THURSDAY 13 Day 3 Inca Trail.
5:30 wake up.
Not too bad a nights sleep.
Temperature quite warm.
A long climb first thing on top of a full belly. We struggled.
Cloud on the tops which meant that we never really saw the mountains towering around us. However with cliffs climbing up into the clouds we were aware of their presence.
Finally at the next pass after a couple of hours the vegetation changed again.
Quite tropical in places and a lot more moisture although the track was still dry.
A gradual descent brought us an hour later to a short steep set of stairs which took us to another Incan ruin. From here there were some great views across the valley to where our next "rest area" was. Read tent city and toilets.
That's our next rest stop over Lindsey's shoulder.
Pity about the cloud. This valley could have been even more spectacular than it was.
Back down those steep steps and then a gentle descent and climb past another ruin and we were there. Time to pull out some of our snack food. The most delicious being Peru's version of a passion fruit. They are about twice the size of our passion fruit, with an orange outer skin which you crack open to devour the delicious seeds which are about twice the size of ours and a lot sweeter.
From left Kieran, Lenny, Anne and Fiona.
Kieran and Anne are brother and sister from Ireland.
Fiona is from Edinburgh and Lenny (Lenin) is our Peruvian guide.
After 45 or so minutes here we climbed a short distance out of the basin to walk a benched track for an hour and a half to reach our lunch stop.
Another terraced area with lots of camping areas but at this one we felt on top of the world as before us two valleys disappeared 1000m below us?
Delicious soup once again for lunch followed by pancakes and tea.
Glamping. This is what the porters erect for every lunch and dinner.
A short rest after lunch and then we descended 100 metres to a ruin on the side of the hill where we rested to let our lunch settle some more.
Lenny, our guide gave another history lesson as we observed a huge Incan terraced area on the side of an incredibly steep hill below us.
Looking down to the next ruin we are about to visit.
After a wee siesta we continued downhill for about 90 minutes, took a left fork and arrived in the middle of these terraces. So steep. I had to ask myself what was the point. Apparently they did it for agriculture. They would plant food on these terraces to harvest.
From here the day's end was in sight and after a very short steep descent and then a sidle along the cliff we arrived at tonight's tent city.
The closest camping of all the campsites. Another Intrepid tour was camped on a terrace directly above us.
One of our number disappeared with our guide at around 5pm and returned with some frustrating news.
The teachers were at it again!
Tomorrow after Machu Picchu we were supposed to be travelling to Ollyantotambo for the night, where we had already left fresh clothes to wear after washing away the grime of a four day hike.
Because of the teachers we were now going to stay in Agnes Calientes (Machu Picchu township) for two nights and we would be reunited with our clothes on the second day. It turns out that the teachers had managed to derail a train amongst other naughty escapades.
After another lovely meal which included a freshly baked birthday cake for an Australian woman (64) in our group we had an early night in preparation for another early start to get to Intipunko, the sun gate, at dawn.
No comments:
Post a Comment