On our final day of the hike, we woke up at 4 am so the porters could gather everything up and reach the only train that could take them home. We were only a couple miles away from Machu Picchu at this point, so we hiked to the Sun Gate and waited for it to open at dawn. Nearly all of the paths we walked on during our four days of hiking had steep cliffs off one side, so hiking in the dark was not allowed.
This doesn't look like much, but it's Machu Picchu covered in fog.
Gradually lifting, almost there....
Tah-dah! There she is. Machu Picchu means "Old Mountain" by the way.
Francis, Robert, Daniel and Frank. Good traveling mates indeed.
Alejandro shared his flute skills with us several times. In fact one really cool moment that I don't have pictures of is when he made a tribute to Pachamama (the mother earth) and played a lovely tune. He is part of the Andean Religion, which is a belief system recognizing the energy that comes from nature. The sun, the earth, the moon, the water, the mountains, etc.. When the energy of these elements is unbalanced, they perform rituals to get back in alignment. He buried coca leaves in the ground so Pachamama would bless us. It was a beautiful moment, we were near a serene pond and it was lightly raining. Ahhhh, Pachamama, rain down your goodness upon us. And she did. Oh, she did.
Odie, Alejandro and Joel, our three fearless leaders!
The Brits with their selfie stick. Every time they brought this out I died laughing. They were a hoot!
Oh those Brits.
WE DID IT! Jackie, Cheryl, Sonny, Chris, Francis, Robert, Frank, Daniel, Ashwin and Kulraj. Such a wonderful group of people to share our stinky selves with.
After taking a million pictures of our bad selves, we actually walked down to the ruins and explored them. You know, to take advantage of the whole reason we came to Peru in the first place.
Alejandro regaled us with more of his signature "history time."
We all took a side hike to an Inca bridge, which happened to be nothing more than a couple logs placed over a gap. NOT their finest accomplishment, but because of all their other accomplishments, they get a pass on that one. In fact it probably wasn't even them because it was made of wood and they did not deal in wood, just stone.
A plaque honoring Hiram Bingham, the American archaeologist who uncovered Machu Picchu in 1911.
That's a wrap! We came, we saw, we conquered.
And I'm ready for a shower. Greasy, stinky, sweaty, scruffy, that's us.
We took a bus to Aguas Calientes, the town at the base of the Old Mountain, and we had lunch with our group.
I had baked trout, cheesy potatoes, salad and a giant vat-goblet of passion fruit juice.
Adam had some kind of meat on cheesy mashed potatoes with vegis. Don't forget the giant vat-goblet of passion fruit juice.
This town was fun, I wish we'd had more time there.
Adios Hot Water/Aguas Calientes. We hopped the PeruRail train and headed back to Cusco for an aguas calientes shower!!!
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