My Peruvian Adventure To Machu Picchu
After Colombia, my next destination was Peru with the main objective as finally getting to see Machu Picchu. I had to take connector flights from Medellin to Bogota and then to Lima before finally ending up in Cusco which is the closest airport to Machu Picchu. Of course this took me pretty well an entire day of transit. During the brief layover in Lima, I tried out Inca Kola for the first time.
Cusco is at over 11,000 feet above sea level and many tourists including friends of mine have been hit with high altitude sickness upon arrival with symptoms like headaches and shortness of breath. I did everything possible to prepare for this possibility including pre-medicating 48 hours in advance while still in Colombia and I think it worked as I never got any symptoms during my entire time in Cusco and Machu Picchu (except for a brief moment when I got stressed out but more on that later as Machu Picchu is technically at lower altitude at about 8,000 feet). In the video below, I share four tips to help other travellers going to Cusco on how to relieve and prevent high altitude sickness.
I also briefly talk about how not to get sucked in by paying the inflated tourist rates for taxis when getting from the Cusco airport into town center.
When I got into town, it was already night time so it was out for a quick dinner since I hadn’t really eaten anything all day during my transits and I had a very early morning start for my Machu Picchu adventure the next day. It was also considerably chillier here in Cusco at night time at 3 degrees C but I came prepared and dressed for it. What a big contrast to the 30 C temperature back in Little Cayman but again I came prepared even though this meant packing more clothes than I would have liked to.
For my first dinner, I wanted to try out alpaca meat which is one of the two specialty meats they have here with the other being guinea pig. Here’s my reaction upon eating alpaca in the next video.
After dinner I went back to my hotel and was offered free coca tea which I accepted even though I really didn’t need any since I did not have any high altitude sickness symptoms but wanted to try it out anyway to see if it would give me a buzz.
Off To Machu Picchu
There are a few different ways to get to Machu Picchu including four day hikes, overnight stays along the way and the quickest way which is what I did by taking a four hour train from Cusco to get there. This would be a very long day starting pre-dawn at the train station which was just a five minute walk from my hotel (key decision on where I booked) and I wouldn’t get back to my hotel until well after 10 pm at night.
There were a few different components needed for this journey which all should be booked well in advance including the actual ticket to get into the Machu Picchu site itself since they allow only a certain number of visitors to enter each day and entry is on a timed basis by specific hours. This was the first step which I secured a few months ago for a noon hour entry for the day I was booked to visit Machu Picchu. Then there was the Perurail train I had to get seats for and in my case it was a return trip for the same day (some other travellers choose to stay overnight in towns along the way). The final ticket needed was a bus from the town Aguas Calientes (final stop for the train) for a 30 minute ride to Machu Picchu. I got all of these components booked in advance of arrival.
Here’s video of the breathtaking scenery during the Perurail train journey to Aguas Calientes.
The train was suppose to take four hours getting me into Aguas Calientes at 11 am which was well ahead of my noon hour ticket entry into Machu Picchu but it took longer as we didn’t arrive into town until about 11:40 am and I still had to find the bus. I was so worried that I would miss my entry into Machu Picchu that I started to think that I might actually be denied entry. This is why I started to get stressed out. Even when I found and got on the bus, I knew that I would be late but recalled that the entry time was for an hour.
When I arrived at Machu Picchu, it was about 12:35 pm and I had no problems getting entry even though most folks who had the noon ticket were probably already in since nobody was at the entry gate but me. Nevertheless, I was so stressed out that I was huffing and puffing a bit even within the first ten minutes into Machu Picchu which was a steady climb up to the top viewing area. But after I reached that iconic spot at the top and realized that I was finally at Machu Picchu in real life, I started to calm back down. and got some great shots as well as video below.
As expected, being at the top looking down at Machu Picchu was purely magical. It’s the photo shot that everyone came here for and I made sure I took my time as this was like a bucket list item for many adventurers. Interestingly enough for me, as I got further down closer to the various structures of the ruins, the excitement kind of decreased. It was still great to be among the ruins but my own interest sort of waned and I think this is because I’ve already previously been to Copan (Mayan ruins in Honduras) and Egypt, both which are superior to Machu Picchu in artistic terms with sculptures and wall art.
But still, I finally got Machu Picchu ticked off and despite the brief high stress moment, it was a perfect day to visit with no rain and temperature was very comfortable. I still had some time to kill back in Aguas Calientes so I decided to have my late lunch/early dinner at a local restaurant by sampling my first Peruvian cerviche and getting a photo with the cute local waitress before boarding the return Perurail train back to Cusco.
The Perurail train also took much longer to get back into Cusco then expected. For some reason at points along the way, it kept stopping and going backwards for a bit before moving on forward. I didn’t get back to my hotel until maybe 11:30 pm or so. In hindsight, I could have broken up this long journey by staying overnight in one of the small towns along the way or even at Aguas Calientes but there’s not much to do there and prices will be higher than in Cusco. As you will see in my next post, I ended up having a great time with a full day back in Cusco.
