Day 10 - Machu Picchu

I wanna rise and shine, I want you to be mine
I wanna wake up in the morning with you in the frontline
I wanna rise and shine, I just want you to be fine

I Wanna - Valaire

I remember saying during breakfast on day 10, today is an important day. We're going to Machu Picchu that day. One of the first thing many people said upon finding out that I was going or went to Peru was Machu Picchu. I'm gonna admit that the main reason I had for going to Peru was Machu Picchu so that day was an important day. I chose to do this by taking a day tour. Many people may actually choose to stay in the town of Aguas Calientes to make the trip to Machu Picchu easier especially if they plan to do some hiking. Also if you're landing straight in Cusco from wherever you are, going to Aguas Calientes may be a good idea since it's of a lower altitude than Cusco. If you have problem with altitude, you may experience less discomfort there. I chose not to go Aguas Calientes because lugging our luggages was not appealing and I was also not going to hike any of the mountains.

So how did our day trip go? Well it's a long day. We're picked up at 06:00 am something again. We're the first to be picked up and off we went to pick other people. There were a total of 3 other couples, 2 couples were from America and another couple spoke Spanish. The staff who picked us up gave us a package which contained our train tickets, tickets for the bus in Aguas Calientes, and tickets for Machu Picchu and then he explained how the day's going to work. The staff didn't come along with us, we're just left with the driver who's going to take us to Ollantaytambo where the train station is. What I remembered from that drive was somewhere along the line we passed by towns which were shrouded in fog. It was kinda cool. Then also somewhere along the line we stopped for a while because rocks were falling down from a mountain. I thought it was kinda like an accident thing and the driver was just being cautious and he's waiting until there's no more rock falling, but apparently some works were being done and they're removing the rocks from up there so we had to wait for that. At this point, I didn't know how much further we were to the train station, but I was still calm because our train timing was for 08:53 AM and it's some time away, but apparently the Indian American couple had an earlier train. That must be nerve wrecking for them. When we finally arrived, I told them they better rush. I don't think they, or at least the girl, welcomed the suggestion.

I don't know why it didn't occur to me that we're going to stay together as one group for this entire trip that me and Gioia just walked ourselves to the train station without consulting the other people. The train station was packed with people. We tried to find a place to wait and a staff pointed to the direction of the waiting area. The waiting area had this small cafe where they sold big brownies and cakes. I managed to find a seat next to a lady who was applying make-up and I thought she was Korean but turned out she was Japanese. Then a tall handsome blonde guy walked in and I did check him out a bit, but then my attention turned to one of the sleepy stray dog under the chair. The dog was kinda big and a guy gave some of his sandwich to the big dog. I don't know if he couldn't finish it or he was being kind. If I recalled correctly there's a little dog that came in, but by then the big dog had finished the sandwich. The whole thing was just kinda cute.

Anyways, then we got on the train. The seats are for a group of 4 people with a small table in between. I thought we had the forward facing seats but it turned out it wasn't so. As we waited, the tall handsome guy came with his friend who's cute too and they sat in front of us. Then I realized that we were picked up together that morning. I talked to the other guy a bit. They're from Florida and they seemed like fun but I don't know, I wasn't chatty, I guess I was shy. Anyway the train we took was the Vistadome train which had these big windows for you to see the view, but we're sitting on the right hand side and on the right hand side it's just the mountain wall. As for the view, since we had taken the PeruRail Tititaca train I thought this train ride was so so. There's another cheaper train called the Expedition train that you can take and I think that perhaps that train is good enough. The Vistadome train has snacks served in a fancier way, but I don't think it mattered much.

When we arrived in the Aguas Calientes station, there was a staff waiting for us and then it registered to me that all of us picked up together except the Spanish speaking one were staying as a group. The staff brought us to the bus stop for the bus which would take us to Machu Picchu. At this point I wasn't feeling well. I was feeling feverish. In the bus Gioia felt my forehead and she thought that I was fine like perhaps my body was hotter to just adjust with the change in temperature which was getting warmer. I didn't think so though, I felt cold and I could feel that my shoulder was kinda aching. So I took ibuprofen in that bus. So that's how it went, around 25 - 30 minutes that it took for the bus to go all the way up to Machu Picchu entrance, my body was processing ibuprofen to help me with fever. I told you this trip was physically demanding. The bus ride was winding, if not for the motion sickness pill taken after breakfast, I would have surely been having motion sickness. It was an interesting ride because as you went higher and higher you could see the top of the mountains more and more.

