MACHU PICCHU

It took me ages to learn that the double C goes with Picchu, not Machu, but I finally have it down. It's almost like learning how to spell license. 
But I digress, it's finally time to give you all the conclusion to my Peruvian Peregrination which happened weeks ago, but my memories remain equally clear today as they did on the epic climax of my trip. 


11/1/11: Machu Picchu City, Wayna Pichu Mountain

5:00am Wake up call...after a day of vomiting and sleeplessness, I was surprisingly (and finally!) rested and tentatively over the altitude sickness from Cusco (Aguas Calientes and Machu Picchu are actually at a far lower altitude).

5:30am A few hesitant nibbles of breakfast and off the buses to take us to Machu Picchu city by 6:00. It is an hour and a half walk uphill that many ambitious tourists complete without realizing how strenuous it will be. A few of the people we met on our tour said it was more challenging than climbing the mountain. I was perfectly content to be transported lazily uphill, curving around 90 degree switchbacks that threaten unsuspected collisions with other buses and plunging to your death below (*cough*Parental unit, I mean everything is 100% safe and all the buses have football field sized lanes and all of the turns are blocked with steel guardrails ten feet high). The drive reminded me of my infamous 12 hour trek through the Andes on the way back from Mendoza, but this time it was hot outside already and there was far more green.

Machu Picchu city...that mountain in the background? Yep, scaled that sucker!

7:30am We arrive at the gates of the city, embarrassed by the number of layers we wore/packed when people were already stripping to tank tops and shorts. Whoever told us its freezing at high altitude especially in the morning...shame on you for making me carry all my extra layers in my backpack up Wayna Picchu Mountain! After wandering around the city for an hour trying to find the base of the mountain, we were already sweating and stressed about making it in time (you have to buy a ticket in advance for the time you wish to go up) and I hadn't fully had a chance to take in my surroundings.

8:45am  The hike up the mountain is 100% ancient stairs. The park has put in place a few ropes or steel wires here and there to prevent more deaths (the number is a bit shady...our first Google search produced details of 3, but other sites claim up to 7), but the stairs are steep. For someone who has never hiked at high altitude (no Ohio and Michigan, your hills don't count...and New Orleans, you DEFINITELY don't count) and who was unbelievably paranoid about coming down with more symptoms of altitude sickness, it was one of the most challenging hikes I've ever done. You can feel your thigh muscles resisting nearly every push upward and your calves squirming in discomfort. Your brain becomes almost more determined to convince you to stop than it does to motivate you to keep going. When someone passed me I would feel ashamed and out of shape, but I had to keep reminding myself that I was 2700m above the ground (which is already way up in the mountains) and my heart was working overtime with a miniscule amount of oxygen to fuel my brain.

10:30ish am: We reach the top!! The view is 360 degrees of unbelievable. The clouds are hovering right there with you, and all around you is GREEN. This kind of green is not something a golf course can buy, it is green green green. I've never been to Ireland (to those of you who know me: ironic isn't it?) but you've got competition lassy. Machu Picchu city is a tiny series of specks off to your right, and the zig-zagged road for the buses looks like a native piece of art itself. There were French, Russian, American British, South American people at the top and it was unbelievable to appreciate and experience such a triumph and natural wonder all together, regardless of who we are.

3/4 the way up Wayna Picchu...look how tiny Machu Picchu is down there!

Once we ate our bread and cheese sandwiches (my first real food in 48 hours!) we took enough pictures to last a lifetime (including one of my friend D and I planking at the highest point!...also very safe of course).

11:30ish am: We descend the millions of stairs. As D said to me, "For what you lack in going up the stairs you sure as hell make up for it going down!" Apparently I am a beast. I credit the years of quick footed Irish Dance skills, but they claim it was because I'm tall and they had to jump half the time to reach a stair. I also got creative, going backwards down steep stretches or grape-vining across uneven areas. It's quite an art. Being so far ahead of everyone gave me even more time to take photos of what barely seemed real, tucked away in the middle of the mountains, high above the sacred river, once long forgotten and pristinely intact. The city was discovered exactly 100 years ago and it was incredibly special to be there during its centennial anniversary. An eleven year old boy from the Pampas stumbled upon it and just one family was living there. Originally, all of the Incans were wiped out by a skin disease brought in by messengers who infected the population.

made it!

