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Machu Picchu. No longer just a dream for us.

They call it the trip of a lifetime, one of the new seven wonders of the world. And I suppose it is. I know that I’ve wanted to come here ever since I saw that first photo of the city perched on top of a sheer mountain, surrounded by mountains.

The ruins of Pisaq are “muy interesante” (very interesting), the ruins of Ollantaytambo are truly terrific, as are Moray, Marasal and others. And they are all in the most incredible landscape. After a few days visiting historical sites in the Sacred Valley, you start to wonder….. what could top this?

Room with a view. Machu Picchu.

Machu Picchu. The photos, even the great National Geographic type photos can’t touch it. It’s like trying to photograph the Grand Canyon. Can’t be done. And here there is a mystical element as well. I’m not much into mysticism. I’m not even very religious. But there are a few places we’ve been on this earth that spoke to me in a way I can’t explain. I mean… why does the human animal respond to great beauty? I have no idea. Machu Picchu speaks to us. We speak back in mono-syllables. Wow! Man! Geez!

And to know the incredible history of the place just makes it even more fascinating. To know that they found the stone on (or nearly on) site, but imported the DIRT just blows me away (they’re stone mountains; the dirt is in the valleys).

Photos don't capture this amazing place.

We’ve decided that putting off seeing Machu Picchu because it’s so difficult to get to just doesn’t work anymore.  It’s not much harder to get to than Europe. A 6 hour flight from Miami, an hour flight from LIma to Cusco, and a comfortable 3 hour train ride from Cusco to Aguas Calientes. Maybe it takes a little longer than getting to London, but it’s not like it’s 3 days in a horse drawn wagon. It’s pretty easy traveling. You could leave Miami on Friday night, see Machu Picchu on Sunday and be back at the office on Wednesday if you had a mind to (which I don’t think I would, but that’s how easy it is).

Now, about our visit to Machu Pichu. Our bus left Aguas Calientes at 7:10 a.m. The buses are pretty much continuous. As soon as one fills up, it leaves and another takes its place. It’s a twenty minute drive up the mountain to Machu Picchu. You show the people at the entrance your M.P. ticket and go on in. It’s about a 15 minute walk to your first real sighting of this incredible island in the sky. Sherry and I were both grinning from ear to ear. It was just so beautiful, and made us so happy. Wow! And as you get closer and closer to the ruins, you keep thinking …. “It can’t get any prettier than this”. And then it does. Wow! If you’ve ever been to one of those places that, even while you’re standing there looking at it, doesn’t look real, then you know what I’m talking about. It was as if we were inside some giant panarama that had moving clouds and birds. It didn’t look real.

Machu Picchu, Peru

We used a guide. You don’t have to. Going it alone is easy. You can wander around at will and stay as long as you want ( or until 5, whichever comes first). You can even listen in to all the guides with their groups, although I doubt that they would want you to tag along for the whole tour. But this place is rich in history and you miss so much without a guide. After the guided part ends, you’re still free to wander to your heart’s content (or until 5, whichever comes first). There are guides available as soon as you get off the bus. Listen to him speak to make sure you can understand him or her, settle on a price, and off you go. Remember that I mentioned that we joined a tour group in the Sacred Valley? Well, our guide (and group) were with the same company (set up in the beginning with the other). A rep was waiting for us at our hotel when we got off the train, and we settled on when we wanted to go, etc. He came back that evening with our Machu Picchu tickets and our bus tickets, both already paid for (when we booked). And those two things alone would have been a bit of a hassle, what with first finding both places, standing in two lines, being confused, etc. This was so easy.

Our guide met us at the top at 7:45, holding a white flag (Pedro’s group). At first there were about 15 of us, but then we split into English and Spanish groups and there were 6 of us in the English group. There were 2000 people in Machu Picchu today (not all at once), so I could stand being with 6. And he was great. Excellent English, stopping at his significant site and explaining it. We wouldn’t have even know what the significent sites were unless we kept our nose in a book the whole time. And when he finished, we wandered around on our own. It was perfect.