When we arrived at the entrance it was so crowded. We arrived at 11 AM something and already there was quite a queue forming for people who wanted to take the bus down. These people must be the people who hiked up to see the sunrise and by 11 they had visited the citadel. The American lady who we met during the Colca Canyon trip talked about this and she said by the time she explored the citadel, she was quite tired from the hike. So maybe put this into consideration if you are planning to hike, but I guess if you decide to hike you must have been fit already :D So anyway in front of the entrance if was just so crowded, but we managed to find our guide and then we went to the overpriced toilet but we didn't have any other option. It was so crowded that the guide just picked along a father daughter who weren't originally in our group to come with us because they couldn't find their own guide. You may have heard that there's a timed entry and time limit on entering Machu Picchu. I can tell you that this wasn't observed for us. Our tickets said 07:00 AM but we entered at around 11:30 AM. I don't know if it's because we had a guide or because it's not peak season yet. Though it's perhaps not peak season, there were a lot of people. This place was the most crowded place of all the places we visited so far. Gioia likened it to Universal Studio; I guess perhaps it's quite true. It's like a theme park level crowd. Another point to note, though Machu Picchu is up high in the mountains, the weather felt like it's in the tropics. In Aguas Calientes, people were selling mosquito repellent. Gioia actually brought one to Peru, but she didn't bring it to Machu Picchu. It's alright though because there was no mosquito that day. How did I know? I'm a magnet for mosquito and I wasn't bitten at all that day.

Anyways, so our group had 8 people. When you enter Machu Picchu, there are some steps to take and after the first round of steps you arrive at a clearing where could see the citadel with the mountain Huayna Picchu behind it, pretty much the standard Machu Picchu picture that you see a lot when you google for it. I learned that Machu Picchu itself is actually a mountain or the old mountain. The pictures that you see of Machu Picchu when you google for it is actually taken from the position of the mountain or in between the mountain and the citadel looking into direction of the citadel. Something like the picture below, but I wasn't on the Machu Picchu mountain. The Machu Picchu mountain was behind me.

The mountain behind the citadel is Huayna Picchu or the young mountain. What's not visible in that picture was to the right there's another interesting looking mountain which is called Putucusi. This mountain is smaller and I think so cute. I have to say the location of the citadel is quite something, amazing views all around and even more so because mountains are sacred for the Incas. There are a few hiking options for those who are interested. You can go hike Machu Picchu where there is a Sun Gate. Our guide told us we could leave him and do that if we're interested and later come back the same way. None of us did that. I think people who did the multi-day hike arrived at the Sun gate to watch the sunrise illuminate the citadel and then they go explore the citadel. Hence why when we arrived, there were already people leaving. You can also do a hike of Huayna Picchu but tickets for this are limited so you need to plan well. For sure I wouldn't be handle a hike of Huayna Picchu :D

Anyways after that first clearing, there were some more steps to take. The steps weren't easy and it was hot. My body was finally adjusting that I could take out my heavy coat. People probably thought I was weird wearing a heavy coat when it's hot but seriously I was still feeling a bit cold in the beginning. During this round of steps, I was kinda worried a bit for the father daughter, they seemed to be struggling more so than us. The steps are narrow so you couldn't really stop much because you would be blocking people and there were a lot of people. Thankfully they made it. I was just afraid there would be people who would get heart attack due to the heat and the steps and especially if they're not fit. By the way, inside I didn't really see any staff so I wonder if they have a plan in place for such cases. There were also many older tourists so I had my concern. Anyways, just look out for people when you're there. Our guide seemed to be watching out for the father daughter too and it was nice of him. Gioia also said she thought the guide was nice for giving us time to pause and breathe instead of marching straight up ahead. Picture below shows you part of the Machu Picchu mountain and the number of tourists. The little house on the left is the guard house, like a check point before people entered the town.

My pictures are not very good, aren't they? Yeah I'm kinda disappointed myself. Anyways after that many steps going in, the rest of the way was quite easy. There were still steps, but it's not very demanding though the heat could still be a problem for some people. At one point I was worried about my sugar level, so I snacked on biscuit. I have forgotten most of what the guide told us, but if I'm not mistaken there were actually not many people living there. The citadel was not very big itself. I think though the location was great, it's not very convenient to reach. I mean it took us 25 minutes or so with a bus. Imagine walking up on your own. I could be wrong, do do your own research to learn more. Here are some pictures from the citadel.



