Man down! Machu Picchu in picchures

22nd December 2006, Day 278

Qosco, Peru

A nice break for you all. This will be a quick painless affair with hardly any preaching and just pretty photos. Undo a notch of your post-Christmas lunch belt and relax. For a more detailed post check out James' blog.

We finished the Inca Trail a few days ago. I am bored of talking about it with people in our hostel, so I'll just mention a few things that stick in my mind.

Here's Machu Picchu itself, one's reward after a four day hike. It is another of these UNESCO world heritage sites. The UN apparently take bit more interest in this than the Nasca Lines and warn the Peruvian government that even the present regulated tourism here is having a seriously denuding effect. In fact some scientists at the University of Kyoto reckon that the whole city site is slipping down the mountain at a significant rate each year. I'm glad I went because if it might not be here for much longer. When we arrived the city was totally encircled by cloud, but thankfully this passed off and we received our long awaited 'oooh' factor.

The favourite theory for Machu Picchu's purpose was that in addition to it's status as a holy place, it was an outlying retreat for the Inca and his Quechuan nobles in event of an enforced evacuation of Cusco, the capital of Quechuan empire. As it turned out an evacuation was what they had to make after losing battles to the invading Spaniards, fortunately they had a place to go to and plenty of ways to get there.

The so called 'Inca Trail', is actually one of a number of different tracks which lead to Machu Picchu, one of the only Quechuan outposts which was never discovered by the Spanish due to a campaign of disguising and hiding it with twigs. Eventually the Inca and his nobles were found and slaughtered but Machu Picchu remained unknown to the Spanish. Nice story, except the vast majority of surviving Quechuans got enslaved.

It is an amazing sight, but it shouldn't be forgetten that this is a relic of feudal society. It is a bit like the Peruvian equivalent of visiting Windsor Castle, except that Windsor Castle is much older (!), and that Machu Picchu is a touch more impressive to behold. There's no real reason to commend one more than the other in terms of what they stand for, but there is in terms of how they were constructed. Whilst building the round tower couldn't have been a piece of cake, lugging huge chunks of stone up seemingly vertical mountains to build earthquake proof walls without the use of track animals must have been tougher.

To me, the four day hike was a mixture of exertion, surprise, anti-climax, guilt and wonder. You pass plenty of other Quechuan ruins on the way to Machu Picchu which were basically stop off points or decoys for Machu Picchu itself: Llatapata, Runkuraqay, Sayacmarca, Phuyupatamarca, Intipata, Winaywayna and Intipunku! It's a long walk in total, includingg three high passes but if the rain stays off you're alright.

This is the Urubamba river which flows through the sacred valley. The view is from Sayacmarca ruins a sentry point. I provide this level of detail so I can refer back to it in a year, not because you want to know. You can see how dramatic the Urubamba valley is from this picture. In Agua Calientes (Machu Picchu pueblo), which lies at the bottom of the mountains and the entry point to Machu Picchu you really get an view of how uniquely sheer these mountains are, as they shoot off into the cloud and out of sight. Pretty.












Some of 22 Quechuan porters playing a version of the game 'Sapo' at the Chakiqocha campsite, during a break we had to encourage them to take. One of the good things about using GAP adventures is that they pay the porters a reasonable wage and employ porters up to the age of 63 without shoving them on the scrap heap. At our first campsite (Yunkachimpa) each member of the tour group and each porter introduced themselves and said a few words which went a long way to humanising the group. I gave them a 'long live Quechuan culture' fisted salute. It was met with indifference.

Percy, our group leader (he told me to ask his Dad why he named him Percival), told us a couple of very interesting things about the porters. Percy himself is half Quechuan. Firstly most of the porters have never strayed much beyond the city of Cusco, much less outside the department of Cusco. Percy himself, who I imagine is better more 'wordly' than many of the porters had never seen the ocean until five years ago and he is 31 now. Secondly there is a great deal of stigma about being Quechuan and some of the porters will deliberately speak in Spanish in an attempt to side step this. To put this in context it's been nearly 500 years since the Spanish invaded.

So why do you need the porters? The porters carry all the food, tents, sleeping bags, gas cannisters and water proof mats you need to camp. They run the length of the day's trail before you so they are set up by the time you arrive. They cook all your food and wash up all your dishes. They create drainage ditches around the edges of your tent for when it rains. They wake you with hot water to wash your hands and a drink in the morning. Basically they do everything but wipe your arse. I hope our eventual tip was generous. Supposedly their options for farming locally aren't great because of small land holdings in certain villages.

This IS the Inca Trail. Some of it uncovered post Hiram Bingham's 'rediscovery' in 1911, some of it rebuilt. The local Quechuan farmers who lead him to Machu Picchu had always known about it.
When the trails were orginally built it they had channels along which water ran built along their entire length. This maintained the tiring Quechuans. Very few parts of the four day trek route have this feature today.

I still find it hard to believe that Percy managed to do the entire four day hike in eight and a half hours on one occasion!




View of the snopwcapped Andes from the Chakiqocha campsite at the end of day two. I'm not sure I'll see anything like this again. 'Day two is the hardest' is most people's assessment of the trail. It is true that Dead Woman Pass in the morning is a challenge, but I would say most people, as long as they aren't truely unfit, could manage it. One woman in our party had two false hips.








All the tour parties gathered at the Sun Gate. Ha ha! Losers! This is what should be known as the Cloud Gate, supposedly the best vantage point for your first view of Machupicchu. Actually I ran to be the first one here, there was nothing to see but whispy whiteness. Incidentaly I was first one to climb to climb Dead Woman Pass and Runkuraqay High Pass too. Except for the porters.








This is me at the top of Waynapicchu, the mountain overlooking Machu Picchu which you can see in the photo at the top.

I'm glad I went travelling, 'cos it means I can do this sort of stuff.

Back to your Turkey sandwiches, or Guinea Pig if you're Quechuan. I'll be having a picnic in the sun somewhere.