Day 144 - Chaquicocha to Wiñay Huayna (Inca Trail)

  Machu Picchu, Peru
Thursday, January 24, 2008

We were woken up by one of the Red Army at about 6am, who kindly brought us a hot drink to warm us up on another chilly Andean morning.

It had rained pretty much all night and unfortunately the bottom of Katie's sleeping bag and her sleeping mat underneath were soaked through.

This explained why I woke up on top of my dirty & wet clothes instead of my mat, because Katie had obviously decided that if she couldn't sleep on HER wet mat, then she would have to sleep on MY nice dry one! Cheers.

The view from the campsite this morning was good despite being pretty cloudy and nowhere near as clear as when we went to bed last night, when we could clearly see the snow-capped peaks all around us.
 
The stars last night were stunning, so clear & so bright.



We did our packing, put on some wet clothing and prayed that we would get some sun sometime today, so that we could dry out our wet gear from yesterday!

After wolfing down our breakfast we were off again, closely hugging the mountain on our path upwards. 



After about 20 minutes we came to what our guide called an "Inca Tunnel", which he explained was a hole that they very patiently chipped away at until they were able to squeeze through it.
 
It made me think of The Shawshank Redemption!



After this we had a nice long descent, which I always enjoy speeding down so I let Julian lead the way for a while...



...before getting bored and steaming past him!

The path wound down and down, round and round until we got to our first stop, a lookout over the valley.

Unfortunately it was still very cloudy, so we could see... absolutely bugger all.

I bet it looks amazing on a clear day!



After eating our mid-morning snacks here I needed to respond to a call of nature, so Julian directed me to a wooden toilet cabin in the distance.

It looked promising from a distance, but when I arrived it was all very, erm, 'Glastonbury'!

 

By the time I got back to the viewpoint the clouds were clearing a little bit and at least it was DRY!

Thank heaven for small mercies...



Soon the Red Army joined us and Julian kindly took a group photo for us, which came out really well, despite the clouds.



The Red Army relaxed for a few minutes and then were off again, storming down the steps like men possessed.

We followed, hot on their heels, with Julian again leading the way.



Again I whizzed past him after a while, loving the challenge of negotiating the stone steps at speed, and enjoying the fact that if you went fast, you didn't really put any pressure on your legs, so it seemed to hurt much less than taking each step slowly.

After a while we came upon another set of stone steps leading up to another Inca ruin.



Slowly the clouds were clearing, but we still couldn't see the valley; at least we got good views over the ruins from above though.

 

I hadn't got the camera out much today because of the crap weather, so I took the opportunity to grab a few quick photos of us, before the next apocalyptic thunderstorm broke!

 

It was definitely clearing up a bit.



After enjoying a few views we made our way down and through the ruins, to follow the trail down the valley.



This time Adam and Nick joined me for the downhill sprint and it was nice to have some male company; on the way down we talked about our countries, travelling, sport, politics, work, it was great fun.

Here's Adam, the Aussie...



A short while later we'd descended enough to just get underneath the clouds, in time to see a set of Inca terraces which they used for planting crops on the steep hillsides. 



We could also see down the valley for the first time and we knew that we couldn't be far away from our camp site for tonight.



Sure enough, about 10 minutes later we walked into our third and final campsite, a couple of hours from Machu Picchu, with the sun blazing down. This was more life it!

Ecstatic, we soon had all of our wet clothes off and wet kit out of our bags; we hung them up anywhere that we could to try and get as much as possible dry before it clouded over again.

As you can see, anything was fair game, clothes were draped over our tents, on the ropes, even over branches in the trees!

 

Dry, damn you!



The Red Army had again secured us a great location, this was the view from just inside our tent looking out.

Not bad eh?



As our clothes continued to dry in the sun, we were invited into the dinner tent for our afternoon tea. Which meant more Milo and more Fanny. 

I guess there are some things that you can never have enough of, right? ;)



After a refreshing tea we all had hot showers for a bargain 5 Soles each, and after changing we walked down the hill, through the bar/restaurant area and onto our penultimate set of ruins on the Inca Trail. 

The ruins were absolutely extraordinary, definitely the best yet.



