Our first stop would be Mollepata, a small town up in the hills where we could get breakfast and load our stuff onto "horseback." We started 'trekking' on the dirt roads out of town, winding up and through shortcuts in the hot sun. We broke for lunch and had our cooks make us up something tasty, then hey cleaned up and loaded everything back on the 'horses' which at this point was an old truck.. We continued waking and chatting until our first camp at Soraypampa (3900m). We had climbed just over 1000m and were feeling good. We passed a huge lodge on the way to our camp, hoping it would have our beds in it, but we found out later that this lodge is part of the slower Salkantay experience. They take 7 days, ride horses, stay in lodges/resorts, pay about 7 times as much as we did, but still looked pretty swanky!
Our tent site had been tarped off to lower exposure to wind and rain, we got no wet stuff that night, clear starry, Milky Way sky, nestled in between Apu Umantay (5459m) and Apu Salkantay (6264m). We were awoken early (5:00) by a call of "coca tea" and had time to pack up and get ready. Our trail today would take us to the pass between two mountains, and to the foot of The Savage Mountain (Salkantay). The pass was 4650m (15256ft) and we were all feeling the lack of oxygen. Photos were snapped and Team Sexy Cuys, our group of 8, had a few snaps as the mountain cleared, then we were off again, back down all the elevation we had just struggled up. This was our favorite day of trekking if only for the scenery, we got very lucky to have a clearish pass, then good conversation along the trail, the only bad part was descending 1750m! We had been promised hot showers (for a fee) at our next camp, but there was no hot water, and actually no running water at all ;) So it was a face wash in the stream (no water in the mouth!) and then snack time, with Kasey's favorite..popcorn!! They did an awkward introduction of our horsemen, who would be leaving us and throwing the extra weight we had put on the horses on our backs and of course we were expected, but not obligated, to tip. It's a bit difficult to know exactly where all the money you paid for a trip went when the guides, horsemen, cooks, everyone gets a tip too...
Day three we woke to damn roosters thinking the sun came up at 3:15am, then rain and eventually a coca tea call. Everyone was a little slow and stiff getting out of bed today but even the dreary weather couldn't dampen our spirits. We were back on dirt roads today and took a windy route down to the valley floor, passing the connecting trail to Choquequirao (a ruin complex that is a bit bigger than MP) Our 'trekking' today was only about 3 hours as we got a combi ride for the last 20km to Santa Teresa. After throwing our bags down, we grabbed swimmers and headed down to the hot springs down by the river. You got whistled at if you didn't shower before going into the pools, and it was funny to see some unshowered people's reactions to being whistled at.. We enjoyed the hot pools for about two hours and attempted to soothe our tired legs and shoulders. Three of our group had taken a bus straight to Aguas Calientes, because they had work and a wedding to attend, so we missed them the rest of the trip (Mark and Marie as well as Guillermo). Day three ended with a campfire and a few celebratory beverages (one group had a few too many).
Day 4 would be our latest time to sleep in, 6:30 I think, and ironically our longest distance traveling by foot, 25km. Some had elected to do a zipline thing, and skip out on the first half of walking, the rest of us carried on, up the valley, past some pretty impressive tunnels being built for another hydroelectric project. We lost our guide, Willy, at one point only to have him show up ahead of us, very mysterious (actually I think he took a car, maybe he was tired..) We eventually got to Hidroelectrica, where we stopped for our box lunch, and waited for the zipliners. After that the trail was all along the railroad track to Aguas Calientes. We only got passed by one train and I was thinking how easy it would be to ride that thing into town. We arrived to Aguas just before dinner time, Kasey and I had been booked into a hotel 5 more minutes uphill from all the others in our group, so we trudged our way up to, Puma's Inn for actually hot showers, and Ellen Degeneres on TV!!! Then we met back up wih the group for our last group dinner, and what do you know they made us pay for drinks!! Anyway we got our breakfast baggies, and instruction for tomorrow and Machu Picchu!
Day 5, Machu Picchu!! We rose at 3:50 to meet the group at 4:20, and headed out, most of the group had elected to walk from Aguas up to the main gate instead of taking the bus. Our route took us over the bridge and then up a windying set of stairs something like 1700-2000 stairs...in the pouring rain. We had plastic ponchos on but still managed to get wet from sweat or rain coming fom the ground up. We arrived at the main gate via headlamps and determination, and found people already pouring off buses, and standing under cover (I was thinking they should have to stand in the rain for a bit..) Our group finally got organized around 7am and we headed in, for our 2 hour tour, which eneded up being maybe 40 minutes. Our guide wasn't as informed or practiced in his presentation and we were a little more than bummed about that performance. It had been raining all morning and our guide kept telling us that by 10 or 11 it would clear up, well he was wrong, but it did eventually clear after 1:30 or so. Kase and I had climbed up HuaynaPicchu (Wayna Picchu) after a mad scramble from SunGate (with Mark and Pia) to the complete opposite end, only to find MP obscured in fog, we waited up there on the Inca's nose, being entertained by Luis and Ken talking about spirituality and the meaning of life, real deep stuff. We climbed to the tip-top of Huayna to take in a different view, and the clouds finally started to part! We snapped a few more pics before getting shooed off the top by a 'ranger type.' We tried to head to the Temple of the Moon, but were turned back by another 'ranger type.' Apparently they close these further sites down early so no one gets left behind. We wandered back through the main complex snapping shots where the rain had made it more difficult before, on our brief tour. We met our friends James and Laura who were snapping shots with their big Canon! So we hung out and snapped even more pictures as the sun had really burned off most of the surrounding clouds..
more info on a face to face breakdown of MP.
We finally left the park just before they closed and headed back down the stairs, a bus costing $10 US dollars, was a little ludicrously priced. We grabbed a fresh(ish) set of clothes before meeting everyone at Chez Maggie's, a pizza place we had been recommended very early in our trip. We ate and talked about the trek, eventually passing the time until we needed to go find the train station, we had a ticket for 9:30pm. Our train ride and snoozing (as there is little view at 9:30) and was interrupted numerous times by loud and apparently rich group of rude Argentinians. Then they pulled a bunch of us sleepy tourists off at Ollantaytambo, to catch a bus the rest of the way back to Cusco. We arrived in Cusco at 2:00am, sleepy and groggy as can be. Long day, 22 plus hours, but man was it worth it!!
We felt so lucky to have the weather break the way it did on Machu Picchu, because without that we wouldn't have been able to be checked off the old bucket list. .
Thanks for reading, we will see you all soon!!!
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