The Inca Trail

Kara says:
The Inka Trail (Torture). Most important - we survived! Though it was a close call at times. Have i complained about altitude recently - altitude and I are not friends. I spent much time fantasising about getting my hands on some of that good stuff the cyclists use on the sly.
On the first day we started at about 2500m and walked through little mountain villages. Small houses, no cars or roads just walking tracks, small crops of corn, some cows, sheep, donkeys for transport - probably alot like Ireland 50 years ago. The women wearing knee-length skirts, leg-warmers, plaited hair and hats. Crossed some dodgy bridges (really just sticks thrown at the river). Then we climbed to about 3500m. That's a kilometer. A whole kilometer up. Stupid. Crazy. Camping at 12,000 ft? Brilliant idea! Should do it more often. Actually the views were beautiful. The food was great (the porters and cook work some miracle whereby they carry a kitchen and all the food and cook up some amazing stuff) and few things can beat being woken up in the morning with a hot coffee (LOVE those porters - see photo of a string of porters all dressed in red running through the cloud forest) and sitting in the tent, still snuggled inside my sleeping bag, drinking coffee and looking at the spectacular mountains. See photo of boots enjoying the view from the tent too.
Second day was climbing further to "Dead Woman's Pass" - see photos of proud (and not dead) woman and Karl at the top. 4200m. Highest I've ever been. Karl sky-dived from that altitude. More beautiful scenery, we saw a bear and a deer and there's a photo of a hummingbird. There's a picture of Karl at the second campsite with the all important toilet roll.
It only rained for about an hour on one day so, alas, my fabulous pink raincoat didn't get much of a showing - see photo.
Third day was party day. Only half a day's hike, our group got to the hot showers and beer first so we got to gloat as the queues built up later in the day. Photo of me with clean hair and a beer - best tasting beer in the world. Photo of lines of well-earned beer outside our tents.
And the next day we arrived at Machu Picchu. There's a photo of sweaty Karl to prove it really was difficult as already he's describing it as a walk in the park (did I tell you about the time i walked 96km straight....).
And Machu Picchu is in just a beautiful setting (i seem to be lacking adjectives, I blame the hypoxia) with the clouds rolling up from the valley it seems magical and unreal. And we have a photo of Gaucho Karl enjoying a traditional Inca snack.
And I almost forgot about Stick! Stick is my new best friend, you'll see him in some of the photos, he's wonderful, he helps you up hills, he helps you down hills, you can use him to lean on, you can point with him, you can wave him about in a threatening manner, even our tour guide liked to borrow him to draw illustrations on the ground when he was trying to beat some facts into us about the Incas. Facts: Machu Picchu "discovered" in 1911 by US philosopher, two local families were living there - the site having been found by local in the 1870s. Other Inca sites in the area that we visited found in 1914 and 1915. The Inca Trail was once of many roads/trails linking Inca towns, made of stone, like roman roads but with more steps (never want to see another step again!).