Day 5: Machu Picchu

Upon landing in Cusco, instantly the feared altitude sickness struck, and it struck hard. The incredibly difficult breathing, the lightheadness, and just the woozy feeling set in before we even got off the plane. Needless to say, the anticipated hike up Wayanapichu the following day became a reasonable concern. Emma's frequent reminders of breathe, pause, breathe slowly through your nose and exhale slowly prevailed and helped us at least get off the plane but the light headness continued for the entire day. We were spending the night in Aguas Calientes, the town that sits right below Machu Pichu and that you take the train from Cusco to get to Machu Pichu. Unfortunately the train doesn't run from Cusco but you have to pick it up from Ollantaytambo, a town about an hour an a half from Cusco. So we hopped in a local cambido, basically a shuttle van, and enjoyed a very scenic and mountainous two hour drive to Ollantaytambo where we hopped the train. 

The train ride only added to this refreshing and relieving feeling of being alive as well it was the most picturesque train ride we've ever taken. In fact I'm currently writing this in the midst of the return train ride. It's unfortunate Peru gets a bad rep for being underdeveloped, unsafe, and not worthy of a visit, considering every single mode of transportation has been nothing short of impressive, at times even more so than the American transport we're used to. Not only are the trains and planes a fraction of the cost, basically a joke how inexpensive they are, but we have ample leg room, nice wooden tables on the train, some excellent tasting free food and snacks, and the service is absolutely amazing, far superior to the Americans. Although a significant portion of the population are impoverished, which is quite noticeable from traveling around, being a foreigner you are treated exceptionally well, far better than when I was studying in Italy or traveling through Europe. I've started noticing how the Peruvians just always have such a fascinatingly positive attitude and are always more than willing to help you out even if they don't speak English and can't understand a word of our broken Spanish. 

Moving forward from my newfound love of the Peruvian nation and onto the real good stuff. We arrived at our hostel and holy cow was it exceptionally nice. We had a massive king size bed, which being 6'3 and growing up in a twin sized bed that I still have to sleep in every time I visit my parents home, well this was certainly eye opening. But the greatest part was that we had an exceptional view of the downtown center of Aguas Calientes, and right below us we could see and better yet hear the roaring of the natural springs river flowing downhill. After marveling at this for some time, we walked around the town and made our way to the Natural Hot Springs that the hostal recommended. It ended up looking more like the local Peruvian swimming pool, luke warm/questionable looking water jammed packed with Peruvian families and one sole American, that being myself as Emma didn't bring any swim trunks. After a few minutes of standing there trying to get the good vibes of the springs, I felt my pores had opened and cleansed enough and we went off to the restaurant the hostel recommended. 

We didn't care where we ate at this point as this was such a small town with limited options and extremely honky tonk eateries and we were just trying to eat and then sleep, but the place they recommended had a ridiculous childlike cartoon of a Pirate as their logo so we actually almost just grabbed a pizza but decided when else would we be able to eat at a Peruvian pirate eatery. They really should consider altering their sign to fit more of their offerings as this meal was absolutely smashing. I got an entire salmon with such a great Peruvian wine spice sauce and Emma got pineapple chicken on top of an entire half cut pineapple, served with an array of free appetizers and Emma's liter of fresh Limeade concoction, rimmed with sugar. 

That essentially concluded the night and we went to sleep only to wake again wicked early at 5:00am. This was to catch the bus up the mountain so we could get there for the 7:00 entrance to the Wayanapicchu mountain hike. Fortunately we had pretty much acclimated at that point to the altitude and were stocked up on coca tea and coca leaves. The hike was kind of absurd. No idea how the Incans constantly climbed these steps, but oye! The steps were the most narrow, steep, and not to mention wet from the pleasant frequent drizzle of rain, we've ever come across. At times there was a rope to hold onto as a means of not dropping off edge of the cliff to our deaths, but the altitude and physical exertion made it quite difficult. Once we got the jig in our step, well it was certainly worth every ridiculously steep and slippery Incan step climbed and highly recommended as it was the perfect way to be introduced and greet Sir Machu Picchu. We sat at the top for a bit to wait for the fog to clear and when it started breaking through you had such an epic and breathtaking site of Machu. An hour up and an hour down we eventually landed ourselves in this sacred site. 

Our hostal had booked us a guide so we had an hour to kill to eat, hydrate, desoke out sweated clothes, and enjoy a lovely cup of icecream. The guide ended up being questionable as we couldn't find Richard our supposed guide, but Eduardo claimed that he was taking Richard's place. For only 20soles a person, equivalent to about $6, and the fact we were entering an extremely guarded site, we decided to go with Eduardo, the unfortunately broken English gold teethed Peruvian. The tour ended up being just fine and we could make out some of what he was saying, but it didn't really matter considering how unbelievable this city was and how it was so perfectly encased between 360degrees of lush green mountains rising thousands of feet above with rivers rushing beneath us. It is unbelievable how any civilization could craft such an architecturally sound and beautiful city in such a Shangri-La location.

After numerous, and I mean numerous photo opts with Sir Machu Pichu, we made our way back down the mountain, picked up our belongings from the hostal and jumped a train back to Cusco. This time taking the train to the nearby town of Poray and the train company bus back to the Cusco bus station.