Machu Picchu

By the time we left Cusco, there was only a few hours of daylight left and so we didn’t head far. After paying for three nights of proper camping and thoroughly enjoying all of the nice food and drink the city has to offer, it was time to reign the budget back in and head somewhere free. Lee picked a nice looking little laguna an hour or so in the right direction. 

We were both pleasantly surprised when we came over the hill and saw the snow covered mountains glowing pink in the setting sun, behind a picturesque lake. People worked in the crop fields either side and drove their animals down a small dirt road which we followed around the lake show. It was a truly idyllic country scene and a few kilometres down the road, we pulled off into a flat area closer to the shore and settled down for a peaceful, if cold, night. 

In the morning, we were faced with some choices in what to do with our remaining time in Peru. We wanted to be in Bolivia within the week and we had already booked our tickets to Machu Pichu. Between the camping spot we’d be using for that and our current location was around a 5 hour drive. There were several other ruins along the way, the closest being just half an hour down the road. The only problem was that the ticket for this included entry to four other ruins and was valid for two days, that meant it was rather more expensive. We could visit one of the other places, but we’d have to cram them both in the same day. I wasn’t sure I needed to pay see three different ruins in one week and so when I discovered there was a little hike where you would get a good view for free, we decided to skip the closest one at Moray and head towards Ollantaytambo instead. 

Although we had already visited Cevevezaria del Valle Sagrado in Cusco (twice), we couldn’t resist a quick stop off at their other restaurant in Pachar. It’s probably the cheapest reason to go to Pachar, it’s not much of a town but you might know it for its iconic sky lodge pods on the cliff behind. Priced at around £750 a night, it was not something on our list. I’m not sure I would have wanted to go up there anyway, even if money had been no object. I was much happier sitting in the warm midday sun in the brewery sipping a small glass of their current special, a rather lovely and very strong stout named Chocoyana. 

We also finally tried ‘Choclo con queso’ a very simple local snack that is literally a boiled sweetcorn served with a huge chunk of cheese. Their sweetcorn here has huge grains, more like the size of a broad bean and so you pick of the huge warm kernels and take a bite out of the lump of cheese with the other hand. For desert that night, we picked up this huge chocolate filled bread to try. Fully fed, and even though we could have probably up for an afternoon nap like Lexi, we continued on to the ruins. 

You enter the town on a cobbled road which leads down into the main square. The side streets on the side of town we wanted to go to are too narrow for cars and so we left Ruby on a side street the other side of town and walked back towards the start of the little hike. It’s less than a mile, but climbs steeply up a rock face to another small ruin, with spectacular views on the way up. 

We could see the crowds swarming the main ruins and were glad we had chosen this option. In a way, it was nice to see it from a distance. You got more of a sense of scale seeing the whole site at once, it would have been the equivalent to a great drone shot but seeing as those are not permitted this was just as good. We completed the little loop, walking through the at ruins at the top before scrambling back down street level. 

After grabbing a sneaky ice cream, it was time to get back on the road and climb the Abra Malaga pass. We aimed to climb from our current elevation at about 2800m up to the top of the pass at 4300m before dropping back down to camp on the other side at about 2000m again, all in less than 90km. We set off, soon starting the hairpins bends that would take us up to some utterly spectacular views down the valley. 

It was a steep climb, but Ruby completely nailed it. Not once did we have to pull over for the engine temperature and before long, we lost sight of the crazy road as we disappeared into the clouds. All we could see now was alpacas.

Once we had dropped back down out of the cloud we had another beautiful view down the valley on the other side. In the afternoon sun we wound our way back down towards warmer temperatures, trying not to overheat the brakes. 

We had picked a nice looking spot which we hoped would be safe for the cats and also warmer than sleeping up in the mountains. It’s hard to tell until you get there what the camping will be like sometimes and despite the fact that the point was marked very close to the road, the fact that it dropped down to the river meant that we were actually a reasonable distance away and so we released Aimee and Lexi who wasted no time in exploring their new spot.  

A local farmer came over and told us we were welcome to stay and safe in the both knowledge that the cats were not in danger and that we were allowed to be here, we fell asleep to the roar of the river. 

The following morning as we got ready to leave, more locals arrived to fish in the river. They stopped by to say hello and give us two small trout before they left. Once again, people were being lovely to us and we set off on the final leg of our journey in good spirits. 