Aside from that earlier part where the guide said we could leave the group and explore on our own, there were also other points where he made the offer, but all of us stayed with him. It's one-directional so we stayed together all the way until the exit. As we're about to exit, I did feel like I wished I could stay longer. I don't know what God's plan for me is but I kinda think that I would never get to Machu Picchu again. To strike off something on a life list is important and at the end I felt like it's somewhat sad that I couldn't just stay awhile, absorb, and imprint this into memory. There were just so many people though that I snapped out of that feeling. I wanted to get away from these people. The exit was again chaotic. Gioia queued up to get her passport stamped. I didn't do that, again on account of my pitiful Indonesian passport and not wanting to make things complicated by adding unofficial things on it. Queue for the bus back down was long. Our guide inserted me and Gioia in the middle of the queue so that we could stick together as a group and someone was upset at him. Our guide was nice. Once we reached back in Aguas Calientes, we just dispersed on our own. I told Gioia if we could have a nice late lunch. She said of course. By the way overall, I think we spent around 3 hours. I had trout, it was good, and I managed to finish my lunch. Then we had so much time to kill. We entered a market that just sold souvenirs. The things were varied, colourful, and cute, but we didn't get anything, just took photos to fill in the time.


After that we sat by the plaza. It was getting colder as the sun was setting. I was back to feeling not 100% and since it was getting colder I couldn't get ice cream even though I wanted to. We decided to go to the train station before it got really dark and waited there. We could have gotten an earlier train, but I think we're booked on the last train at 06:10 PM so we had to wait. If you're doing this on your own and confident with the timing and all, I guess you can try booking the train at a better timing. Anyways the station was crowded and it was getting colder. I could feel I was getting impatient. Finally it's time to board our train and we were seated with the guys again :D We had a bit more conversation. The blondie said something that I often say and I was like, tell me about it. I wonder if it made us immature for feeling that way or if he felt that way because I often feel perhaps I was being immature. Anyways didn't ask him that. I did find out he's like 7 years younger than me. That's the thing with my life these days. Often time I see people and think they're my age group and then I have to remind myself that no you're old now and sure enough most of these people I meet are younger than me.

Anyways the guys were tired so they took naps. I was impatient again on the train ride because we stopped for a few times, I think to let another train pass or something like that. It was dark I couldn't see much. I also didn't eat the lemon cake we got because I wasn't hungry. In this train ride back to Ollantaytambo, there was a performance. Truly if you work for PeruRail, it's like you have to be able to do many things. The staff have to serve customers, do cultural performance, and model cloths that they sell on board. This performance involved a guy in a mask. When he first appeared, I was startled, but I appreciated his enthusiasm :D When we arrived at Ollantaytambo, I was relieved especially when we found our driver, but no we couldn't go just yet :( We had to wait for the Indian American couple who was on a later train than us, argh!!! I think it was another 10-15 minutes wait then off we went on this pitch black road. I was thinking, I guess in Indonesia surely there will be roads like that too which would be pitch black. I mean it's not necessary to put lights on when there weren't many people passing at night, but still the whole thing was a bit of a shock to the system and I was glad the driver was skillful. I then realized that outside the night sky was amazing. There were so many stars. The last time I saw sky like that was in New Zealand but even so I thought this sky in Peru was even more beautiful. You know how when you google night sky picture and the pictures that appear often would have the bright milky way? It was there in that sky that night! It's really too bad I couldn't get out of the car to see it better. It was most glorious.

We reached Cusco at around 10 pm. Went to our old hotel to check if our luggages had been moved as promised. They were but they weren't in our new rooms so we had to wait for that *sigh* but overall it's great to be getting my own room. For pictures from Machu Picchu and Aguas Calientes, you can go here. A last thought to end this. Machu Picchu would most probably be top of everyone's mind when going to Peru. It's undoubtedly the main motivation for me going there. However after exploring Peru up to that point, I realized it's not the top most wonderful thing I did there. For me that would be going to Palccoyo. It's funny how some things that have been on your mind for so long can be overtaken by other things that you have never even thought of. Isn't it great when life can surprise you in a wonderful way?

:) eKa @ 10:05:00 PM •

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