12:30sh pm: Blazing hot, sweaty, and crisping in the sun, we found a tour guide (in Spanish!) who gave us a two-hour tour with just a few other people from Spain and Santiago. Elizabeth was her name, and she was from Aguas Calientes and has lived there here whole life and loves it, she never wants to leave. It's hard to imagine but I can understand her happiness surrounded by such beauty, it's hard to top it. Elizabeth explained to us that Yale University (of course) has 85% of all the original artifacts from Machu Picchu (including its mummies...who are mummified in the fetal position so as to die as you are born), even now 100 years later. 80% of the city itself is also in its original state, with only 20% restored, but it is maintained daily to prevent erosion from the many tourists (though limited) who pass through every day.
In several places there were secret things you could never know for yourself, like a site on the back side of the city where you can clap and it echoes through every crevice of the mountains. The Incans used it to avoid shouting. There are also blocked windows that vibrate when hummed into as a religious practice. Interestingly, you cannot touch the sacred rock at the highest point of the city (which is known to emit its own kind of special energy you can sense) anymore because a camera man filming a commercial there broke part of it with a beer bottle. However, most importantly, there are unmonitored herds of random llamas walking around. If it weren't for the overeager Australians sneak attacking them I would have gotten my kissy face llama picture! I will forever be bitter.
It was a perfect day.
 I couldn't believe how much we had accomplished by 2:30pm. We all just sat on the terraced landscape for another hour soaking it all in, not ready to leave one of the 7 Wonders of the World, one of the most unique and precious places I will ever know.
Sadly, everyone is kicked out of the park by 5:00pm anyway, so back to Aguas Calientes we went. Our Japanese roommate in our hostel had cleared out and was replaced by the most interesting middle-aged British man named Mark who was traveling on his own for a few years after quitting his software programming job. He lives entirely off of renting his house in England and has been all over the world, from the far East to Brazil to Chile. He even took an intensive month long Thai massage course in Thailand, just for the heck of it...he recommends it to no one, describing it as one of the most painful and least relaxing experiences you can ever have.

Cusco and Lima Round Two...the End of an Adventure
 11/2/11
We repeated the train/bus back to Cusco, with everyone absolutely exhausted. It was freezing again, even hailing as we sat in the little bus. The one thing that kept us entertained was the adorable dark-haired Peruvian baby aboard. If anyone wants to adopt a child, adopt one from Peru because they are the most beautiful babies I've ever seen.
Once back, we found an organic food restaurant and I had the best food I've had since I've been abroad. I had organic sweet potato fries with a lush Caprese Salad. We attempted to get into the museum at the site of the Incan Palace but ended up just mosying about. All of the boutique fit shops were ridiculously overpriced so we just hit some panaderías for tasty chocolate truffles and shopped at the local artensanía until closing.

11/3/11
Back to Lima. I really enjoyed Lima the first time, I thought it was beautiful and clean and exciting. This time, as we were in our cab from the airport to a new hostel in Centro Lima, a kid walking through traffic at a red light reached into the car from a cracked window and attempted to steal my friends backpack from the floor. It took three people from inside to wrestle it back from him and  NO ONE got out of their cars to help in the struggle that lasted several minutes. Typical. Not even the crossing guard moved to help. At least our hostel "1900 Backpackers" was insanely gorgeous with marble floors and high ceilings and intricate woodwork. We also were able to find lunch at a hole-in-the-wall joint for 7 soles for 3 courses. We visited the MALI art museum and the Bryce exhibit was particularly interesting (more or less a collage of re-drawn articles and magazine covers from the WWII era...hundreds of them). By the end of the day, I had even bought Harry Potter in Spanish..and everyone was sick again but I won't go into that.

1/100th of Bryce's work

While the trip had far more drama than I care to share here that may have ruined it a bit for me, the day at Machu Picchu was enough to make me have no regrets. So go. Drop whatever you're doing and book tickets (and please for the sake of everything that is good in the world, book them all in advance...plane, train, hostel, bus, do it all.) I'm dirt broke now and came back to Chile a bit downtrodden and eager to go home to the States, but if you're with people you love, you're guaranteed the trip of a lifetime.

Full Gallery of Peruvian Photos