On the trail of the Incas

5am is not the most conducive time to meet new friends, but that was when we boarded the Inca Trail bus with our eight fellow hikers, guides Raul and Jaime, and twenty porters. Breakfast at Ollantaytambo perked us up: chocolate/banana pancakes and fruit, before the whole entourage was deposited at 'Km 82', where we started the trail. We queued with other eager groups, taking photos of pack donkeys with colourful burdens crossing the swing bridge at the checkpoint.

Quick obligatory photo (which we were well used to after the 'Death Road' biking outing) and we were off along the valley! We shared the dusty path with donkeys and donkey manure, lending a farmy feel to the early kilometres that wound through several tiny villages and a scattering of Inca waystation ruins. We tried chewing coca leaves on the encouragement of Jaime, but soon spat them out! Lunch was taken at the mouth of the valley branching off the main Sacred Valley, next to a rushing stream. Upon arrival at lunch we were given fresh juice, and discovered the porters had put up a meal tent, with table and stools, and had cooked a hot two-course lunch, including delicious trout!

Inca educational and possibly spiritual establishment (the snake shape = knowledge)

After a little nap, we trailed up the valley to the first night's campsite, where magically (i.e. thanks to the porters) our tents were already set up and the 'happy hour' coca tea poured. We played 6-aside football with the porters on the only bit of flat ground in the valley, which was breathless and hot but fun. Roger impressed everyone with his goalie skills. We washed off the sweat in the river and sat down relatively freshly to another stunning meal, with pudding! Raul our guide talked to us about the Inca civilisation's foundations on trade along the different climates of the Sacred Valley. 

The porters woke us at 5.30am with coca tea and bowls of warm water at the mouths of our tents. Mt Victoria, visible from the campsite, was glowing in the rising sun. Omelette, fried plaintain, malty oatmeal and bread appeared on the breakfast table. Dead Woman's Pass, a 1300m height gain (4,215m above sea level), awaited.

The lunch and dinner tent

At the porter checkpoint (to ensure they weren't carrying more than 30kg each) we encountered a hiker bottleneck, but managed to get ahead via a long slog uphill. Digging into the reserve of NZ tramping skills, we kept a consistent pace up the slope, the seemingly thousands of steps, keeping pace with porters, until we reached lunch at 3800m. Waiting for the others in our group (apart from speedy Australian Jesse) we were able to nap in the dappled shade. Lunch was no less impressive than the day before.

Looking back at the path up to Dead Woman's Pass

On the final 400m, we passed a few altitude strugglers and dispensed our last two sorochi pills and advice (being the veterans we were from our Bolivian altitude adventures). We joined the other early arrivers on the breast of the dead woman, watching others struggle up the final 100m, eating colourful fruit-and-nut mix and getting slowly cold. A long downhill staircase completed the toughest day of the trail, to the camp of rocky terraces and particularly smelly (but still plumbed) loos.

Spot the observatory/fertility temple

We awoke to drizzle. Brightly coloured plastic ponchos appeared all over the camp. Banana and passionfruit pie righted the mood, keeping us going up towards the second pass via the circular observatory/fertility temple (depending on your interpretation). Above the observatory, we escaped the clouds and reached the pass easily, placing rocks in little towers (cairns) to the Gods for rain/fertility (depending on your interpretation).

As we descended the Inca path, the vegetation started to change and we arrived at a fortress on the intersection of the Inca Trail and the route deep into the jungle, perched just above the cloud forest. It's aquaduct could still be traced, cut into the rock from above and crossing a now top-less rock arch into the buildings, through a system of channels in the walls and emerging into a fountain. We spotted the stone steps beyond the aquaduct, leading off downwards into the forest, and imagined taking that path.

Just past the Inca granaries, we stopped for our final lunch - the porters had pulled out all the stops! The food was served with intricate and creatively carved vegetables and fruit platters. We discussed the merits of different food photography filters and apps.

Then came the most pleasant stretch of trail: undulating Inca paved pathway along a ridgeline and through a short cave to a view of Mt Macchu Picchu, with the famous citadel "just round the corner". Some groups were camping here, adding an extra 2hrs to their early morning walk to the Sun Gate.

