One of the seven wonders: Machu Picchu

A tingle crawled from the bottom of my spine. Up to that point it hadn’t seemed real. But I was suddenly struck with the full force of reality at 4am: I was going to Machu Picchu, visiting the "Lost City" of the Incas.

Our first view of Machu Picchu

We were up, as we learnt from our Aussie friends, 'at a sparrow's fart!' I climbed out of bed and watched the cloud forest emerge from inky blackness, but I was still hopeful for sunny skies. Apparently every day at Machu Picchu starts like this.

A room with a view: the priest's house

We were first in the queue for the first bus up - you can walk but we wanted to save our stiff legs and sore feet for a full day of exploring. A 20-minute bus ride carried us up the zig-zagging dirt road to the entrance, beyond which lead a stone staircase, bound for the top of Machu Picchu.

We were nervous - the tour company has made an error with both Med's and my tickets - they both said we were 112 years old and had a typo in our passport numbers. Raoul was with us though, and we shuffled in quietly like a pair of 112 year olds.

Salkantay team...we made it!

As we walked into Machu Picchu at the front of the already-forming crowd, the famous mountaintop citadel came into view; it was still dark but I could now see the clear sky above it. The most breathtaking sight - "like Disneyland, for adults" I squeaked. The resident llamas looked down at us: "here we go again," the were probably thinking.

Machu Picchu is known, actually incorrectly, as the "Lost City". It was rediscovered in 1911 by American historian Hiram Bingham. Bingham had been searching for the city of Vilcabamba, the so-called "Lost City of the Inca" where the last of the independent Inca rulers waged a years-long battle against Spanish, when a Quechua family with whom he was staying told him about a nearby mountaintop ruin.

Bingham paid the son, 11-year old Pablito Alvarez, about a dollar to lead him to the ruin we now know as Machu Picchu. Mistaking it for the Vilcabamba, Bingham dubbed it the Lost City of the Inca and the name stuck.

Sunrise over the mountains

Eventually the government of Peru recognised the importance of Machu Picchu and took steps to protect it. Years earlier, unaware that the ruins existed, the government had deeded the entire mountaintop to three local families.

What makes it so special, one of the seven wonders of the world, is that it survived intact, unlike most other Inca sites that were eventually plundered or destroyed by the Spaniards.

Legend says that upon learning about the advancing Spaniards, the Incas erased all signs of trails leading to Machu Picchu and abandoned it rather than allowing their most sacred of sites to fall into the hands of marauders.

I am most grateful that they did. Sadly it did fall into the hands of Yale University, where Bingham took 74 boxes of treasures on the promise of returning them within a few months. Yale has them hidden away to this day much to the disgust of Peru - it was a brave man who we saw wearing his Yale jacket in the ruins.

Machu Picchu's other speciality is the mystery that enshrouds it. The Incas had no system of writing and left no written records, and archaeologists have been left to piece together bits of evidence as to why Machu Picchu was built, what purpose it served, and why it was so quickly vacated. There are so many questions left unanswered, and I like it that way.

Postcard view from the Guard's House

After the initial rush of seeing Machu Picchu wore off, and we’d watched the sun spray it's rays over the top of the mountains, it was time for a tour. Lead by Raoul, our guide from the Salkantay Trek, we walked around the complex for about 2 hours, learning about the sacred temples, the unfinished sites and what life might have been like in the kingdom.

Raoul pointed out the difference in the masonry: painstakingly polished stones were used for religious structures, while rough-hewn stones signalled structures used by commoners. Though theories abound, most now believe that Machu Picchu was a religious centre, occupied primarily by priests, members of the Royal family, and the commoners who served them.

At 10:30am, after refuelling on some snacks outside the main gate (you aren't supposed to eat inside), we climbed to the Guard House, the original entrance to Machu Picchu, for the postcard-perfect view of one of the seven wonders of the world.

Then it was onwards and upwards to the Inca bridge, a very narrow, beautifully intact pathway that clings to a sheer cliff. Incredible to think it's survived earthquakes, storms and landslides over 600 years. Even more amazing was discovering that the Incas appeared to make their structures earthquake-proof.

The Inca bridge

We could linger too much on this thought, as it was time to climb Wayna Picchu for a birdseye view of Machu Picchu.

When I first lay eyes on Wayna Picchu, I had no idea how I’d get up it with my tired legs and throbbing toes. I’d heard there were ropes on the steep sections (actually they are steel cables), but from below, it looked impossibly steep.

But believe it or not, there is a trail that winds up the mountain face, and it only took me about 20 minutes to get up it. And what a view!

It is thought that priests and virgins made this climb every morning at dawn to welcome the new day. Once was enough for me, though.

The view from Wayna Picchu

We then bid farewell to our fellow Salkantay trekkers, and completed the pretty tough loop to the Gran Caverna (Big Cave) with our Aussie friends, James and Fleur, who just happened to be at Machu Picchu at the same day.

Before our final climb of the day, we sat cross-legged on one of the broad agricultural terraces and watched the day’s 2,500 (or more) visitors abandon the site. By 3 p.m, we had Machu Picchu almost to ourself as the grassy central plaza glistened an amber-green and the ruins turned a burnished gold in the retreating sun.

We climbed up slowly up to the Sun Gate, where one of the original Inca trails approaches the kingdom. The low sun was blinding, but the view was another of the amazing vistas that leave people speechless here.

