The Salkantay Inka Trail to Machu Picchu, Peru

Once again, we got up early... 4am, way too early for my taste. We were picked up by a cab together with Washin, our guide for the next days, and Cayetano, our prospective cocinero (cook). Climbing over a high pass the cab brought us out of busy Cuzco to Mollapata, which was the start of the our, the Salkantay Inka trail. The mist shifted apart early in the morning and granted us a view on Nevado Salkantay, the mountain we will be hiking around for the next days.

We started our hike in the little village of Mollapata, where Mum got to try some local bio-lipstick ;) By the way, the kind of touristy lookin' person on the picture is Washin, our guide...

The cowboy on the lower picture is Cayetano, our cook for the next days. Aren't we a nice team?

At the beginning we were in subtropical valleys at a low elevation of about 2.500m,

but thanks to the steep trails we quickly gained altitude.

Unfortunately, or should I better say "as expected", our guide wasn't half as fit as we are and so we were forced to take a break once in a while.

We even had a little fight with our guide, because he wanted to camp on green meadows way below Salkantay pass but we were eager to move on. Finally, I convinced him (by bribing him with beer) to a little higher up towards the white mountains you see in the pic below.

Since the view cleared up in the evening, nobody regretted going higher up, where we had an amazing view of Salkantay's sheer South face. Impressive definitely! Too bad I will not make it to Huaraz this trip to see the beautiful Alpamayo ;(

But our perspective wasn't bad either, especially when you just get out of your tent with two beer, right mum?

Definitely, one of my favourite pictures!

Cayetano prepared a really good dinner for us spiced with herbs that he found along the track. We were awakened at six in the next morning with a yummy Coca matesito, had breakfast, and hiked up towards Salkantay pass.

The pass is depending at which map and which sign (c.f. pic) look at between 4.400m and 4.800m high. Since we were well adapted to the altitude from Bolivia, it didn't matter too much. We stopped up there for some minutes to praise Panchapapa (Father mountain god in Quechua), sacrifice some Coca leaves, and just soak up the scenery.

While descending the weather turned bad, really bad. In fact, we felt like in a tropical shower in the middle of the jungle. Unfortunately, the tropical shower was quite chilly at this elevation... okay it was really cold, I admit it.

After walking downhill in the pouring rain for three hours we stumbled over a small local village. As it turned out, Cayetano's cousin lived there and we were invited in one of their houses t warm up over the open fire.

Unfortunately, I just took one picture in there. I should have taken more but it just didn't feel right to me. It was very interesting to be at an original Quechua family's place cutt off from any contact to the modern world and observe their local customs, such as guinea pigs all over the place...

As we descended further down into the tropical valleys the weather got better, the sky cleared up, and we had a picture perfect view of Nevado Salkantay again.

This picture reminds me a little of my treks in Nepal. You are yourself in the valley in dense jungle and look up to the glazier shining high above you in the sun, impressive and truly wonderful. It just doesn't fit together, the jungle and the glacier, but the mighty rivers rushing in the background tell you that it is real. You want to see it in motion picture, together with our next day's bridge?

In the next morning we crossed the river,

took a look back at the incredible scenery offered by Salkanty,

and descended into a tropical gorge, always following th melting water through the jungle.

Wahsin, slow as usual, led us through the jungle

passing incredibly beautiful waterfalls,

crossing the thunderous creeks beneath them,

until we finally made it back to civilization. Luckily, there were banana plantations everywhere (they are growing 17 different species of bananas there!) and I could stuff myself :)

We hiked out the valley until we got to a place called Playa (seriously) around lunch time. There I played football with the local kids and Mum had fun with the newborn dogs:

While Cayetano was preparing lunch, I stole his knife for some "Crocodile Dundee" posing:

Since we were going to spend the night in Playa and had nothing to do for the rest of the day, we decided to walk the 20km to the next town, Santa Teresa, where really nice hot springs should be located. Washin was too exhausted from the morning hike and decided to stay and take a nap. So we took off alone and made our way through banana

and coffee plantations.

Although the hike was long and it was hot'n'humid, it felt like walking through a paradise-like botanical garden, a garden full of bananas and coffee!