We pressed on, past an attractively rambling Inca administrative centre (or perhaps observatory) with a series of layered water fountains, and then down a loooong stairway. Luckily we were descending with Veronica and Ben, our American-Norwegian new friends, so we talked politics and life plans.

The final down was through long, wide, curved farming terraces: these kept the royalty in Macchu Picchu well fed. We saw a dragonfly dragging a dead tarantula that it had recently killed, and apparently was off to lay its eggs in.

Macchu Picchu's breadbasket

The final campsite was busy and noisy, but we enjoyed a final meal with whisky-laced hot toddy afterwards, which gave me the confidence to make the thank you speech to the porters on behalf of our group, in dodgy Spanish. Each porter told us what they carried (the tents, the gas cannisters, the food, the rubbish) and we shook all hands and said thank you in their Quechuan language.

In the night there was a huge storm, with pounding rain, thunder rolling round the valleys and lightning illuminating the tent. We were all woken in the early hours by an unearthly scream. Veronica had had a nightmare. This set off camp jitters (snakes? tarantulas?) until the message was passed along the row of tents: it was just a dream.

3.30am wake up: coca tea for the final time and a long cold wait in the queue for the checkpoint to open, allowing the keen bean hikers to race to Inti Punku - the famous Sun Gate. "Don't walk near the edge" was Raul's advice; some get so keen they will push you out the way, even into the valley below.

As we walked, the sun came up, streaming into the Inti Punku as we ascended the final set of stairs, alone for a few moments before joining the crowd craning their necks for a first glimpse of Macchu Picchu. We enjoyed the buzz and views, before rambling down the path, smiling smugly at the clean, well dressed, early day trippers puffing up.

The trail hadn't had its last laugh yet, incorporating a big smooth boulder into the path next to a burial area. On which Roger rolled his ankle, lost balance and fell forwards and sideways, disappearing into the bushes below the edge of the trail! Luckily Roger's quick reactions caught him in one of the plants. Unluckily it was the spikiest plant in the valley, leaving him with thousands of tiny spines lodged in his hands and arms. The rest of our group, however, seemed to get the bigger fright seeing one of the team tumble over the edge!

  

 We all recovered, taking postcard pictures in the sunshine above the ancient citadel, with llamas. After a luxurious loo stop, Raul took us on a tour. Macchu Picchu was a city in ongoing development, built on the existing pre-Inca activity in the area. The majority of the mummies found in the surrounding hillsides are female, assumed to be the city's workforce of textile-makers and chefs for Inca royalty. The city was strategically placed for control and trade, from the jungle region along through the whole Sacred Valley and its several micro-climates. Ensuring crop movement and storage was key; dehydrated potatoes could last up to 5yrs and feed the Inca populus in a scarce year. Raul didn't mention the metal working so emphasised at the Macchu Picchu museum, based on tools found in excavations. As we'd discovered, there are many interpretations.

There is a two-story house, belonging to the lucky care-taker priest of the Sun Temple. There are surfaces for sacrifices and niches for mummies in the temple, and more in the rocky 'wings' of the Condor Temple, carrying the Inca nobility to the next life. There are windows and stones lined up to produce certain shadows at certain times of year (the solstices mainly), helping with the agricultural planning and festivals. There is a botanic garden where the Incas acclimatized plants from other parts of the empire, now tended by Macchu Picchu rangers. There is a stone quarry where rocks were cut using wooden wedges, water and heat.

The tour ended at the 'fridge' storehouse, which was a welcome relief from the hot sun. We then had time to explore on our own, within the tourist-curbing one-way system. However, with Jesse we struck out towards to the Inca bridge, via the old route to the jungle and another Inca citadel that remains lost and forgotten (Raul is convinced). The bridge turned out to be a narrow path cut precariously into the cliff face, that traversed a huge wall of rock and disappeared. We all felt a little vertiginous, and returned to the main site.

Finally Incad out, we took the bus down the switchbacks to Aguas Calientes, for pizza, beers and thank yous to Raul and Jaime. Roger and I had an earlier train, that zipped back on the valley floor to Ollantaytambo in a disappointingly short time. A final collectivo deposited us in Cusco, where we devoured huge burgers and finally taxied to our airport air bnb for a blissful shower and sleep.