Deepest Darkest Peru

The United Mice Team
see all photos »

DAY 1. We Started our 5 day trek at 4:30am! Well actually we got on a bus for a few hours stopping briefly for breakfast in the village of the damned, on the way! We saw a bloke lying on the ground clutching the edge of the curb in order to prevent himself from falling off!

The walk started off fairly easy with a gradual ascent, but we soon were puffing and panting due to the thinning air...Its really quite annoying as you just physically cannot move as fast as you want to. Then we had our first steep ascent a whole new world of pain! We all started chewing the Coca leaves as advised yuk!

Where there is pleasure ...there is pain!

Dizzy heights of the Andes!
see all photos »

The relief amongst the group was obvious when we reached our first camping place at the base of Mount Salkantay, not only due to the altitude problems but also the freezing cold conditions and rumbling stomachs!

I felt pretty dizzy despite the various remedies..like getting up from your chair too quick plus a slightly dull headache and a sort of pressure at the temples. I drank copious amounts of coca leaf tea and after a bit of group bonding and star gazing, opted for an early night (well I am thirty now).

WHAK! POW! SMACK! Natalie´s broken snozz.
see all photos »

DAY 2. Another early start 6am, made a little easier by our guides who brought a cup of tea to our tent! (more coca!)

Flora our main guide said it would be a few hours walk this morning, as she gestured in a sort of heil hitler fashion , to indicate a steep climb (groan). But on the bright side the afternoon would be down down down.

By about 12am we had reached our optimum height of 4800 metres (blue lips and hallucinations). We were rewarded with a very close up view of the snow capped Salkantay and several impressive glaciers, plus a whole mountain range in full panorama. We even saw an avalanche.

The cloud City of the Inca´s - Macchu Picchu
see all photos »

The moment was made even more special by Flora getting us all in a circle to perform an ancient ceremony. This involved flicking some rum in the general direction of the most prominent mountains and saying 'Apu Salkantay' etc etc. Then we poured some of the rum onto the earth before downing the remainder. This was followed by all of us taking three coca leaves, making a wish and letting them float off in the breeze.

It was suprisingly quite a nice touch to the day and the whole group seemed to enjoy it.

The afternoon was down down down as promised and the scenery changed from a sparse cold landscape to a lush green forest. The forest was brimming with hundreds or varieties of beautiful plants and orchids. A highlight for me was seeing a tiny green humming bird hovering next to some flowers...magic!

DAY 3. Awoken by a chorus of cockerels at 5am.

A day mainly walking on the flat and much lower today so altitude was not a problem! There were loads more varieties of flowers and all sorts of veg etc growing. We picked passion fruit for our morning snack, the guides collected some squash for making soup for lunch and we saw coffee beans growing as well as avocado, tomato trees, bananas and loads more.

We camped in a small village called 'la playa' which had been totally rebuilt after a devastating landslide in 1998. The village had been ruined and many people killed. The ones left there are the survivors and their children.

The village is next to the river so we were able to take a nice cold shower! Brrr. Unfortunately it rained all night and our tent leaked and I woke up with a wet pillow and sleeping bag at 4:30am!

DAY 4. Up at 4:30am and no room service!

Unfortunately (on many levels) it was a very wet day. We had a very long and arduous climb in the morning. The view should have been amazing but we spent most of the time in dense fog/clouds. So it was quite a boring and due to that was very hard work...my legs were like lead. At the summit of the climb we were guided around some Inca ruins, but everyone was cold, wet and tired so noone wanted to linger long. We should have had our first view of Macchu Picchu from here but we couldnt see it due to the fog!

The walk to the bottom of the mountain we had just climbed was around 3 hours, so when I slipped and fell over after an hour and a half, resulting in a broken nose it wasnt the best!

My boot slipped backwards on a rock on a very steep and wet descent sending me literally head first into another strategically placed rock!!! Ouch! Copiuos amounts of blood, several packets of tissues, some steri strips, painkillers and a jelly sweet and I was on my feet to walk the other hour and a half down...which turned into 2 hours due to my falling making me and everyone else very nervous!

Luckily for me there were 4 doctors on the trek...so I got very excellent and immediate attention (beats the 4 hour wait in A & E at home!) Also I felt quite lucky that the rock broke my fall because some of the paths had sheer vertical drops of several hundreds metres. Jim actually looked more shocked than me bless him!

I was very happy and relieved when we reached our base for the night Aguas Calientes especially because Flora had written off the camping due to the wet tents and booked us into a hostel yey!

DAY 5. Up at 5am to catch the 5:30am train to Macchu Picchu. I chickened out of the walk because my left eye was by now pretty much useless due to the swelling, and I couldn´t be arsed to be fair!

Macchu Picchu definately didnt disappoint. I managed not to mention my pain and suffering for at least 5 minutes to take in the view! Jim being an 'Urbanisto' and all, was totally in his element.

The buildings were gorgeous and the Incas had left all the biggest boulders exactly where they were and sort of incorporated them into the structures..very quirky. There was a temple with two windows and on the winter solstice the sun rises through one window and sets in the other!

There are water channels bringing fresh water from a spring further up the mountain, that still work. The best buildings have such precise calculations in how the bricks are fitted together they didnt need any sort of cement and they were anti seismic!

Jim and the rest of the group climbed the famous peak over looking Macchu Picchu whose names escapes me sorry. I sunbathed on a terrace!

It was a lovely clear hot day luckily too so we got a good view and we thoroughly enjoyed it despite the facial throbbing!

Everyone in the group got on great and we were quite sad to say Goodbye...but we had a brilliant time!