Day14: Through the Sun Gate

We were woken up at camp Phuyupatamarca at 3650 meters above sea level  with the customary delivery of coffee and coca tea.   As I hobbled out of the tent with sore leg muscles and a cloudy brain and looked around, I took in the spectacular view of the surrounding mountains and valleys and realized with excitement that today was the day.

Last night, Nep really loosened up and told us stories about different client experiences he’d had that had us on the edge of our seats.   He is a great story teller and this was the kind of stuff that had Robin begging for more... she loves people stories, as do most of us.   

The first story was about a really overweight lady from the UK.   She really struggled, with Nep having to split the group and send the other 6 people (unrelated to her) ahead on their own while he plodded slowly up and down the trail with her, arriving hours late to every checkpoint.   She never complained.   Not one bit.   When she got to the sun gate, she sat down and cried and proclaimed with gusto that she had done it!   She later gave Nep a small token of appreciation for keeping her company day after day... he opened it up and it was a carved figure of a tortoise!

He told us of a British couple who flat out refused to move after getting to the first lunch break on day 1.   They told Nep that they “want options” for what they could do.   He presented them with options.... go back or go forward, but once you reach Dead Woman’s pass, there was no going back.   They insisted on setting up camp at the lunch stop, so he had to radio the porters who had gone ahead to come down the mountain and set up camp.   He told them he would wake them at 3am and he would need their decision about going forward or backing out.   Eventually, they did go forward, with an extremely long day 2.   When they got to Machu Picchu for the tour day, it rained like crazy and all Nep could do was smile at the karma.   We used “we want options” jokingly with Nep a number of times after that story.

Nep guided one guy that had some kind of physical disability (we suspect cerebral palsy) and despite falling a number of times and struggling quite a bit, never complained and never gave up.    

Then there was the story of Belinda, a 42 year old Canadian travelling alone who he described as “special”.  She ended up having some kind of edema and temporary paralysis that had her transported to a hospital for a week’s stay.   To make a long story short, Nep had basically walked and accompanied her from the middle of the trek, 24 hours to Cusco, walking the trail with porters carrying her on a stretcher.  He would visit her often in the hospital and when she left she didn’t say one word of thanks nor provide any feedback.  Geez!

We dropped down the trail quickly from camp, reaching Intipata first at 2743 meters, a cool, extensive set of ruins.

   


We halved the allotted time.   In short order, we got to the lunch campsite at 2500 meters elevation... we were almost two hours early!  

This camp was where the 4 day trekkers did their last overnight stay.  The 4 day trekkers wake up at 330 to get to the last checkpoint before the sun gate, where they line up until it opens at 530.   They then climb up the sun gate, take in the views of Machu Picchu and continue by touring the site then hop on a train in the afternoon back to Cusco.... we were really glad we were doing it over 5 days.  The main difference being we would see Machu Picchu from the sun gate this morning, but do the comprehensive tour of the citadel when we were fresh(er!) tomorrow.

After lunch, we took a little five minute detour to a site called Winay Wayna at 2550 meters.

  

If we hadn’t seen pictures of Machu Picchu before, we would have been blown away by this place, but the prize was still waiting for us.

A half hour more of gradual descending on a four foot wide, truly Indian jones stone path and we were through the last checkpoint and arriving at the monkey steps.  The steps were 50 very steep steps that we took carefully, sometimes using hands and feet.   At the top, we could smell the end being near.

We practically raced the last 10 minutes of gradual uphill stone path until we could see a stone entrance in the middle of a stone wall.... the sun gate or Intipunku, at 2700 meters above sea level, or 270 meters above Machu Picchu.

42 kilometres on the trail...countless meters of climbing and decent over very little even ground and we were finally here.   The sun gate (so named because on the winter solstice, June 21, the sun shines through the gate and into the sun temple ala Indian Jones) is high above Machu Picchu and was the only entrance to the city during Incan times.

The view was breathtaking, but was highly enhance by the build up over the previous three and a half days.  Hiking the trail made the reward of reaching Machu Picchu and seeing it first through the Sun gate even greater than we could have imagined.

We lingered there for 15 minutes, taking it all in.   We didn’t see any other trekkers coming through the gate, though there were perhaps 20 people that had hiked up as part of their visit to the citadel below.

The sun was full on, and we baked as we half hobbled down the arching pathway that would eventually lead to the more postcard view of the site.   Since we’d done the trail quickly that morning, arriving more than two hours early to the sun gate, we’d been mostly in the shade.   The people we passed now that were hiking up to the sun gate were melting.

Eventually, we arrived near the top of the citadel.   We were not to enter it today as our one time ticket was for tomorrow, but we lingered again for some great photo ops and again, to soak it in.  

Eventually, a hot shower beckoned.   We started down the stairs to the exit.   Nep had a quick exchange with a guide he passed going the other way.   The guide sounded shocked.   Nep relayed to us that he had asked Nep if why some of his day trippers were using poles.  When Nep told them we were on the five day plan, he was utterly shocked that we were there so early!  It really didn’t feel that fast.... it just felt steady, with very few breaks along the way the entire four days.

We hobbled down to the entrance area which was a staging area for the bus service to take us down to Aguas.   The bus was the only way, other than walking, to get between Machu Picchu and the small tourist town some 300 meters directly below.  The road was built in the 50’s and followed the original path comprised of a dozen or so very steep switchbacks that snake their way down the mountain.

Before getting in the log bus line up, Nep stamped each of our passports with a cool looking souvenir stamp next to our Peru entrance stamp.  We got to the end of the line about 400 meters from the front and Alex immediately turned up with a round of cold beers.... they really hit the spot, and we quickly went for round two.

Getting off the bus, we were shocked at suddenly being inundated with touts  offering for for one happy hour drinks.   That did sound appealing, but the showers still called.  Kim made the comment that Aguas Calientas seemed like a little alpine tourist town like whistler or blue mountain.  It also reminded me of Pokhara, the launching point for treks in the Annapurnas.... 

Our hotel lobby was not far but we were all hobbling by now.   The twenty minute bus ride had caused our legs to cease up.   When we got our keys, all room numbers starting with 53x, we assumed we’d be heading for an elevator, but no.... we passed building #1, up 6 stairs, ouch.   Building number 2, up 6 more stairs... the grounds were beautiful but this was too much.   We finally got to building 5, then had to climb two more flights of stairs to get to our level.

The shower was amazing.... four days of stench was boiled off and environmentalism be damned I stood under the scalding hot water for another ten minutes.

Dinner was included but our reservation was for 8pm, so at 5 we went hunting for some appetizers, first hitting a quasi Mexican place that served quasi guac and chips, then going to the Carpe Diem sister restaurant for some shared pizza and beer.   The maître d did a really cool card trick that left us all amazed but alas we had to leave and get our third round of dinner hotel.

We are all looking forward to tomorrow.  Hopefully our bodies will heal a bit as I know we have a number or steps to climb and descend.   Getting a brief glimpse of Machu Picchu today reminded me of when Beth and I first went to Cambodia.   Our guide, Lap Tek, drove us past Angkor Wat once over the first two days, never talking about it and only giving us a short glimpse to whet our appetites.   The main course came on the third day where we got the detailed walk through.   My expectations are high for a great day tomorrow.