Here's the beginning of our really long walk at high altitude towards Aguas Caliente, the nearest town to Machu Picchu!!! Notice our starting elevation - ~11483 feet!
On the first day of our hike, our guide told us the trail was pretty much flat at the beginning and the hard part wouldn't be until we reach the 7 snakes pass... Guess what, when our guide said flat, it's Peruvian flat!!! As in rolling hills sort of going up and down and up and down! Just look at the photo on the right, our guide described that as flat!!! Hehehe!
Here we are on our first home, just a little below the highest point we will be on the trip... Let me tell you, they are not kidding when they say the 7 snakes pass is hard! I wimped out and rode my horse for 15 minutes on the trail... hehehe!
No worries though, I wasn't affected by the altitude at all... I didn't take any medicine and no problems while we were there... Well, except that it was freezing cold that night that I really had to think very hard that night when I felt I had to pee if I should go or just hold it in 'till morning since it's so cold even inside the tent (20 degrees fahrenheit!)!!! Oh yeah, almost all of my trek mates were affected by the altitude and they couldn't really eat... As for me, let's just say my appetite's the same at sea level and at high altitude... mwehehehe!
Look at how cold it was, there was some sort of pond near our camp and when we woke up in the morning, the pond has ice on the surface! It was that cold!!! Oh yeah, I remember that morning that we were woken up by mooing cows! Hehehe!
Just look at the view from our first home, gorgeous! Oh yeah, while we were on the trail and while in our tents, we could hear some rumbling, which was, our guide said, avalanches!
Here we are at the highest point of our trek (2nd day)! Everything is now downhill from here... I mean, literally, we're going downhill! Hehehe!
Here's a few of the animals we saw on our trek, they may not be wild, but still cute! Look at the baby sheep!!! =)
Look at our peeps! Hehehe! They are our support team!!! The mules carrying all our gear and kitchen stuff and two horses in case we wimp out on the trail! The trail is pretty busy in some areas by the way... There was one time another mule/horse team was going in the other direction on the trail and we were told by our guide to stick close to the wall. I guess one of the horses was really tired and that horse was not listening to the horseman because it sort of nudged my pack and almost took me down! That horse about gave our guide a heart attack! Hehehe! That's the good thing with this trail... You can hire a horse to carry your gear or even carry you! Hehehe!!!
Here's our home for the second night... Anybody else need to hang their laundry? Hehehe! I believe we were camping out in somebody's backyard here... hehehe! Oh, there's a toilet here and running water by the way!!! There was also a stream were we were able to sort of wash our hair (no soap though!)... Hehehe!!!
Here's another photo of the trail we were on... We must have passed by quite a few creeks here. So, I think I would recommend wearing waterproof hiking boots here... hehehe!
And no, we did not cross this river... Just walked alongside it! Hehehe!
So do these guinea pigs look like your regular guinea pig pets at home? Okay, if you have a guinea pig pet, stop reading...
I warned you, these guinea pigs are being raised for food and called "cuy" here... I didn't have the heart to try them after seeing them like this!!! Although, I have read that cuy is pretty tasty!
Some more animals we saw along the way... The monkey is cute, as in, it is small... hehehe!
On the third day, we were given an option of stopping by a hot spring, and of course all of us jumped on the chance!!! The hot springs was at Santa Teresa and boy was it wonderful after three full days of walking!!! There was a girl there at the spring who kept muttering "my feet hurts" while we were soaking... I don't blame her! Hehehe!
Oh, and something exciting happened while we were on the trail... The train that we were supposed to take from the hydroelectric plant to Aguas Caliente was not running that day because of a strike. So instead of us walking to the hydroelectric plant on the fourth day, we got a ride instead to the hydroelectric plant and we were hoofing it to Aguas Caliente... That's our ride above! Hehehe!
Look at the views while we were on our ride! Beautiful!
Here's the next part of our trek... Walking along the railroad ties!!! Oh, the bad thing with the strike was the people coming back from Machu Picchu who needed to catch a plane were hoofing it to Santa Teresa to be able to get back in time for their flight in Cusco, with all their luggage!!! I don't know if I would have been able to do that! For us, we were told to just carry a change of clothes for the next day and our cook was going to wait for the trains to start running again and take the rest of our stuff with him to our hotel in Aguas Caliente... What an adventure, right? =) We're almost at Aguas Caliente and the next day, we'll be at Machu Picchu!!!
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