Raiders of the Inca Trail!

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We came, we saw, we conquered the Inca Trail!! After pumping ourselves up for the last six months we set out on the trail that the Incas took 400 years ago to arrive at the ‘lost’ Inca City of Machu Picchu.

We got off to a bad start when we missed our briefing from the tour agency due to the traffic jam from hell on our way from Puno to Cusco. Luckily they arranged another briefing for the next night for us which was great and we were all prepped for the big trek.

We booked our tour through Intrepid back home 6 months ago which turned out to be a wise decision as a lot of the people we have met on our travels so far have been disappointed when they arrived in Peru to find out that the trail was all booked out. The Inca Trail is usually the number one reason a lot of people come to Peru (apart from guinea pig on a stick) so it would be pretty disappointing to miss out.

The first bridge
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We found out at our briefing that there would only be two other trekkers in our group which we were happy to hear as sometimes the groups can be up to sixteen people at a time. To top it off they were Aussie as well! In the morning we met our fellow adventurers Rebecca and Jacob who were great company along the trek and Rebecca is also going to be living in London after travelling through South America so she won’t be able to get rid of us anytime soon!

The trek took four days and involved camping for three nights along the trail. Now when I say camping, this wasn’t your run of the mill set up with campfire and billy on the boil (to cook up the two minute noodles). This was five star baby!!

Here we go...
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To look after the four of us we had: one tour guide, one chef and seven (yes that’s right, seven) porters to carry our gear (one of whom doubled as assistant chef, another as waiter)! We had no idea we would have it this good, we were all in shock when we arrived at lunch the first day to find a dining tent set up complete with tea, coffee and a three course lunch waiting for us. Better still, during lunch the tour guide ( JC) told us that after lunch would be siesta time and we all thought he was joking. That was until we stepped out of the tent and saw 4 mattresses all lined up in a row ready and waiting for us.

Those amazing porters
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Things only got better when we arrived that evening to our first campsite to the rapturous applause of all the porters (who had been there hours already) who quickly brought us all a bowl of hot water to wash our hands and faces in (at one point I thought they were going to throw rose petals at our feet!) in preparation for Happy Hour, that’s right you heard me, Happy Hour!!! Happy Hour consisted of afternoon tea (usually popcorn and cheese crisps) accompanied by tea, coffee or Milo - we were in Inca Heaven!

Ruins along the way
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Happy Hour was followed by some card playing and then another three course meal (dinner). To give you an idea of what the food was like, the carnivores’ dinner consisted of soup, followed by fresh trout lasagne, then a freshly homemade (in the camp oven) cake!! I won’t bore you with every meal of the trek but let me say that the standard of food was exceptional, especially considering it was all knocked up in a tent in the middle of nowhere!

Anyway back to the actual trek, I got a bit side tracked there... We had been told that the second day was going to be the hardest and they weren’t wrong. It was a steep climb most of the day to end up at Dead Woman’s Pass which is at 4200 metres above sea level. Needless to say we were all pretty stuffed. The only consolation was that it was all ‘down hill’ from there as the next day was the easiest day of the trek (but still included plenty of ‘ups’).

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The third day probably was the easiest and we had the carrot dangling in front of us that we had hot showers, beers and apparently a discothèque waiting for us when we arrived at camp! The beers and showers were there but no sign of the discothèque, there was a hall with people drinking in it so maybe that’s what they meant?

Anyway I don’t think we had enough energy to party after the three days trekking, and a hot shower and a beer was just what we needed. We had to be up at 4.30am the next morning to start our trek to the sun gate to catch the sun rise so after filling ourselves with our final trek meal and thanking (tipping) all the porters we retired for the night.

Visa really IS accepted everywhere!
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We set out in the dark for the sun gate which was only a short 1 ½ hour trek away. Through the sun gate we could see below what we had all come to see - Machu Picchu! Even though it was pretty hazy that morning and the sun wasn’t really making much of a show it was still unforgettable to see the ‘lost city’ for the first time (first time for us I mean) and there were high fives all around! We then made our final trek down to the city itself to take a closer look. You can’t even begin to imagine how they built this city in the middle of nowhere without heavy machinery etc. All the structures are constructed without any type of mortar or cement and the stones have been painstakingly cut so that every bit fits perfectly together.

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The rest of the day was ours to wander around and take pictures of the site (we took about 1000) and relax until it was time to catch the train back to Cusco. The whole experience was more than Em and I could ever of asked for - we had a great guide in JC who as well as keeping us informed the whole way also kept us laughing the whole trek, and we had the marvellous porters who took care of us all along the way. These guys were super strong, each of them carried twenty-five kilos on their backs along the trek, most of the time setting out after us and arriving at the next campsite a couple hours ahead to set up for us!

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Hopefully all the photos will show what a fantastic time we had! Note: Most of the photos are Machu Picchu, we aren't creative enough to think of so many captions!