We continued to drop as the good tarmac road wound down into the valley. Then, at the town of Santa Maria we left the paved road behind us and turned off on the final section to Hydroelectrica at the end of the road. It felt wrong as we left the town. We hit a lumpy dirty road with no signs, and not much traffic. It’s not what you would expect as the access to such a famous place and I suppose it just goes to show that most people don’t arrive this way. It’s not the best road, they are doing a lot of major work along it and we stopped regularly for roadworks or to pass construction lorries at little passing places on the side of the cliff. Ruby struggled in the heat and with the slow and steep road. If we weren’t stopping for traffic, we were stopping to avoid boiling the engine. Steadily, we made our way to Santa Teresa. After a brief stop in the town, and then taking the wrong turn that ended up at an unbuilt bridge, we were back on track and mid afternoon we arrived at the campsite in Hidroelectrica. 

A family run place, you could park your car in the shade on a higher level or in the sun by the entrance. We needed the solar, and so we parked up next to a large coach. There were a few minibuses around and a few tourists, but not too many. A few people came to take photos of the van, one of them even gave us a bag of his special coffee. We were doing well for freebies today! Our plan to get to Machu Picchu wouldn’t begin until the morning and so we spent the rest of the day making sure we had everything in place for tomorrow. 

While the best tickets are considered to be early morning, these had not been an option for us when we had booked and so we wouldn’t be getting access to the ruins until 2.30pm. The upside of this was that we had plenty of time to get there and so we set off tracks mid-morning. A 12km flat hike down the train tracks would take us to the final town of Aguas Calientes. It is possible to take the train, but this would cost us $140 and we decided that a nice easy walk would be better anyway. 

It was a pleasant hike; easy and shaded the tracks follow the river. As the crow flies, the ruins where nearly visible from our campsite, on the top of the peak above us. To access them however, you have to follow the river down the valley and walk around to the other side. We caught glimpses of the ruins from the tracks below as we continued on. 

Arriving in Aguas Calientes at midday, we had a little time to kill. It’s almost odd to arrive in this bustling tourist town with its paved roads and numerous buses as there is no road to get there. I assume that any car that was here, must have driven down the train tracks to arrive, as there is simply no other route.

Our first port of call was the cash machine, something you have to be careful with to avoid paying extortionate withdrawal fees. With enough cash to pay for our hotel room later, we waited an hour or so in a bar making one drink last. This is not a cheap place to eat and drink after all. Then, it was time to find our bus. 

Being the huge tourist attraction that it is, things run pretty smoothly. Large coaches run on the twenty minute bus journey between the town and the entrance regularly. These too, are pricey. This short ride will set you back $12 each way, but after already hiking there and knowing we’d be doing more walking around at the top, we opted to pay for transport and miss the very steep climb which is necessary without the bus. We found our queue and got in line. Within half an hour or so, we were boarding the bus, arriving at the top just after the start of our time slot. Time to get our culture on. 

The tickets for Machu Picchu are sold in different categories. We followed the recommendation for first time visitors to pay for the 4 circuit ticket, giving you access to all of the ruins at ground level. There are other options that include other hikes out to the peaks that look down on the site and less routes on the ground, but with less convenient timings, we had opted for the standard, and cheapest package. We set off up the hill in the incoming drizzle, typical. 

Luckily, the rain was short lived and perhaps the swirling clouds even added to the ambiance of the whole thing. 

Before long we stood there. In front of that iconic backdrop. It was almost surreal.

The routes inside are strictly controlled, so that you must always walk forward along the designated path. While no one checked out ticket to make sure we were in the right place, we did get whistled at several times by the staff that are there to make sure you stay in line. While the measures are strict, you are of course free to walk at your own pace and these limits do at least mean that the whole thing is kept organised and is also not completely overrun with people. While there were some, it wasn’t quite flooded in the crowds like I had imagined it might be. 

We headed down into the main site, wandering between the ancient walls and imagining what life would be like living here. We did have some information that we had downloaded but we unfortunately found that a lot of the places were now shut. Despite selling tickets at the full price, they block off certain parts of the site after midday, which frankly is a bit rude. Nevertheless, we wandered around what we could, and eavesdropped on the odd tour guide. 

After a few hours, we felt like we had seen everything we wanted to see and so headed back to the entrance to catch a bus back down. It was time to find our very budget £15 hotel room for the night. It promised a hot shower and I could hardly wait, turning down the cold showers at the campsite to save it all for this one!

The hostel ECO art, is perched at the top of the town and claims to boast the best views in the town. We puffed our way up some very steep stairs and checked in with a friendly owner.

