Peru: Inca Trail and Machu Picchu June-July
The first leg of the Peru trip, walking the Inca Trail to Machu Picchu
Start of the Inca trail - woo hoo
Veronica
The train that most people travel to Machu Picchu on
Rex ('AP')
The trail was amazing, Inca ruins everywhere
Our first night's campsite
It poured down the second day
Made it cooler for our 1200m climb
There was a bit of snow at the top of Dead Woman Pass
Looking back from whence we'd come
Dale ('Ches')
GUO doing the Parawai salute to celebrate getting to the top
Pistol and I go about it in our usual quiet, timid style
Paula ("Pills")
Heading down the other side
Our camp for night two - awesome a climb to start the next day!
Relaxing after the rain
Breakfast
Packing up
Pleased to report the climb the next day was not that bad
Marcella
Lunch stop day three
The team all introduced themselves
It was fascinating hearing their history
Lebos playing the flute to keep us marching
Raul, our head cook and an awesome guy
He fed us like kings and queens - 2 course lunches, 3 course dinners, afternoon tea party
These ruins weren't discovered until the 70's
We were up at 3.30am for Machu Picchu
Our first look at Machu Picchu - wow, wow, wow
WOW!
We even saw Llamas as we walked down from the sun gate
Temple
The stone work was simply stunning and as good today as it was 800 years ago
Wayna Picchu - our climb later that day
The A team
Machu Picchu (the mountain)
Pistol
DW
Owen and Marian
Rex and Dale
Paula and Julie
Nev and Elisabeth
The place was just gob smacking
It's estimated 1,500 people lived here
A number of rocks at Machu Picchu lined up with mountains
Reflection pools
Lebos explaining how they worked
The 'three steps' you see everywhere depicting the heavens, earth and afterworld
Start of the climb up Wayna Picchu
The views just kept getting better
It was a steep climb
DW and Lebos
Pistol ('Pistol')
We didn't expect a tunnel at the top - t'was a tight squeeze
On top of Wayna Picchu
Idiato Pumu
Nev ('Rupe')
Paula
Julie ('Wendy')
Lebos
The bus route down the hill from the train station
Train station below
Off to the train station after lunch
Our train
