El Camino Inka

Well its my very last day in Cuzco and I have had a great time here over the past six weeks, and Im really quite sad to be elaving both the people ive met and the city which I love almost as much as Edinburgh but not quite! I could easily stay in this city for the rest of my time here but as I said to a friend yesterday, who was trying top get me to stay, there are so many other places inPeru to see and so I have to leave!

This week I walked the inca trail - it was amazing and a little difficult, but once Id finished I could have happily have walked it over again even though almost every muscle and joint in my body ached!

I did the trip with 7 other people, a father and son from Hawaii, two guys from Denmark and three other girls who are also travelling alone. Joy from Telford, Renske from holland and Kim from the USA. The four of us became the sisterhood of the inca trail!

For the eight of us we had two guides, Roberto and Rolando, eight porters who carried our tents, the cooking equipment and lots of luxury items for us and our cook who was fantastic! Each lunch and dinner time we had tables set with covers and cutlery and two courses followed by matte te and between lunch and idnner we had afternoon tea of popcorn, crackers tea, coffee and hot chocolate. Now this is the type of camping I like! When we arrived in our campsites each night the tents were ready for us and in the moring we were woken with hot tea in our tents!

The first days walking was fairly easy, which was good to allow us to get to know each other, we visited one archealogical site along the way, I htought that witht the number of sites Ive visited by now I would be unimpressed but with eachnew place the incas surpirse me with the ingenuity and skill! The views of the mountains and the valley were astounding and there were many periods of silence as we tried to take in the beauty of the landscape.

The next moring we were introduced to our porters before setting out on the most difficult days walking at 7 am. We had 6-7 hours of walkingahead of us before we reached camp and our lunch. Our breakfast of porridge, pancakes and toast set us up nicely! we had to climb 1100m from our campsite to the highest pass on the trail called warmiwañusca or dead womans pass. Most people who have walked the trail will probabñy agree that the it is a very apt name for the pass! The first leg was a relatively easy before we ascended into the forresst and our first experience of inca steps at wich point I started to curse the incas and their stupid Andes! Out came the walking sticks (yes ria,I know,Im pathetic but thank Pachamama I took them!). The climb became steeper and more crowded with all the groups walking the inca trail as people slowed down and had to take many rests. But again the views of the valley below, the wisps of cloud floating around and the daunting pass towering above us kept us going. The last section of the climb was a nightmare and well quite frankly I dont think I enjoyed any of the 2 hour climb until I reached the toip and suddenly the satisfaction of reaching it reieved the pain and tiredeness in my legs and I felt full of energy and slightly elated - i blame the altitude!

Then cme our descent into the valley below where our campsite and lucnh awaited us, this was a nightmare. After about 2 or 3 more hours of stupid inca steps and a pair of very sore knees we reached our campsite and the best lunch Ive ever had! This campsite was stunning, behind us were waterfalls cascading down the mountainside and to the front,the deep valley and towering snow capped mountains.

The next day was difficult because of our tired and sore legs and feet, but we had several archaelogical sites along the way to break up the walking. IN the afternoon we walked through the cloud forrest. This was my favourite part of the trail. Its like nowhere Ive everbeen before and felt like a different country. The inca road here was breathtaking. It perched on the side of the mountain with a sheer drop below and more mountians above us. It snaked around the mountainside and the number of different plants and trees were amazing, we were surrounded by clouds and it felt as thought we were the only ones there (except when the porters came running by with our tents and kitchen!). In the last section of this days walking we were greeted by the most ridiculous steps which took us about 3 hours to go down to reach the campsite. The thing that kept me going was the thought of the hot showers and a cold beer in the very civilised final campsite - oh yeah and learning rude words in quechua and spanish with one of the guides!

The shower was great the beer better and our final meal together was a feast. We even had energy left for some dancing! The next moring we started walking at 5.15am in the dark to try to reach machu picchu for the sunrise. Unfortunately when we reached intipunku (the sun gate) there was only cloud. We waited for a bit with the hope that it would clear but with no luck we started our final descent into mach picchu. As we reached there the cloud started to move and it felt magical and mystical watching the site appear and disapear in the cloud.

We had our tour of machu picchu but we were so exhausted that it was too difficult to explore properly. I was really glad I had visited previously. By the time we were ready to leave the sky was blue and I had a little sunburn, just so people knew I was a british tourist! I had the best time on the inca trail and I think it has been the highlight of my trip so far! I have around 200 photographs for the trip and at the moment I cant upload any of them, maybe next time!

I{m off to Puno tomorrow and then after that to Bolivia for a few days and it{s all very exciting not quite know whats coming next agian. Im also more than half way through my time here so I{m definately going to have to make the most of it! So until nbext time, whenever that is ciao!