Mucho Excitement at Machu Pichu

6am alarm calls should be illegal when you're on holiday. Still, this day was different; we were off to visit the ancient Inca ruins of Machu Pichu!

Israel our guide got us on the bus at the foot of the mountain along with 4 others and we ascended towards the top.

Every turn up the windy road gave us a different, breathtaking view of the mountains and lush, green, tropical forest surrounding them.

Within 30 minutes we reached the top and excitedly walked through a narrow alleyway between two Inca buildings and right before our eyes was a breathtaking sight.

The cloud was low but the sun was shining and Machu Pichu looked amazing. It was everything we had imagined and so much more!

I personally didn't expect it to be so huge and we explored the ruins over the next 2.5 hours leaving no area unseen!

Hundreds of terraces, just like in the Sacred Valley, were used to grow crops.

A view off the main Inca temple from below.

The Incas carved the head of a Condor into this stone and the building behind it was constructed to look like wings and the body of the bird.

The Incas were incredibly intelligent and often pioneered new techniques for farming and building. One of their main traits was to use existing rocks in their buildings and build their buildings around them rather than clearing a site first and building on a flat surface. This gave their buildings incredible structural integrity but more importantly, they were more at one with "mother earth". See the example below.

The Spaniards certainly were barbaric.  When they came and found the Incas at Machu Pichu, they saw that they were worshipping the sun and immediately captured one of the great Inca leaders and told him to renounce his beliefs and state publicly that the Catholic faith was the one true faith. He refused and so the Spaniards chopped off the hands of all the male Incas and told him if he didn't comply, the same would happen to the women and children.

So, reluctantly he did as they asked. As he finished his sentence saying the Catholic faith was the only true faith, they beheaded him. Harsh.

After our tour we bumped into Gary & Rachel and Shane & Corrine again and made arrangements to meet up for dinner in Cusco the next night.

Around 11am Lauren and I decided to walk up to the Sun Gate which is a series of rocks a few kilometers up the Inca trail that looks over Machu Pichu. As the Incas worshiped the sun, they constructed the Sun Gate so that on the 21st June (midsummer solstice), the Sun would perfectly align the Sun Gate and Machu Pichu.

The walk was around 4 kilometers and all uphill over very rocky ground with hundreds upon hundreds of uneven steps.

I took a video about half way up and got 'video bombed' by Rachel who didn't realise I was filming!

http://youtu.be/RZkVwDJHQxw

We came across this fella who was casually on his way down.

A few hundred metres from the top the heavens opened and visibility of Machu Pichu (the main reason we put our unfit bodies through this pain!) was gone!

We waited around, dripping wet from head to toe and it cleared enough to get these shots:

The rain continued all the way down making our descent hair-raising to say the least! Our 4ft wide path (at the widest part) was now slippery as well as bumpy... with an unthinkable drop on our right hand side and no barrier!

You'll have guessed by reading this blog post that we made it down in one piece, albeit soaked to the skin and made our way to find some shelter.

The only place was a restaurant by the gate into Machu Pichu which cost a fortune to get into! Lauren by this point was in a lot of pain with her back so we paid the money and went in the warm to dry off.

We were joined by Rachel and Gary and after a couple of hours, the rain stopped, most people had left Machu Pichu and so we ventured in again for one last look with much fewer tourists around!

We left shortly after, grabbed a couple of beers with Gary and Rachel in Aqua Callientes at a lovely restaurant right by the river.

http://youtu.be/a8iFpLNmAj0

We then got our train and bus back to Cusco in time to pick up our bags and check in to our next hotel, the seventh different place we've stayed since Christmas!

What an amazing day!

Lauren's Thoughts:

Machu Pichu was not a disappointment. The Incas really knew how to pick the most breathtaking of areas. For me, the real excitement started on the train. The tropical rainforest mountains hemmed us in and were just so beautiful, it actually made me well up. What a girl, hey? I'm just astounded at how much beauty there is in this world. 

Since planning our South America trip, this was high up on the bucket list. I can only imagine how the guy that rediscovered Machu Pichu felt when he came across it. 

For many, this trip is a real spiritual experience but I can't say it was one of those moments for me. That said, the site was so impressive and fascinating to hear what historians think it was used for. My moment was probably more taking in the setting it was in and being amazed at the natural beauty that surrounded it. 

All in all, I would highly recommend going. It won't disappoint.