 2 hours or so until we got to a nice look out peak that we took a break for a little while before setting off again to get to camp. We arrived at camp around 3:30 PM and had lunch. At 5:30 PM was tea time and dinner was at 7 PM. After dinner most of us just went straight to sleep because we where all pretty tired. In the morning was a nice rooster wake up call around 6 AM followed by some coca tea and breakfast, we hit the trail around 8 AM. We hiked a little ways to our second control point and get our tickets and everything cleared to enter the Inca trail. Most people believe that the trail begins the first day but this isn't true the first day the trail that you follow is a newly created route for this trek. The actual Inca trail doesn't begin until the second day at the second check point which is at KM 88. From there we had a free day. Since their were no ruins or monuments on along the trail on the second day our guide told us that we could have a free day. We were allowed to walk and enjoy the trail at our own pace. There are 2 break points during the first part of the trail each about 2 hours apart. After that it's another 2 hours to get to the first mountain pass "Dead Womans Pass". Here you have a spectacular view of both sides of the mountain and you can see the Inca trail winding down both sides of the mountain. It is here that you switch from the Inca trail the another modern trail. the reason for this is because around the 1970s a land slide destroyed much of the trail along this stretch of the mountain range, and because of the expense of reconstruction the Peruvian government decided it would be more cost effective to make a different route that went into the valley instead of following the upper part of the mountain range around to the second pass. It was in this valley that we had our second camp. We arrived their around 3:30 PM again and from there it was pretty much the same as the previous night. Again the morning schedule was the same and we hit the trail around 8 AM for the 3rd day of the trek. This day we had 3 different sets of ruins all of which were very interesting. My favorite how ever was probably Sayaqmarkus. This city is located at the first part of the cloud forest and is situated on the outer most peak of the mountain crest. From the city you can see the entire valley and you are eye level with the clouds. For me I think the name should be the heavenly city, but that is just my opinion haha. these ruins are quite extensive and very well kept. The scene is something out of a fairy tail, with a constant mist that surround this ruins and gives them a sort of mystic and magical feel, truly one of the most beautiful sights I have every been to. after that it was a 2 hour hike down to lunch followed by a pretty long hike up to the 3rd pass. Here our guide took us off the main trail to an outlying peak that allowed for a early view of Macchu Piccu and Waynu Piccu Mountains. and just below the pass is another set of ruins that we got to spend some time in. After that it was another grueling 4 hours of treking to get down the final camp and final set of ruins called WinaWayna. Now here is where things get a little dicey haha. In the morning of the 4th day we started at 4 AM. We had breakfast, packed up camp, and made our way to the final control point. Here everyone that is one the trail lined for the controler to open the gates at 5:30 AM. When the gates opened it was a free for all run to get to the sun gate which is normally about 1 1/2 hours away, we did the run in about 45 minutes. It was here that I sprained my ankle haha, damn you stupid rock and crappy vision. haha. Once at the Sun Gate we stayed for about 5 minutes to take pictures and rest then we were off again on another run to get to Macchu Piccu, the reason for this is because there are only 400 people allowed to climb Wayna Piccu every day, and there are around 1,500 people that visit Macchu Piccu every day. For this reason getting a ticket to climb Wayna is very very difficult. out of all the people that were on the trek and were trying to get a ticket which was around 40 or 50 people. Only 8 of us got tickets. After Sara (the other volunteer I did the trek with) and I got our tickets we went on a tour of Macchu Piccu with our guide, then we went for our final hike up Wayna Piccu. This trail is about 1 hour up and 1 hour down and is very very step and difficult. Our guide told us that on average 4 people die a year climbing this mountain. After that we had very little time. We made our way to the bus station and took that down the the lower city. We had some lunch before boarding our train back to Ollantaytambo and from their we took taxi back to our house in Cusco. We arrived around 6:30 PM, showered and went to sleep.
All in all this trek was one of the best experiences of my life and I highly suggest it to anyone that goes to Peru. And if you don't want to go on the Inca trail their are also alternate routes that you can take to get to Macchu Piccu. All of which are supposed to be fantastic.
And for a finishing thought and fun fact. Macchu Piccu is Chetchuwa which is the language of the Incas, now their are two different dialects of this language, and based on where you lived in the time of the Incas you spoke of one of the two. Where Macchu Piccu is located the name for the mountain is actually in a different dialect. So the correct name of the mountain is Macchu Olko and Waynu Olko.
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