On the Trail of the Inca / Machu Picchu

(30 July)

Inca Trail - Machu Picchu, Peru
This one is for the ever fabulous Reneé Darvin.

Our last morning on the Inca Trail, we are up at 3:30am. The checkpoint five minutes downhill opens at 5:30am. The problem is there are many groups camped out, waiting to pass through the checkpoint when it opens, so we need to get there early to be at the front of the line. Once we are cleared, we have about a two hour hike to get to Machu Picchu. The anticipation is great, and the morning is still and quiet. At sunrise, we approach Intipata, the Sun Gate, from which the first views of the Machu Picchu citadel can be seen below. We´ve made it!

It´s almost another hour´s walk to get down to Machu Picchu, watching its stone contours and alleyways emerge below the rising sun. Illness, foot blisters, callouses, sore muscles, aches, and hammered knees all fade away. We are basking in the glow of arrival.

Already the buses are exhaling tourists from Auguas Calientas by the hundreds at this early hour, but at least we have the relative quiet of the morning to take in the vastness of the place. By noon, the site will be literally flooded - resembling an amusement park. The park regulations allow 2,500 tourists to enter per day. I feel entitled to my space, having walked for three and a half days to get here, but I too am one of the millions who are contributing to the demise of this precious jewel. A group of Japanese scientists recently found that the terraces at the edges of Machu Picchu are sloping downward at a rate of 2cm per month, due to the heavy traffic on the delicate site. It is not unforeseeable that this will be a site only visible from a distance at some point in the near future.

On the Trail of the Inca / Part Three

(29 July)
Inca Trail, Peru

On the third morning, we set off from camp into a mystical landscape of shifting clouds and light. We have about three hours ascent to reach the second pass at Qochapata (12,916 ft). I´ve recovered nearly 100%, and my stomach is feeling much more normal this morning. On the way to the top, we stop at the small Inca ruins of Runkurakay and pass by a small mountain lake.

It is customary on the Trail to pick up a stone at Runkurakay and carry it to the top, where you place it on a rock pile at the summit and make a wish.

From the Second Pass, we make a steep descent deep into the cloud forest, where the climate and plant life changes dramatically. We visit the Inca sites of Sayaqmarka and Phuyupatamarka and pass over our third and final pass at 12,000 ft.

Sayaqmarka

Sayaqmarka

Sayaqmarka, built high on a mountain top, is believed to have been used by the Incas as an astronomical observatory. Just over the third pass, Phuyuptamarca ("city above the clouds") demonstrates well the Inca use of terraces, which were built to prevent erosion, but also served as agricultural areas.

Phuyuptamarca

Phuyuptamarca

The cloud forest is lush and green, and offers an unbelievable variety of plant species - bamboo, orchids, moss and lichens of every color and variety...

On the Trail of the Inca / Part Two

(28 July)
Inca Trail, Peru

I´ve decided I´m in this for the long haul no matter what. There´s no turning back! In the morning, though my stomach is still clearly bad, I´ve regained much of my energy. I will need it for this day - for the steep climb over Warmiwañusca, aka Dead Woman´s Pass (1,272 ft.).

The trail is steep, and the main focus is on getting oxygen into one´s lungs while making progress on the trail. I take slow steps, and rest every few minutes. We climb for about five hours towards the pass. My stomach remains much of my focus, but I begin to feel a part of the immense landscape around me, and finally take out my camera for the first time as the Pass comes into view.

As I reach the pass, condors are flying overhead through the clouds, around the snow capped peaks. Tired trekkers and chaskes are resting weary muscles and bones. A group of some ninety school boys and their teacher are singing the national anthem and shouting, "Viva Perú!". Today is Peru´s Independence Day. I am feeling relief that I have made it, and have not had to turn back on the trail. This is the point of no return. Once you have passed this spot, the only way is onward.

The two hours left before reaching camp are downhill. I take it slow, and enjoy the surroundings, as the landscape turns closer to the cloud forest - the transitional ecosystem between the Andes and the rainforest. I focus on the stones beneath my feet - laid by Inca hands some 800 years ago, and the ever-changing array of plant species at my sides.

Descending to Camp

Camp at Paqamayu

On the Trail of the Inca / Part One

(27 July)

Cuzco - Inca Trail, Peru

Traveling in the Andes, there are two things you can be assured of, both of which I experienced in their fullness on the Inca Trail: 1.) Witnessing landscapes, colors, skies, mountains, people like no other, and 2.) Having your stomach invaded by parasites.

4:45am Friday morning. My alarm clock goes off in my hotel room in Cuzco. The trek company is to pick me up at 5:20 to set out for the 4-day trek on the Inca Trail to Machu Picchu. I´ve had a fever, chills, aches, sweating, dizziness, headaches all night. What am I going to do? I´m really sick! It may be altitude sickness, I think, but I´ve been fine two days in Cuzco - why would it be affecting me now? I drop my bags at the door, and tell the guide I´ve been sick all night. He says he thinks it may be the altitude. "Let´s see how you do the first couple of hours, if need be, there will be the opportunity to turn back, and you could join us at Machu Picchu by train on Monday."

We board a bus and pick up the other members of our trek group - fifteen in total, and head to Ollantaytambo - the last town before the starting point of the Inca Trail - where we will get breakfast and pick up any last minute necessities for the trail. The bus rumbles and bumps constantly up and down. The window won´t close, and the air outside is cold. My stomach is starting to turn on me. I´ve been planning this part of the trip since last December. The tour comapnay´s website brags that no one has ever had to turn back on the trail. I try to get used to the idea that I will be the first; that, after giving it the obligatory shot, I will turn back on the trail and return to Cuzco to overcome whatever is ailing me.

The bus drops us at the head of the trail. There are dirty shacks, animals, mountain women carrying baskets full of drinks and snacks to sell, as trekkers prepare their things to set off on the trail. Soon, we are off - after showing our passports and permits at the control office, we cross a small suspension bridge over the Urubamba River, and set off on the trail. My head is still spinning, as is my stomach as I put one foot in front of the other, the morning sun now shining down upon us.

The first day´s hike is not terribly long or difficult - about six hours, mostly even ground, with a few ups and downs, but my head is throbbing, my stomach, churning, and I have little energy. I don´t even take my camera out all day - which is a sure sign that I´m not well! When we get to camp, the tents have already been set up by our porters, or chaskes, as they are called in Quechua. It´s a term that means "swift-footed ones." The chaske tradition goes back to Inca times. It is a proud and revered profession - something akin to the athlete in Ancient Greece. I´m told the Incas would actually hold games wherein chaskes would compete to carry heavy loads over steep mountain passes. It´s also one of the most sought after positions in Peru to be a chaske on the Inca Trail, as these men are part of a long tradition, and make a decent living by Peruvian standards. There are regulations now about how much they can be required to carry (20 kilos). As you walk along the trail, you hear, "Chaske!," and you step aside to let him pass, with a mountain of bags and equipment on his back. I see the chaskes go by, and my fixation on my own burden and lack of energy begins to fade.

I get some sleep at camp, and after dinner, our guides, David and Gladys, take me and one other sick trekker to the Medic office down in the small village below our campsite. The village is celebrating its 64th anniversary, so there is the sound of a loud generator outside, and blaring music, as the handful of residents gather in the central courtyard. Inside, the two medics ask us questions about our symptoms in their tiny institutional green office lit by a single candle. The woman fishes in the back for a stash of pills. She examines them under a flashlight. I am to take one of each twice daily for three days.

We return to our tents and settle in for the night, under an ocean of stars. The sound of the generator and the Andean music from the village below, and the occasional explosion of fireworks swirl into a surreal dreamscape.