Pushing Pesos: Machu Pichu wonder of the world. PERU

Not being hardcore trekkers we opted for the more fun and activity filled trek to Machu Pichu, which consisted of 3 days including mountain biking down the Andes, all down hill, Zip lining across the mountain range, a visit to spectacular hot springs and on the final day a hike to the world famous Machu Pichu...

Day one 1..

A drive up the beatiful andes, where we jumped on mountain bikes and sailed our way down on perfect tarmac avoiding trucks buses and cars as we raced down. Nowhere near as dangerous as the death road biking we did in Bolivia but still a hell of a lot of fun with very little effort.

The top of the Andes, where we started our descent

After the biking we headed by car to our next stop San Teresa where we would be staying the night before heading off closer to Machu Pichu the next day. We had to endure another death road adventure this time by car, and our driver Sergio was crazy as ever taking blind bends with cliff edges on the side with high speed. After doing the death road in Bolivia by bus and facing near death we had said to ourselves we would never do that again, but here we were again, this time by car!! Anyway we survived again.

Our home for the night in San Teresa

Arriving in San Teresa we stayed at a very quiet guesthouse with only our host Freddie to look after us. He mentioned that there were some hot springs so we headed off there to go and chill till teh sun came down.

Having been to many hot springs before we were very impressed with the setting of these, down in the valley with a roaring river running past the hot spring pools surrounded by vast mountains...

Death road, here we go again!!!

Arghhhh - slow down Sergio!!!

Time to relax at the hot springs

Hot springs

Nice view

The next morning we had the option to do some zip lining instead of a 4 hour hike, an easy decision for us and off we went zip lining. I have been zip lining before and have always found it over too quickly, these though were huge, with the longest being 1.5km long and stretching across two mountains across a huge river. Great experience overall and definately the best zip line ive ever done...

Back of the pick up on the way to zip line 1

Here we goooooooo..................

Jungle Jo in full action

The remainder of the day was filled with hiking along the Inca railway to Agua Caliante situated on the foothills of Machu Pichu. Our views were stunning with jagged peaks and large trees forming vast canopies of shade on our train track trail.

As we neared Aguas, our guide pointed to the top of one of the mountains and said "the other side of there is Machu Pichu". Now from where we were standing you could now really start to imagine how special this place will be and how much effort it must have taken the people to build this, or how much wipping would have to have been done!!

Machu Pichu from below...

As we arrive in Aguas Calientes we head to our hotel, a first since our travels, some booking error by the agent had meant instead of a dorm hostel we were in a hotel with a proper bed, bedside tables and bathroom, pure luxury, in reality probably a 2 star but beggars cant be......

We were instructed to be up by 4am, ready to start our climb to Machu Pichu. We had made friends with some English girls Danielle and Becky who would join us to the top.

Our hike in the dark....

Eager to get up there as early as possible to see the glorious Machu Pichu at sunrise we headed off at a good pace, a good hour of hiking up Inca built steps and the sweat was at full flow, luckily we had packed snacks the night before which kept us going. Arriving at gate one, we had to get our final tickets and then we would head to see one of the wonders of the world....

Our first glimpse of Machu Pichu

Machu Pichu grey and dull.....

So was i wowed as much as i expected to be, all the talk...."the photos, the wow, it was amazing, and life changing, and so impressive that nothing you would ever see would be as spectacular as Machu Pichu" blah blah.

Well not quite, yes it is a city built in spectacular setting on top of a mountain, but my first thought was that it was just a load of sheds neatly arranged, maybe it was the early morning start or just my expectation was too high. Our guide, now in full swing into the history of machu pichu, started to tell why this is such a great achievement. As the story goes on i begin to realise what a feat this was and now began to admire the surrounding sheds and their beaty as i picture how the Incans lived here.

Nobody really knows what it was built for, much speculation that it was a holiday retreat for the kings, a place for sacred rituals or just a place for attractice ladies only and members of of the Inca elite. To help build a more favourable picture for me i opted to for the high female to male ratio....

The amazing thing about Machu Pichu is that it was only discovered by westerners in 1911 by an explorer who was looking for a lost Inca City, who happened to find it by talking to local villagers who had settled in the area to avoid the pillaging Spaniards who had said they know nothing about the lost city but new of other ruins. A bribe later and an offer of money the locals showed the untouched Machu Pichu to the explorer, who as sole finder of this wonder filled his pockets with the treasures and gold of the Incas which to this day are still missing.

Our tour consisted of the different parts, all painstakimgly built by hand by what must have been thousands of workers from huge stones on the mountain tops...

Full view from entrance gates

The temple head

Terrace

Brickwork

Alley

Sunblessed - the Incas worshiped the sun

The rocks on the left are what they used to mason the brickwork

Behind is the mountain we climbed before!

Sacred stone, shaped like a condor. Looks rude to me....

A bottom to top view of the terraces

Once we had walked around Machu Pichu we had the chance to climb the adjacent peak Huayna Pichu, which would take an ardeous hour straight up! Well we made it and it was completely worth it, now i really could appreciate the wonder of Machu Pichu from above. I had actually asked Jo before whether she was impressed on when we first saw Machu Pichu and her thoughts were the same as mine, but seeing it from here has changed my mind.