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Other entries in Machupicchu

Finally up there

Reaching Machu Picchu is all about beating the crowds of yellow-anoraked Japanese tourists and arriving in time to enjoy the tranquility of the site before the hollering, bleating, middle-aged hordes from Israel and the US descend to kill the reflective silence. Not to pick on any groups in particular, that's just kind of the way it pans out. And so, with more willpower than muscle strength, we hauled ourselves from blissful slumber onto the dimly lit path to the peak, the one that goes almost vertically up, cutting across the winding road that would start transporting the enemy to our Machu Picchu come sunup. Although just over an hour, the climb in the early morning mist had us soaking and winded by the time the visitor centre and the restaurant offering a buffet for a mere three months average wage in Peru came into view. As was the main gate, so were the toilets closed, and thus began an agonising wait, as the first busloads of visitors swung into the car-park. Just before seven, the ticket-checkers set to work and moments later we were in. Following the vague instructions set out in the guide book, we headed first for the Hut of the Caretaker of the Funerary Rock, so as to have the most complete view over the whole site. Heaving up what appeared to be the path to the hut, this illusion was shattered after about forty-five minutes of clambering up a slippery, drenched path whose every turn took us further from the ruins. It turned out we had started walking the Inca Trail in reverse, and had thus wasted the guts of an hour distancing ourselves from our goal. So back down we went. We might as well have been in a shopping centre in Clonmel for all we could see of the Inca's pride and joy and depressing images of Cotopaxi (images obscured by pea-soup fog) came flooding back as we sat forlorly on a rock, blanketed in gloom, and the knowledge that you can cheat the train company, but not the weather gods, hoping against hope for a break in the clouds.

And it came, first teasingly slowly and then with an increased sense of urgency. As if by sheer force of will, we watched the mist thin to reveal, fleetingly, an image of Aguas Calientes hemmed between two sheer peaks. As the fog re-covered the hills, it began, with painfully little haste, to roll itself back from the main attraction. As it thinned enough to de-cloak the elusive Hut, which we'd walked right past earlier, we made the final walk to the promontory and crossed fingers and toes, breathed out in an exaggerated fashion and felt the twin rushes of relief and delight as the ruins slowly, slowly came into view. It's the classic scene, the one depicted in every photo and poster of Machu Picchu, yet still nothing prepares you for the wonderment as you see it for real, in glorious 3D, from the cliff above, the dark green mountains cushioning the salt-white sprawl of stones, forming the gigantic head of an Inca for those with a little imagination. Eight long hours we spent, contemplating the site from every conceivable angle - above, below, within, without, burning in the now glorious sun, basking in the now complete sense of achievement.

When the time came to leave, with heavy hearts and leaden legs, we ambled down the never-ending path, hauling limbs that no longer had any interest in moving, with only thoughts of steak and pizza to keep us mobile. Pizza was nice, but steak was a divine gift to bodies entirely bereft of energy, bodies that would have to make one final assault on the tracks the next day, as the bright lights of Cuzco once again beckoned.

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