Machu Picchu

 Machu Picchu -- a great wonder of the world, many people's highlites of their South American trip.  To get to this famous spot, we went on the 4 day Inca Jungle trek.  Many people just take the train from Cuzco to the top of Machu Picchu (which is about a 4 hour ride), but instead we hiked/biked most of the way taking us 4 days instead of 4 hours.  

Team Pumas after getting our faces painted. Day 1 of our trek

A local kid showing off his dead rat he caught

a monkey drinking beer

 The 1st day of our tour we biked about 15 miles down a mountain, which I didn't get to enjoy as much as I would have liked. The bikes were a bit sketchy (my brakes barely worked and I felt like my tires were going to fall off).

Greta, Lilah, and Amy

dressing up and learning a traditional dance

 The second day we hiked about 12 miles, ending our day at natural hot springs.  During our hike the guide talked about the different trees and animals in the jungle, as well as the history of the Incas.  On the top of the mountain we did a Quechaua ceremony. Our guide talked in Quechaua, as we all held up 3 cocoa leaves.  These 3 leaves signified the upperworld, this world, and the underworld. Bolivia & Peru are large growers of cocoa leaves. It literally takes a ton of these to make cocaine so don't think I'm getting myself into sketchy stuff here, haha. Many locals will chew on throughout the day. They will chew on them to have energy and lack of appetite as they work in the fields all day.


Halfway through our hike we stopped at a place where we got to dress up and do a traditional dance (which was more or less stomping while our tour guide played the flute. That night we went to a discotecha in Santa Teresa, where I learned how to dance Salsa (however, not quit mastered).

at the top with the 3 cocoa leaves

at the top with our group

Lilah crossing one of the many scary bridges

The third day I woke up, still slightly effected by the night befores activities ready (or, not so ready) to hike another 13 miles.  Most of the group paid extra to go ziplining but because of my previous experience in Costa Rica, going in circles, I chose to opt out.  We spent the afternoon walking on the railroad tracks to our destination, the town of Agua Calientes.  From these tracks, you could see the top of Machu Picchu. After 3 days of hiking through the jungle, we could finally see our destination.  Along the way, we crossed many types of bridges (all a bit scary) ranging from bridges made of 3 logs, cable cars, mini suspension and bouncy bridges.  All off which are over white water rapids.

cable car!

Machu Picchu!!

 

so stunning

at the top of Machu Picchu Mountain

Our fourth and final day we woke up at 4am to begin climbing the 1,726 stairs to Machu Picchu.  Half of our group walked, and the other half took the bus and we all met on the top.  We had to wait for an hour because they weren't going to let a girl from our group in because her ticket said "student" (I'm still not sure why this took so long to get cleared up).  Greta's ticket said she was from Afghanistan and was let in, no questions asked.

After finally being let in, our guide, Sammie, shared with us some more history of the Incas, and showed us around the ruins.  The ruins were incredible, but what really impressed me were the mountains surrounding it.  We hiked another 2,000 steps to get to the top of Machu Picchu mountain.  We spent the day walking around the ruins, and admiring them (and the mountains).  We walked down the 1,726 stairs to catch the 6:30 train back to Cusco.

We had 2 days of rest in Cusco before leaving on another 4 day/3 night trek in the jungle (Manu National Park)