Inca Heaven in Cusco and Beyond

After the desert, we moved onto Cusco and the centre of the Inca Empire. Whilst only lasting a relatively short time in history, The Incas had an enormous impact on Peru, and contributed to the history of this city, which claims to be the longest continuously inhabited city in the world.

The city is wonderful, and a remarkable example of Spanish colonial and Inca styles combined. It consists of a series of lovely squares connected by wonderful buildings with beautiful balconies. It was a great place to wander around and have a coffee. We were also there when there was a festival and Halloween when the squares were full of singing, dancing and kids in costumes.

Beyond Cusco there were some interesting places to visit. We saw the incredible ruins at Moray where the Incas built terraces to test the ability for crops to grow in different conditions. These were adjacent to the Miras salt mines, where the Incas realised they could harvest salt from a small, local stream to use in cooking, preserving food and for medicine.

Perhaps the highlight was the Sacred Valley and the Inca Trail. The Sacred Valley is a lush, fertile valley surrounded by high terrace-filled mountains. Not uncovered by the Spanish, and only rediscovered in 1915, the valley is full of ancient Inca sites dotting the path between the major centres of Cusco and Machu Picchu. On the way through, we stopped at weaving and pottery centres to understand some of the local culture better.

We stayed in the lovely town of Ollantaytambo on the night before the Inca Trail. It was a lovely place to explore some old ruins in a great setting, and was our last refuge before four days of hiking, Early the next morning, we then set off with fourteen soon to be friends, two guides and around twenty-five porters, chefs and other helpers.

We spent three days on the Inca Trail. This is a proper, stone path which is largely restored after being overgrown for centuries, and complete for 70% of the way. It was only discovered soon after an American, Hiram Bingham, found the “Lost City” of Machu Picchu in 1915.. It makes for interesting walking as it consists of small steps, big steps as well as caves and tracks curving around steep hillsides.

The first day is actually straightforward and involves trekking mainly on dirt paths. Not too steep, it also allows the trekker to see the incredible countryside, as well as the many Inca ruins that can only be seen on the Trail. This leads to a whole story unfolding of pilgrims, local farmers, army lookouts and runners taking messages between Cusco and Machu Picchu.

The weather was great and this meant that staying in tents was relatively straightforward as we neither had wet conditions or cold. We were on a slight lean the first night, but after that the campsites were lovely. We were attended to by a welcome drink, bowls of “hot” water for washing, and remarkably a beer sold by a lady from a local village.

The second day was the most challenging, and almost entirely uphill until we reached Dead Woman’s Pass – so called because of the shape of the rocks and not the result of a day’s hiking. Starting through cloud forest and ending at 4,215 metres in the open it was a great day. After the early start, we were actually finished and had the afternoon to recover in the sunny weather; But not until after a late lunch which included a trio of deserts from lemon meringue pie to bread pudding.

Day three was largely following a ridge before plunging a thousand metres down steep steps to the third camp. It was much more relaxing and punctuated with wonderful viewpoints and interesting ruins. Lunch was on a ridge and included a cake, which the chefs had somehow baked and iced, with a message for our team, the “Crazy Condors”.

The day was reasonably short as we had an early start on the fourth day at 4.15am. We trekked for an hour and a half to reach the Sun Gate around 7am. Unfortunately, the entrance to Mach Picchu was misnamed today, as after three days of sun it was very cloudy and damp, and we only caught glimpses of what was below us.

After four days of trekking we were in danger of being exceedingly disappointed, and after an hour or so of fog and mist we had to start the half hour descent to the ruins. Remarkably we did catch glimpses of the ruins and did get some misty pictures with bits of mountain and ruin behind us.

However, everything rapidly changed for the better. Around 10am the sun came out, as the guides predicted, and after a few calls, we managed to re-enter the site and head back up to the top to get to the iconic view. Suitable elated, we turned into bad tourists as we shoved everybody out of our way so we could get the best pictures. Even the meekest of our group was heard to say, “have you walked four days to get here? If not, you will have to wait until we have all finished taking OUR photos”. It was quite remarkable how we had gelled as a team, and finished a wonderful four days of hiking.

We returned to Cusco via bus and first class rail travel for a day’s rest; although being accosted by hundreds of children for sweets on Halloween cannot really constitute a rest. We then decided to do another day’s trekking up to 5,000 metres to punish ourselves further, but also get rewarded with magnificent views. Rainbow Mountain and the Red Valley are remarkable geological features, but sadly only discovered as a result of climate change and snow melt.

With that, our time in Cusco and the surrounding area was up. It has been a highlight of the trip, and a chance to fulfil a childhood dream of trekking the Inca Trail. Now for the last couple of weeks in Peru…