Gardens of Machu Picchu

And a perfect day. The weather was great. I carried a very small backpack, just so we would have someplace to stow our sweaters and jackets as the day warmed up. And it did. There’s no shade on Machu Picchu. Nada. None. And the sun at this elevation can be fierce. (A brief aside: I knew that the sun/elevation factor was high even before we left, so we’ve been using sunscreen religiously. But on one day, one half day, I forgot to do my neck and got a very nice burn for my lack of attention. Red Neck). We also carried three bottles of water – and emptied all three. There is no (public) water on Machu Picchu. No bathrooms. Nothing to eat. You can get all of those things back at the entrance to the park (a fifteen minute or more walk). You can’t take food into the park. People do. We took granola bars. As long as you don’t litter, it seems to be okay (but still not officially allowed). There is a restaurant at the entrance. You have to leave the park to get to it, but you can get back in with your ticket as long as it’s the same day. The only difference is that to re-enter you have to show your passport, which is not a big deal.

Afraid of heights? Steps?

If you go, you’ll need: sunscreen, water (lotsa), granola bars, bugscreen (we didn’t use ours, but you might – depending on the time of day and season), a hat (preferably broad brim), one of those great long sleeve hiking shirts that don’t weigh anything and are UV resistent, a jacket, something to put the jacket in (like a small backpack) and you would appreciate wearing cargo pants (the kind with lots of pockets and zip off at the knees to become shorts).

This is not a place for people who have trouble walking or are seriously afraid of heights. Lots of steps, 8500 feet of elevations, the steps are stones of all different shapes and sizes, and you’ll be going up and down a LOT. If you want to be acclimated to the altitude by the time you get to the most important part of your trip (Machu Picchu), then take the itinerary we took. By the time we got to MP, it was easy. We still had to stop to catch our breath from time to time, but it wasn’t particularly tough. I’ll write up an IDEAL itinerary (what we’d do if we were going to do it again) in a couple of days.

We saw a woman being carried out on a stretcher when we came in (at 8 a.m.). Our guide wasn’t sure, but he thought that it may have been her first day in Peru and she had an altitude problem. We never found out what happened.

Machu Picchu.

A Near Disaster!!!!! Just before we left Ollantaytambo, my camera started acting up. Oh NO! Trip of a lifetime and your camera breaks. What are the travel gods trying to do to me? It would still work, but sometimes it wouldn’t open. We had new batteries with us. Didn’t help. Well, sometimes. Sometimes just taking the batteries out and putting them back in would get it to work (same batteries), but not every time. Ollantaytambo is a very small place. Only one store had any cameras at all, and it only had three. Luckily they were three good ones, so after decided which memory type best worked in our computer, and we bought a new camera. And battery. And memory card. We charged the battery as soon as we got to Aguas Calientes (we had tested the camera before we bought it) and it worked well and all was good again. About half way through Machu Picchu, the new camera said BATTERY EMPTY. Arrrggggghhhh. Luckily, I had brought the old camera as well, so I took it out and lo and behold it opened and worked long enough for us to get the rest of the “important” shots. And then it died, too. Lesson learned. Two cameras, two batteries each.

Speaking of lessons learned – a short story about last night’s dinner. We went to dinner with some new friends, Roger and Michelle from Australia. We liked them very much and had a lovely time. The bill came. The restaurant takes credit cards. Roger used his. The machine wasn’t working and Roger had no soles (Peruvian dollars) with him. Uh oh. He did have American money (they said they always travel with American money). The restaurant would take it but at an exchange rate of 2.5 (instead of the going rate of 3.0), making the meal considerably more expensive. Finally, I just gave Roger soles at 3.0 for dollars. What if he hadn’t even had dollars (or they wouldn’t take them)?

In case you don’t know, this blog is attached to a website. You can go there to find all about Peru and all the places (and more) that we’re visiting by clicking on HOME above and then clicking on PERU in the navigation bar. Of course, the web site has much more than that. From learning Spanish to learning about all 21 Spanish speaking countries. Enjoy.