Experts believe this area was used as an agricultural research centre, where the elders and wiser Incas came from miles around to help test and refine their agricultural methods, to increase yields and efficiency.

You could clearly see all the terraces, yet others were still hidden behind dense vegetation further up the hill.



The houses where the noblemen stayed were also well preserved, only really lacking their thatched roofs. 

As usual, Julian gathered us together and talked us through what's known about these ruins.
 


He stressed what an amazing achievement it was to bring rocks up from the river below, all the way up the steep mountain, to work them into the right shapes, and then fix them in place without any sort of cement or sealent.

Amazing.



After this really interesting explanation we headed up into the ruins, where we learnt more about the temples at the top of the site, and posed for a few photos.



Julian took this opportunity to explain all about the famous "Inca Cross", which has a variety of meanings, mainly based around the ideas of 'trilogies', which the Incas were so devoted to.

For example, the first quadrant of the cross represents a trilogy of sacred animals. At the bottom the Snake, in the middle the Puma, and at the top the Condor, according to the heights at which each animal could be found in nature. 

The second quadrant represented a trilogy of 'states'. At the top was Mother Nature, in the middle was Human life, and at the top was Spiritual life. 

The third quadrant represented the trilogy of Inca values: teamwork, sharing and maximum effort at all times.

The final quadrant represented the trilogy of existence: the upper world, the every day world (earth) and the under world.

This is what the Inca Cross looks like, with the circle in the middle representing Cusco, the Inca capital and the "navel of the world".



The Incas would often use half of this cross in their sacred buildings and most examples are found on the Inca Trail, which thankfully the Spanish conquisadors never discovered.
 
For this reason the buildings and half-crosses in this area were discovered in a much better condition that the buildings which they ransacked and demolished elsewhere. 

After all the information we wandered around and took a few more photos.

Note the shape of the window in the photo below, which gets more narrow the higher it gets.

 

These windows were designed (like their doorways) to withstand earthquakes and it's very interesting that not a single Inca window or doorway has ever collapsed in an earthquake, in direct comparison to the devastation caused to our Western style buildings.

The Incas also used a 15 degree angle when setting their walls, so all of their buildings lean inwards, again protecting against earthquakes. Amazing.

The views from the top of the complex looking over the valley were stunning.

 

Julian had finished his tour, so we now had some free time. 

Most of us decided to walk down towards the main complex, where visiting noblemen and religious leaders would stay overnight before visiting the holy city of Machu Picchu early the next morning.



The steps down were small and steep and we were all very aware that what goes down must come back up again...

On the way down the steps we could see beside us some of the amazing drainage and irrigation systems constructed by the Incas, which are still in perfect working order today.

These can just be seen to the right of this shot, beside where Katie is walking.



The views were just as stunning at the bottom of the hill and you could see how far away the river was, and how much effort must have been involved in bringing these large stones all the way up the slope to their current location.

Rather them than me, and more power coca leaves!



You could also see clearly across the terraces from here, appreciating their sheer scale even more from close-up.

 

It was impressive how intact most of the buildings and walls were, despite being hundreds and years old and open to the elements.

I'll bet you that tourists do more damage in the next 50 years than nature did in hundreds. What a depressing thought...

The final wall in the complex gave a great view to the valley behind it.



Here's another great view of the valley. "Machu Picchu mountain" is off to the left, just out of shot.



You may also just be able to make out a very light track on the side of the mountain to the far right of the frame.

This is the original Inca trail that the American historian who (re)discovered Machu Picchu used to find the lost city, also uncovering this complex on his way.

When he first arrived this site was completely covered in dense vegetation, so he returned to the US, raised some money and years later returned with a crew of locals who helped him remove the trees and bushes, and gradually uncover these astonishing terraces. 

All this exploring was thirsty work, so after finishing at the ruins we walked back to the bar, and got some beers in.

CHEERS!



We had a couple of drinks each and even brought a couple of cold ones back to the tent for Julian and Elvis (the head porter) because tonight was our last supper, or as Julian called it, our 'Farewell Dinner'.

Sure enough when we walked into the dinner tent we saw that the Chef had pulled out all the stops... we had a feast which trumped everything else so far. It was absolutely nuts.

Check this out!