Eventually, we made it to Santa Teresa and its hot springs. And, damn, it was worth the long hike. I hav never been to such beautiful natural pools, anywhere!

Steep vertical hills in the background, jungle in the valley and snowcapped mountains above, what do you want more? Well, some hot springs to revitalize your muscles ;) By the way, for the way back to Playa I organized a driver.

The next morning we hiked up along an old Inka trail to Llactapata. The trail consisted of stairs exclusively, which led through dense vegetation.

Bushwhacking in a hot'n'humid environment!

Pretty soon the vegetation changed from subtropical rain forest to a cloud forest. You don't know what a cloud forest is, well imagine a rain forest with moss everywhere and with slightly lower temperature... or just look at the picture:

Do you have the impression? It looks like a fairytale forest, taken directly from lord of the rings.

As we crossed the Llactapata pass, we saw a quite famous mountain ridge at the other side the valley. Do you now that place?

Shall I help you and zoom a little bit into the picture?

It is one of our new seven world wonders - Machu Picchu! But more about that later, it's on the next day's schedule anyways. We descended down into the valley again and left the cloud forests, which means that we entered the domain of sun (=no clouds) again

and together with it the tropical vegetation - purple bananas, yummy :)

Back down in the hot(!) valley we crossed another mighty river

walked by one of the most impressive waterfalls I have ever seen (although it's the drainage of a water reservoir),

and hiked along the railway (together with Cayetan becaus Washin needed a break)

until we finally arrived at Aguascalientes, the base camp for Machu Picchu and one of the most frequnted places of all of South America. From here on everything changed completely, from the peaceful solitude of the Peruvian mountains to South America's number one toursit destination with 3.500 visitors a day.

We did what we were used to do, that is, get up early at 4am, and hike up to Machu Picchu for sunrise. Instead of a sunrise clouds were greeting us, but the mist made the setting just more spectacular and mysterious.

And would this classic picture anyways look like without the mist?

As you see, I have Machu Picchu as a little bit a subject of irony. I mean after having been to so many outstanding and spectacular places on my trip, you come to this so-called "New World Wonder", are charged an incredible amount of 44$ to enter (= 44 meals), and additionally you have to share the place with 3.500 other tourists. But believe it or not, Mach Picchu is still more than simply impressive, it is just WOW! I mean look at the upper picture again, can you top this setting with sheer faces on all sides, dense green jungle, and the mist?

In fact, if the same spot wasn't located in such a humid climate and thus all the vertical mountains (in fact granite spires) wouldn't be covered with dense vegetation, then this would be a supreme climbing destination, don't you think so? Well, let's go back to Machu Picchu.

Our trek included a guided tour through the site. Don't worry, I won't flood you now with information. First of all, because the facts aren't that impressive, and second because it's online anyways.

What makes Machu Picchu so spectacular to me is besides the setting also the way how the Incas understood to embedd their own architecture into the vegetation and the exisiting stone formations, as if the buildings were grown...

Concernig the tour of the site, it's always what make of it, right?

Right, the llama would say so, too.

In fact, I think the llamas were put up there simply to give the tourists better picture motifs... probably true. Although can you take any bad pics of this spot? I don't think so.

Besides the main site there are also other sights to see around Mach Picchu. You just need to invest 10 minutes of hiking along scenic trails constructed right at the edge of a cliff.

One such sight is a trail itself, the so-called "Inka bridge." Zoom into the lower picture, do you see how the Incas exploited the ridge in the face to construct a way? Do you see their bridge construction where the ridge is broken off for some meters? Incredible how they must have "walked" in the middle of a 500m granite face...

At the end of the day I also climbed up the scenic hill of Wayna Picchu (the famous rock behind he ruins). The climb involved a little ferrata which was jammed by Japanese tourists and led more or less right up a vertical face. On the top other ruins were awaiting me. Just a spectacular site. Here is another picture of the main ruin complex taken from Wayna Picchu.

Unfortunately, it started raining then and so we hiked back to town, where the train was waiting to bring us back to Cuzco. In short, the five Salkantay Inka trek was a "pleasant" hike through a breathtakingly beautiful scenery and ended with a real highlight. Even though parts of the trek were really touristy, a lot of unforgettable pictures are burned into our minds now!

¡Nos vemos!

Florian