The Inca Trail

Trip Start Jun 03, 2008
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Trip End Aug 11, 2008


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Sunday, June 29, 2008

Finally, the time had come to do the Inca trail. This was the main reason why I had travelled to South America. We began the Inca trail at 11:40 Sunday the 29th of June. We started at the 82km mark by crossing the footbridge across the Rio Urabamba river. The first day of the Inca trail was easy with only one mountain pass to climb. Thankfully I was not affected by the altitude. The sceanry was stunning along the whole of the Inca trail and the weather was very warm during the days and close to freezing at night. The thing that amazed me during the first day and throughout the whole trail was the strength and stamina of the porters. They each carried a total of 20kg and began the first day by jogging past us to set up camp for lunch. For the whole trail they carried this big weight and always had our lunch ready and in the evenings had our entire camp set up before we arrived. Our group of 18 had 16 porter, 2 chefs and 2 tour guides The food was also excellent every day.
Dead woman`s pass.harder than it looks!!
Dead woman`s pass.harder than it looks!!
The first day we saw only one Inca ruin at Llactapata and arrived at our campsite at four pm after a pretty easy days walking. We then took on the porters in a game of football in a clay pitch beside the campsite. This was great fun and we were winning 4-0 when the altitude and fitness kicked in and the porters scored 4 goals in a row. However we managed to score the last goal and win 5-4.

The second day was supposed to be the toughest on the trail and so it proved. We started out at half 7 after being introduced to the porters and chefs. Nearly all of it was uphill through mountains and forests and ended in "Dead Woman`s Pass" where we reached an altitude of 4,201 metres above sea level. This day was a bit of a struggle, especially over "Dead Womans Pass" where the air was very thin due to the altitude and I could only walk for 5 min. before talking 2 min. breaks. Was a great feeling to finally reach the top. We then descended a steep path for 45 min. to reach our campsite at threepm.

Day three and again we left the camp at half seven. This was the day where we saw most of the Inca ruins. We started the morning with a very steep climb to reach the first Inca fortress at Runkuraqay. The rest of the day was relatively easy with only some uphill sections. The walk took us past a further three Inca ruins and the sceanry was amazing as we went along mountain passes and the cloud forest. All of the Inca ruins were very impressive and displayed their engineering brilliance. At the end of day Three we camped at Winaywayna, only an hours walk from Macchupicchu
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