She asked if we wanted a TV or a mountain view, so naturally we went for the mountain and soon stood in our surprisingly nice room, looking out over the valley. After a long sweaty day of hiking, I got ready for my luxury shower. I had had the presence of mind to bring conditioner, not expecting a budget hotel to provide that. I had hoped they might do the little packets of shampoo, however, I was wrong. They did provide a small bar of soap. It took me a while to figure out which was the hot tap as they both ran cold, however once I got a very slightly tepid stream of water I decided that I would leave it to heat up. I came back a few minutes later to a steam filled room and excitedly stuck my hand under the stream of water. It was freezing cold, and whatever brief amount of hot water had once come out of it, never returned. It did get slightly warmer, to the point I thought I could probably tolerate it if I only stuck my head under. Hair wet, I scrubbed at it with my tiny soap bar until it was slightly soapy. Naturally at this point, the water went freezing cold and I was committed. The town sits at around 2000m and while it is a glorious hot sun, the water that comes off the mountains is not hot. When I emerged, teeth chattering and with brain freeze from sticking my head under the icy stream I got into bed in all my clothes to warm up. I suppose I was clean. Lee wasted no time in commenting on how entertaining this whole thing was considering that we were in a town called Aguas Calientes (hot water) before saying he would not be partaking of the experience himself. 

Once I had warmed up, we headed out to dinner. 

While it was certainly touristy in the day, at night Aguas Calientes pulled out all the stops. Down every street some tried to shove a drink offer at us or some kind of promotion. Every bar offered a 4-4-1 cocktail deal, which seemed highly suspicious. I can’t imagine at that price that anything good is going on with those cocktails. With the promise of all these free cheap drinks, the restaurants the clearly made their margins on the cost of the food. We decided it was either between a cheap pizza, or a veggie restaurant we had found. It was a little more expensive, but it offered the local Peruvian food in vegan form and I was interested to get a close as possible to trying some Peruvian salted pork, so we opted for this. 

A little away from the hubub of the main street, is Govinda restaurant. We weren’t even sure they were open as there were no customers and the family sat at one of the tables inside, entertaining their child with a board game. We got menus nevertheless, and decided we’d go for it. We ordered the lomo saltado and the causa rellena, both typical Peruvian dishes. It being one of those ‘healthy’ places, there was no alcohol so I opted for a kombucha. The food was nice, nothing to fancy but tasty. It was good homemade food, which is really what we had expected. It was nice to try something different too and we enjoyed our meal. The kombucha was actually delicious and I felt inspired to try and resurrect mine again.

The family behind us did not enjoy themselves, they pulled faces, sent things back and then asked for stuff that wasn’t on the menu, while complaining loudly the whole time. Having served people like that myself in another life, I  couldn’t help but sympathise with the owners. As she was busy dealing with her horrid customers, we ended up as the babysitter as their young daughter came and sat with us at the table. She was a cute little kid though, amazed first by my watch and then by Lee’s arm hair, so we didn’t mind being the distraction as a stressed mum took plates back and forth to the dad who was cooking. 

Fully fed, we wandered back through the huge tourist market, stopping for one craft beer before heading back for bed. It had been a long day and tomorrow, we would walk back again. 

All this time, the cats had been left with the camper. We knew that for one night, we could put down sufficient food and drink that they could comfortably stay in Ruby and so we had left them there in the car park. When we had seen the amount of animals there, including baby chicks, rabbits running around, we had determined it was a pretty safe spot. Instead of locking them in as was the plan, we left their catflap in place and told the owner they’d be staying with the van, which he had no problem with. While this was a much nicer option for them, our past experiences meant that we still couldn’t help but worry. 

After a two and a half hour hike back the next day, I was relieved to open the doors and see Lexi stretch out on the floor. Aimee however was nowhere to be seen. She was obviously not impressed with our disappearance and remained gone for the rest of the day. We had wanted to leave as soon as we got back, but now we waited. Once again, we became entertainment for the family's children. As the day was coming to a close, she rolled in again at about 5pm, much to our relief. Now we had to decide whether to stay or go, we planned on returning to our lovely river spot and as we still had time to do the majority of the dirt road in daylight we decided to make a break for it. 

We were doing well, until we took a wrong turn. This diversion took us up away from the road and we ended up giving our second lift of the day to a lady with an enormous bag. After dropping her off, we realised this was not where we wanted to be. We went back down again, but by now it was dark and so we slowly made our way back out to the main road. By the time we made it to our spot it had been dark for some time, but we had made it without damaging the car and in time to relax for a few hours before bed. At least here, we knew we’d be getting a nice night too, falling asleep to the roar of the river again.