On our way back down, the llamas were back, surveying their land, making sure no tourists outstayed their welcome. We stayed right until we were asked to leave (and I was actually chased by one of the llamas!).

It is thought 60% of Machu Picchu still lies tangled in the roots of the jungle around us, so who knows what it will look like 50 years from now.

I hope that they keep it that way though: buried in layers of mystery and mostly reclaimed by Pachamama (Mother Earth).

From sand to salt : Salar de Uyuni

Talking of cowboys in my last post, after hearing countless stories about the drunken cowboys who drive 4×4 tours through the desert to the Salar de Uyuni, the next day we were pleased to find that our driver for the next four days had a solid head on his shoulders. And a beaming, no-nonsense wife next to him to keep him in check and cook our food.

Lots of llamas

And so, after strapping our bags to the roof of our truck, Tess, Adrian, Med and I set off on our trip all the way from Tupiza to the salt flats with Segundeeno, our guide, and Porfidia, our cook and entertainment for the next few days.

On this first day, we were headed to the small village of San Antonio de Lipez (popn 250) via breathtaking landscape dotted with llamas. We had seen our fair share of cacti-pimpled desert over the last week but this really took the biscuit. Bright red, weather-beaten cliffs sat amiably among mounds of loose blue-grey shingle and tufts of parched, yellow grass.

Village children playing football

At every twist on the mountain road the plains became more and more beautiful throwing up even better, stretching vistas. The llamas were all different coloured and distinguished by the multicoloured pom poms and ribbons clipped to their pointed ears.

Muy frio in our homestay!

We arrived in the village where we were staying the night in someone's modest house. We watched children, layered in llama wool and gloves, play football in the forefront of a snowy mountain range that was catching the last of the day's sun. It was simple, authentic and lovely, despite the freezing temperatures at 4260metres.

We had limited electricity and an outside bathroom, and not even a fire to warm us up. So, after putting on all our clothes, we enjoyed our feast, listening to the songs of a shy local village boy who had come to earn a few Bolivianos. Money is scarce in these isolated, rural communities.

We woke up at 4am, still under the bright stars, moon-drenched mountains and in the bitter cold.

I couldn't feel my toes or fingers for the first hour or more as we made our way across the dusty, rubble track in the dark to San Antonio - an abandoned, ghost town that is thought to have been controlled by the Diablo (Devil).

Rub-a-dub-dub

As the sun burst over the mountains we entered the Eduardo Avaroa Parque Nacional, crossing frozen streams and bumping over rock-laden track - stopping for photographs and "el bano naturale"!

We drove through the gold mining settlement of Quetana Chico and onto the Polques aqua termales. It was freezing and we struggled in the wind, but we are hardened backpackers used to cold showers and a bit of dust so we stripped off and sprinted as fast as we could towards the pool.

Geysers and mud springs

Inside the hotspring it was absolutely divine just as long as we kept as much of ourselves as we could under the water. Still, when was the last time you took a hot bath at 4400m surrounded by mountains, desert and llamas?

After a brief stop at Laguna Verde and Laguna Blanco we headed through El Desierto de Dali - remiscent of the paintings of Salvador Dali and full of weird and wonderful petrified lava and onto the "Sol de Manana" - the geysers at 5000m.

It was colder than ever here and we felt a bit weak with the altitude, but it was great to stand among the plumes of sulphur.

Our accommodation that night was next to Lake Colarado, a huge red-coloured lake (because of the plankton and algae) home to hundreds of flamingos. Into bed after dinner with all our clothes on and extra blankets stolen from the other beds in the dorm.

Another early start, they were getting easier, to take us to the Desierto de Siloli to see a rock shaped like a tree and other petrified lava formations. We were now completely in desert, nearly 5,000m above sea level. Muy estrano.

We joined the laguna dots, visiting one after another to see more flamingos and watch them constantly snacking. And then on to a dust bowl of a settlement to see the tombs of the first inhabitants of the region, from pre-hispanic times. Nothing like a few explosed skeletons dressed in the rags they died in to give you the jitters.

One of many lagunas

That night we stayed on the cusp of the salt flats, in a hotel made completely of salts.

The walls, the furniture and even the beds were all made from solid blocks of sparkling salt. We crunched along the rock-salt floor to the salt-walled shower, then sat on my salt bed and plugged my camera into charge in the salt wall.

The next morning was what we had come for: Salar de Uyuni, the world's most famous salt flats. We drove across the water-logged part of the salt flats to watch sunrise in the middle of it - probably the best sunrise I have ever witnessed.

The salt hotel

The salt flats are indescribable, sucking all the colour out of the world and leaving just the vibrant blue of the sky and the dazzling white of the earth’s crust.

Everywhere we looked was white – just miles and miles of smooth, flat, sparkling white land joining the distant mountains that surrounded us.

Sunrise on the salt flats

As momentous as our first sighting of Salar de Uyuni was, every ounce of wonder and happiness had been hard earned in the cold and wind of the desert and mountains.

After a delicious breakfast of cake and cereals in the middle of nowhere, salt as far as the eye could see, we of course we made the obligatory stop so that we could take a hundred photographs that played with perspective. We had come prepared, bringing with us Godzilla himself and an almost-empty bottle of rum.