Lima

So Lima was great. One of the most interesting things I found about it was all the different types of architecture. Because of the earthquakes buildings are destroyed and rebuilt often, while keeping what survives and building onto it, so it is kind of like a melting pot of styles. I loved it and thought it was beautiful and interesting.  

We spent a day at the Plaza de Armas and just happened to be at the Presidentail Palace at the time of the changing of the gaurds. It was super fun to watch and we were glad that we didn't miss it. We spent the whole afternoon exploring.

When it came time to go back to our hotel we ran into some difficulty getting home. We found that hardly anyone spoke any English and we spoke very little Spanish so we couldn't communicate with the taxi drivers about where we needed to go. It was stressful because we didn't want to use just any taxi -lots of them looked super sketchy and like they were about to fall apart. We walked around for over an hour trying to find someone to help us or a cab that looked like we could use it, eventually I was getting a little overwhelmed so we decided that we would take a break and go get some ice cream. Unfortunetly our timing was off for that to, while we were waiting in the ice cream line two guys started talking right in front of us and before we knew if there was a drug deal taking place. We had no idea as we couldn't understand anything anyone was saying, so we decided to forgo the ice cream and try and get home again. Eventually we found a taxi that looked okay so we hoped in it and were able to communicate to the driver to take us to the mall that was only about 4 blocks from our hotel and then we just walked the rest of the way.

Miraflores

I feel like our trip was planned perfectly, which is really something considering we didn't know anything while planning. Every place that we went was increasingly overwhelming for me, but because we had been in the previous place I was able to handle it, if that makes any sense.
 
We started in Lima, which is a really crazy, really big city! Lima is the biggest city in South America, there are almost 10 million people living there. It began badly with my luggage being lost and trying to deal with LAN airlines to locate it, which they were unable to. Then leaving the airport was super stressful, the traffic was horrendous! It didn't seem like anyone obeyed traffic laws, which is always especially stressful for me! Driving people would squish in as close as possible to the vehicle in front, beside, behind, anywhere they could inch their way forward... it was pure craziness, and this craziness was just magnified by the fact that no one spoke English... It could have also been the fact that we had flown over night so we were running on next to no sleep. By the time we got to the hotel my nerves were thin, and I was feeling a little overwhelmed.

Best decision ever was staying in the Miraflores district! I loved Miraflores!! We stayed at the Radisson, the continental breakfast is beyond amazing, if you ever stay in Lima I highly recommend this hotel! Once we got settled there we set off to go find a few things to replace my lost luggage. The funny thing about Peru is that they close everything down from around 11 to 1, so of course our luck had it that we got to the mall at 11. So we walked around for a while until we found a place to eat, which was a little stressful cause a lot of the restaurants only had menus in Spanish and the waiters only spoke Spanish. We did finally settle on a restaurant, and the food was so good, actually all of our food in Miraflores was so good!!

We just hung out all day enjoying the beautiful scenery. In the evening we decided that we had better take a turn paragliding. It was super cool! So beautiful! And just an all around cool experience.

What is all this about a Strike?

So the thing is, we never knew we were walking into the middle of a strike when we arrived in Cusco. Our bad that we were not checking regional news before flying into each new area. Lesson learnt!!! We did however feel a little frustrated because we had dealt with both our hotel as well as the airline because our flight had been overbooked and no one ever mentioned anything about it. So when we finally got to Cusco we were surprised and completely caught off guard. As soon as we landed the strike was evident, there were lots of police guarding the airport and there were no taxis to be seen, which was very unusual in comparison to the other airports we had landed at. But even that we were able to shake off as we had seen so many army and navy personal in Iquitos that it didn't seem to outta control. Once we started trying to get into the city and experiencing so much difficulty  and then arriving in the city and seeing how deserted the streets where, it began to be evident that more was going on. Still it didn't seem that dangerous, we walked around, did a little bit of shopping where we could, it wasn't until the evening when we asked our hotel receptionist for restaurant recommendations that we realized maybe we were taking things a little to lightly. He advised us not to go far, to just stay nearby and to stay off the streets as it was not safe, probably should have been common sense. But as first world citizens do we sometimes think we are invincible traveling? I think Dahlin and I do! But everyone was just saying that the strike was a transportation strike and no one ever got into details explaining what it was about. So we thought no taxis, no buses or trains, we could live with that. It wasn't even until we were stuck in the road block that we realized we might be in over our heads!
So what was the strike all about? Apparently a law had been passed in the beginning of October to  allow private companies to provide tourist services at Peru's archaeological sites. This would allow state governments to award 10-year licenses to private companies for cleaning, security, restaurant and museum services at archaeological sites. Cusco locals had immediately voiced opposition to the new law but nothing had come from it. Until the Regional Federation of Cusco Workers organized a two day strike, which we just happened to be in the middle of. So the entire city and surrounding area was striking... including the city leaders, demanding that Peru’s national government repeal the law. Definitely more than just the transportation strike people had sloughed it off to be.

