It’s Day 9 of our 17-day odyssey. We just finished our 5-day/4-night Salktantay Trek late yesterday and said goodbye to our new friends. Today, we’re finally going to touch the gray granite of Machu Picchu! It’s hard to imagine that, in just a day and a half, we will have hiked from that grand view on Llactapata. Down to the river, up the river valley, and then up to this, the last and final center of the Incan Empire and one of the Seven Wonders of the World.
Aguas Calientes (named for the local hot springs) reminds me of Gatlinburg, TN. You can see a short video pan of the main part of town by clicking on the picture.
There are lots of tourists and shops. Our hotel, La Cabana is very nice and not much of a cabin at all! And it’s really close to the train station.
We’ll be staying here again tonight and taking the VistaDome train to Ollantaytambo where we’ll ride a bus back to Cusco.
But today we’ll do what is known as the Short Inca Trail, it’s only about 7 miles long. But wait…there’s three or four thousand feet of climbing involved with all the ups and downs (including the gringo killer approaching the peak at Intipunku, the Sun Gate). Oh, and we’ll need to walk the rail bed in the morning along the Urubamba River for about 5 miles just to get to the trailhead.
Our man Ruben will be the guide, so we’re excited to see him again. But he’s bringing the main group straight to the trailhead at rail marker km 104, and has arranged for a guide-in-training to meet us at 5am for the 2-hour rail walk.
“Big Al” showed up on time and we left La Cabana with the boxed breakfasts they had prepared just for us.
His name is hard for tourists to pronounce and said most people call him Big Al. I asked if he was ok with that. He said, “I like it!”
So Big Al he is.
We didn’t need our flashlights for very long and it was sweet walking in the twilight and listening to the birds. Big Al pointed out an Andean cock-of-the-rock, native to Peru. It’s a spectacular bird and darn near impossible to photograph in the trees!
We meet Ruben and our new group of seven. A couple from Ireland and three from Utah. A good size and the biggest group we’ve been in so far. There are other guides and groups to be sure, but it’s not crowded at all.
After loading up on water, snacks, and sunscreen we start out. The trail is looking pretty sweet so the shoes come off almost immediately.
Now this is some fine trail! And…it can be a bit disconcerting if you look just past the tall grasses and plants on the downhill side! But so much fun!
The Short Inca Trail leads to Wiñay Wayna, which means “forever young” in Quechua. The Inca built a home for their leader here. It was never found by the Spaniards and was in a pristine state upon its re-discovery.
Wiñay Wayna is just another mind-boggling spectacle that just seems to happen everyday and around every turn. The Inca were so adept at carving a living out of these steep mountains. More than a living, a fruitful and rewarding way of life.
The terraces were built to raise food for the royal family. At one end of the terraces are a series of stair-stepped spring boxes. The water is provided at the top via an aqueduct from a spring located in a cove and works its way down each terrace to the living quarters. Water can be channeled where necessary.
And, after all these centuries, it’s still running!
What a magnificent place!
“Jefferson! Do you feel the energy!?”
As I walk up from the rear, Ruben is at the head of the group, showing them a primordial fern tree that is just stunning. His comment, of course, is referring to my bare feet. He gets a big thumbs up from me. Yeah, I feel it.
This has turned out to be…surprise…another full day! The climb was more difficult than expected and the heat and humidity were the highest we’ve experienced so far.
Reaching the Sun Gate was such a reward! Today we actually climbed and skirted around Machu Picchu Mountain, opposite Llactapata, to reach it. We could now look over to the west and see our camp from just two nights ago!
There was more haze this afternoon than we’ve seen to date. But we soon started hearing thunder and watched a short-lived storm quickly clear the air, just for us! The sunbeams were streaming down and we saw a rainbow!
But even an idyllic life has its ups and downs. Apparently Patricia had picked up a stomach bug and, with all the extended exertion, it had chosen this moment to act! She needed to get down fast and Ruben put Big Al on the task. We hurried down to the visitor center.
How thankful can we be that she made it to the bus station at the end of this day? Ruben made sure we got on the next bus down and we made it back to the hotel. We couldn’t make dinner, so Ruben brought me a pizza and some medicine and electrolytes for Patricia.
One thing about an odyssey, things can change quickly. But our guides adapt quickly too. Our next day was to be a tour of Machu Picchu, so we actually had a little flexibility. We decided to see how things were in the morning. For now, we’ll just hunker down and see how the medicine performs.
Today’s bus ride from Machu Picchu is the first time we’ve been in a vehicle since the Glass Cabanas and we’ve covered a little over 60 miles through the mountains by foot. Not a bad way to find Machu Picchu.
Oh, and Ruben says that this trail was harder than upcoming Rainbow Mountain. That sounds promising.