 

I've been to weddings which had worse food than we were having, 3 days into a trek, in the middle of the Peruvian Andes, with everything you see (apart from the beers) carried by a team of porters!

After the beers and afternoon tea we really struggled to finish our food, but it was good to know that any leftovers went to the Red Army, who seemed to have an appetite equal to their Russian namesake!

When all the food had been finished, Julian lead the chef and the Red Army into our dinner tent, where he asked each of them to explain their responsibilities on the trek, what they carried; it was basically their chance to (deservedly) blow their own trumpets.



I think this was all about tipping, because it's Inca Trail tradition to tip the porters, the chef and the guide. The senior members of the team therefore stand and 'pitch' to you about how hard they've worked, it was a bit like The Dragon's Den!

Fortunately we'd been organised enough earlier to get all the group tips sorted out before the food arrived; we decided to give 50 soles to each porter, 100 to the chef, and about 150 soles to Julian for being such a fantastic guide.

So far, this Llama Path Inca Trail trek was probably the best "tour" or trek that either Katie or I have ever completed, anywhere.

It was virtually impossible to find a fault, they seemed to have thought of everything and executed it perfectly. For once it was a pleasure to be able to tip the staff involved, to show our appreciation for their massive effort, to ensure that we had a positive experience here.

After we had individually thanked the team for all their hard work (how very Japanese!) we could relax and watch them perform a few traditional 'Ketchwa' (the Inca language still used in the mountains to this day) songs.

To be honest they weren't natural singers because most of them were devastatingly shy, so it was more of a collective tuneless mumble, with only Julian singing away like he was on the Spion Kop!

This part of the night felt a bit like 'The X-Factor'! How many more tv shows were to come?!

The only problem with the end of the porter's performance was that Julian explained that it was now turn!

We had practised our performances very quickly at the bar earlier, where we'd decided to each sing our national anthems, which we thought they would really enjoy.

We also agreed to go in alphabetical order, so Adam & Lisa started us off with a bit of ´Advance Australia Fair´ action, before a chant of "Ozzie Ozzie Ozzie!" handed the batton over to Team Canada, the double-act of Manjeep and Sunny, who roared through ´Oh Canada´ before handing over to Katie & I.

Our rousing performance of ´God Save The Queen´ was an epic affair, with our voices booming across the valley, as grown men wept at its sheer magnificence and resonance.

Ok, that was a lie, but we sang our little hearts out and the rest of Team Commonwealth even joined in at the end, which was a really lovely touch. 

Our football chant of "En-ger-land, En-ger-land, En-ger-land" then passed the metaphorical ball to Team New Zealand!

(I desparately wanted to do the "Neville family" Liverpool song instead, but Katie said that she'd divorce me because it's so full of swearing!)

Jane nailed a fantastic solo performance of the Kiwi national anthem in MAORI (!), before handing the batton to the final sprinter, her partner Nick.
 
Nick had very bravely decided to bring our show to a rousing finale with a performance of his high school 'haka', the powerful Maori tribal dance which the All Black rugby team perform to psych-out their opposition before each game.

This was quite someting, but also highly amusing, so I was rolling around in front of him trying to capture this on the camera. I wish I'd thought to video it!



The porters LOVED our performance and gave us a fantastic reception which must have been heard across the huge campsite, which was packed full!

We were all hugely relieved that this horror show was over, so imagine how we felt when from nowhere the music started up again, and the porters rushed out to dance with our girls, which is no doubt the highlight of their trek, the swines! ;)

Manjeep was loving it, while Sonny cringed and Katie hid in the shadows, the big chicken!



Unfortunately I 'accidentally' nudged Katie out into the light again, where she was instantly grabbed and thrown around i tomon an amusing fashion, before we all collapsed in a heap and thanked the porters and Julian for a memorable last night!



We went to sleep at about 9pm, with a VERY early 4am start ahead of us tomorrow, to try and beat the hordes to the checkpoint.
 
From the checkpoint we would head to the famous 'Sun Gate' and our first glimpse of Machu Picchu, at last!

We'd had a fantastic trip so far, we just hoped that we would be able to see the famous lost city tomorrow!


Lots of love,


Al & Katie xx