I feel like in order to get the significance this law would have on the Peruvian people you have to look at how ingrained history is in them. I obviously am not an expert, and I have only a small short experience to base this on but it seemed like their entire identity was based upon it. The people seemed to have more passion for their history than any culture I have ever experienced. So when they argued that the private companies could never possibly manage everybody’s heritage and that it was an attack against their culture I had to agree. However once getting home I did some research about the law and the law would not apply to archaeological sites which are officially designated as national or world heritage sites, sites like Machu Picchu. But there are 19,000 archaeological sites identified throughout all of Peru, the majority of which have not been deemed either national or world heritage sites. So most of them would have been affected.

I feel like the people had a right to fight for their rights. I don't know that this was the best way to do it as it was estimated that each day of striking cost the region $1.5 million in revenue from tourists. But in the end they did rebuke the law so it was obviously effective. It makes me appreciate a little more as to why they were so persistent in not letting us get to Machu Picchu.

In the end, this ended up being a huge learning lesson for me. I think that every cities peace and safety is incredibly fragile! We need to always remember that we are visitors, their is so much more going on then we are aware of as tourists. It is our responsibility to be vigilant in trying to be aware of what is going on so that we can do all we can to keep ourselves safe. Thankfully we were never hurt and nothing got violent, but it could have easily went the other way. I don't ever want to be in the wrong place again just because of ignorance.
This is of course all just my opinion!

Machu Picchu

Our last day again began early, we were up at 3:30. This time though I had a harder time getting up. We had to wake up early so that we could walk 15 minutes to stand in line at the check point which would open at 5:30 to continue on the rest of the trail to Machu Picchu. For some reason we had thought that we would be able to be at the sun gate at sun rise, but that was not the case. Eric did however give us the option to go to another near by archeological site and watch the sun rise from there rather than wait in line. The only down side to that was that we would be the last group to be in line when the check point opened. He let us choose which we would like to do, we opted to go to Winawayna. We were so glad that we did. It was so beautiful and peaceful as we again were the only group there. Seeing all of the archaeological sites was truly breathtaking every single time! Each one of them where amazing and unique, I would not have wanted to pass up the opportunity to see any of them.

This also was the first chance we got to see the Lamas, which I of course was afraid of.

 

Once it got light we headed back to the cross the check point. We got there with plenty of time, enough that we still had to wait in line for a bit. The hike from the check point to the sun gates is pretty tame in comparison to the previous days. The highlight was definitely the monkey stairs where Dahlin and another of the trekkers raced to the top. Wish I had a picture, but they are called monkey stairs because they are so steep you have to use both hands and feet to climb to the top of them, but they are short, it took Dahlin less than 30 seconds to get to the top of them. Dahlin and I also felt pretty free hiking this day as we got to send our sleeping bags and mats home with the porters so our bags where literally half the size as they had been before.

Machu Picchu was beautiful! We spent 3 hours touring the different areas and learning about the significance of everything here, which I really really loved! Again everything was so impressive and amazing! But it was super busy! And super hot! And we were all super tired! So when free time came no one really stuck around too long, we decided to jump on the bus and head down.

We learnt a ton of interesting things during the tour, one of the things I thought was most interesting, and sad where these orchids. They cause you to hallucinate and apparently this is what the Inca people would give the children that they were going to sacrifice and then they would take them to the top of the mountain and leave them. This was apparently a huge honor to the families of the child being sacrificed.... but to this mother it breaks my heart hearing about it a little.

