In our plans for our trip to South America, a visit to the New World Wonder of Machu Picchu was a must do. We had spent a week in Ollantaytambo, which is conveniently located near the train station that would take us to the bus stop at Aguas Calientes that would in turn take us to Machu Picchu.
On our scheduled day at Machu Picchu, we woke up to some rain, but undeterred (or rather, with no other choice), we carried on to the train station. We had planned to take the train that arrived into Aguas Calientes at 9:15. A 20 minute bus ride from Aguas Calientes seemed to mean that 10am entry tickets were the way to go. I figured that maybe we would arrive at the site a few minutes before 10am and have to wait a bit to get in, but it should be close. Or so I thought…
When we arrived in Aguas Calientes, we saw people walking towards the bus stop where they would board the buses for MP. We knew we had to grab tickets first, so we followed signs to the shop where they can be purchased. At that point, we realized that the people walking towards the buses were actually part of a line. A LONG line. A line that seemed long, then we turned a corner and realized it was REALLY long. Then we turned another corner only to realize it was REALLY, REALLY long!
At this point, I was a bit worried that we were going to be super late and thought people were lined up with later ticket times than we had. Nope – we were all waiting with 10am entry times. In fact, if you had an 11am entry time, you couldn’t even wait in our line. It was kind of madness! Again, with no other choice, we hopped in the back of the line and waited. and waited. After just under an hour, we arrived at the front of the line and were able to hop on the bus for the 20-minute ride up to the site.
By 10:45am, we were in the site and ready to discover Machu Picchu!
A quick note here; apparently UNESCO wants their sites managed in a certain way – one that helps to maintain the integrity of the site and keep it in good shape for future generations. Apparently, Machu Picchu was on UNESCO’s naughty list, and as a result, had tried to implement some new measures to improve – reduce the number of visitors, more controlled entry times, a requirement to use a guide, no food brought in, etc. We don’t want to be snitches or anything, but none of these measures were enforced. Especially not reducing the number of visitors!
We were very lucky to get some suggestions from another family who were traveling in the same area at the same time as us, and, having just been to Machu Picchu themselves, had given us some great advice to get away from the crowds. We happily took their advice, and quickly left the crowds behind as we hiked to The Sun Gate, or Intipunku, one of the hikes that can be done in Machu Picchu that doesn’t require a separate ticket (by the time we planned our trip to Machu Picchu all those special tickets were gone).
We followed this nice, slightly uphill path as it wound around the mountain, offering us spectacular views of the surrounding mountains.
The hike was nice, but it quickly began pouring rain. Luckily we brought our rain coats, so we were fairly comfortable as the rain pelted down.
Finally, we arrived at the end of the hike, the Sun Gate.
And, with the good vibes of the Sun Gate, we got some sun! We enjoyed a simple but scenic lunch with nice views over the Machu Picchu complex.
We took a quick minute to appreciate the views without the clouds.
We started with clear skies and great views for our walk back toward the ruins.
Unfortunately, the clouds eventually came rolling in and the rain started back up.
This time we all ended up pretty wet. However, these rain showers did have some benefits – they cleared out some of the fair-weather tourists and we had a much less crowded experience once we got to the main ruins.
Despite the boys flagging enthusiasm, we took another quick detour before we headed to the main ruins. This time we did a short walk on a somewhat narrow path along the mountain (again – US safety standards they were not!), leading to a bridge that was an entry point for visitors during Incan times.
This bridge was simple and ingenious. They could lay a slab of wood across the two stone bridge points to welcome visitors. However, should these visitors be unwelcome, they simply remove the slab of wood, and the visitors have no way of getting into Machu Picchu except attempting to jump across, most likely falling off the mountain to their death.
As we suspected, the boys were pretty tired after our extra walks, and with the rain still sprinkling down, we didn’t spend a lot of time slowly exploring the main ruins.
Because we planned to go to the Sun Gate before we got to the main ruins, we had to make the choice to not have a guide. It definitely would have enhanced the visit had there been someone there to explain things to us, and we did occasionally attempt to scoot into a group to listen to what the guide was saying, but overall we were happy to just wander and spot the llamas (or are they alpacas?) who made the ruins their home.
After a bit of exploring, the rain kicked up a bit and we decided we had seen enough and we were ready to take the bus back down.
Apparently we weren’t the only ones with the idea to leave at that point because once again, the line for the bus was SOOOOO long! We just kept walking and walking and walking to get to the end of the line. By the time we got to the end, we were like 1/4 of the way down the mountain already! (#exaggerating). We had heard of this alternative to taking the bus, and that was walking on a path that leads directly back to Aguas Calientes. Now (in my humble opinion) only a mad person would walk UP the mountain, but it seemed infinitely more reasonable to walk DOWN the mountain. We scoped out the path, quickly verifying with one of the bus employees that we had the right path down (at which point he offered to move us to the very front of the line to get the next bus – nice offer, but since we weren’t in a particular hurry, we would have felt really bad taking him up on that offer!).
Then, we were off down the path off the mountain.
The scenery during this walk was amazing. We had seen some of it on the bus ride up, but at a walking pace, we really got to appreciate it.
C and I agreed that a big part of the magic of Machu Picchu was where it was located. The ruins are neat, but the thing that really makes them worthwhile is the stunning in-the-clouds mountaintop location.
The walk was slightly uncomfortable on those of us whose knees are 40+, being oddly steep but not super steep, but overall the walk was a great one, and we were glad we opted to walk off the mountain.
Once we got into Aguas Calientes, we had time for a quick meal (our meal was not in fact quick, so we had to dash off abruptly basically only minutes after our food arrived!), then took a nice train ride back to Ollantaytambo, swapping stories with a friendly traveling Kiwi – guy from New Zealand, not the fruit.
Machu Picchu was a pretty stunning place, mostly because of its location, and was certainly a must-stop on our journey through the former Incan territories. But we aren’t done with the Incas yet. After this, it was time to move on to Cusco, nearby and still very much an important place for the Incans.