Inca Trail day 3

I feel like I may have understated the level of exhaustion I was feeling at the end of day 2. I was beyond tired, my back was seizing, my legs where shaking, I literally could hardly make it through dinner without collapsing. Dahlin and I had decided that we would carry all of our own gear... because as Dahlin put it, we could so why wouldn't we. We never knew when booking but this appeared to be quiet unusual, we were the only ones in our group, or any of the groups we saw for that matter, who carried more than just a day pack. All night I stressed about how I would put that stupid pack back on and whether I  would be able to survive carrying it another day up and down those dreaded steps. We had brought Tylenol 3 in case of an emergency and when I went to bed I fully intended to drug myself through the rest of the hike just so that I could finish. By some miracle though I woke feeling great and my back didn't hurt at all for the rest of the trek, thank the lucky stars!!!

our 2nd night camp site

ready to begin another awesome day, did I mention I'm not a morning person

We again started our hike early, early, early... apparently being up in the 4's was becoming our thing. We were up by 3 and on the trail again by 4. We had to finish the rest of day 2 and get to the end of day 3 in order to be at the entrance to Macchu Picchu the following morning when it opened. Day 3, however, is the day you travel the longest distance 16 km usually, though it is not as grueling as day 2 which is normally about 12km but with most of the elevation gain. We however, still had half the elevation gain from day 2 as well as the longer distance. So we weren't sure how we would do, we did have a back up plan as to where we would sleep if we couldn't make it to the camp site, but we really wanted to push to the end if possible.

So we got to it. Our first goal was to get to the summit, this was a 600 meter ascent up to the top of the mountain, Warmiwañusca mt. They call this the dead woman’s pass and it is located at 4,200 meter /13,776 feet, the highest point of our hike. It is called the dead woman's pass not because a woman died there but because of the shape of the mountains.

At this point in the day we were still hiking the trail by ourselves so we were able to spread out and everyone could hike at their own pace. Dahlin and I just went at a comfortable pace and we made it up in an hour and a half. Then we were able to just relax and enjoy the scenery while we waited for the rest of our group to get there.

the 11 of us

Then began our decent into the Pacaymayo Valley. The stairs are not great, in my opinion, for the ascent- but they are equally horrible for the descent. I was, however, very greatful at this point that we hadn't continued the previous night. The stairs would have been slippery in the rain which would have been made even more dangerous in the dark! Plus we would have missed out on all the beautiful views.

We next reached the ruins at Runcuracay, a circular structure with a rectangular outbuildings perched on the edge of the valley. This was thought to be a guard post or lookout point.

It was really foggy and really cold! But we hung out here again for a while for the group to gather.

We then continued on a paved path –Camino Inca to the second pass (3,950 m / 12,956 ft) called Abra de Runcuracay. It was about another hour beyond a series of false summits at the top of another series of steep staircases till we got to this summit.

Then began our descent, where you go through a short tunnel and through a series of tight switchbacks, dropping height quickly. You then begin to descend more gradual and the path curls and coils across the slopes. To the right on the pass lies a large, algae-covered lake, and our first view the next archeological site, the Sayacmarca Inca town. 

This is the point in our hike where we began to run into other hikers. I don't wanna sound spoiled, but man we had it good up to this point!! Having to share the archeological sites and the trail definitely changed the feeling of the hike, as we had to either follow behind long lines of hikers or else pass which was difficult as the trail was pretty narrow.

We were now caught up to the other groups, a little sleep deprived, but caught up. Everyone was a little sore, and tired but nothing outta control, so we were pretty proud of ourselves! This was our first day that we had to eat with everyone else and by everyone else I mean ALL of the other trekking groups, it was a lot of people and there were 6 groups who didn't make it at all due to the strike. It is actually kind of crazy how many people are there, I never did get a picture of it but they made it work. The food that we ate the entire trek was SO good! It was so impressive the things that they were able to cook with just things that they hauled up the mountain. All of the SAS workers were amazing!
Despite having been up and hiking for 6 hours already  we had more to go so after lunch we got to it.

the hike was pretty gradual from this point on through the beautiful lush rain forest and eventually cloud forest. There was so much beautiful moss and lichen and everything was so green! We did however end up hiking in the rain at this point, for probably only about an hour. Thankfully we had our trusty ponchos though so we were no worse for the wear once it was all said and done.

The next archeological site that we hit was Phuyupatamarca, the Town of the Clouds.

I wish I could remember all the details of every archeological site... but it all feels a little like a blur to be honest. So you will just have to enjoy the pictures.

To get out of this site we had to descend about 2,000 steps into Wiñaywayna. These were steep steps! I was super super greatful we were going down them rather than up!!!

At 4:00, 12 hours from when we had started, we got to the last archeological site we would see this day, Intipata. This was again a bunch of farming terraces with a couple of buildings. Such gorgeous views too, you could see a long way to where we had came from so that was pretty cool as well!

~We got to our camp site around 5, which was the time everyone else got there. So we did it! We hiked half of day 2 and all of day 3 in 1 day. We then settled in for the night, with all the other hikers! It was definitely our nosiest night with all the other people around, but we were so tired it really didn't matter. It was really a great day! The views where just so amazing!