¡Wayna Picchu!

Okay so nothing too exciting happened today so I'm going to talk briefly about my day and then move on to Machu Picchu day!!!  Okay, so exciting things from today:  I got to sleep in.  I had ballet.  No bird poop got near me.  I had my Cine class where we watched a French movie called L'enfant (El Niño, The Child), which was a good movie, as they always are.  I was serenaded on the micro by a guy with a guitar (obviously I wasn't personally serenaded, but he was good and I gave him a sol).  I learned how to make Lomo saltado tonight from my empleada Lydia.  I ate Lomo saltado tonight.  I get to finally share part of my experience at Machu Picchu..

So on Machu Picchu day I woke up at 5:30 a.m. (which was early, but late of course), got ready quickly, ate breakfast quickly, and headed out the door.  My whole time at Machu Picchu was spent with another kid from my program named Mark.  We had the earliest tickets to the city (Mark and I decided to call it a "city" rather than a "park") along with another girl in our group and our director; however, the other girl fell the day before and injured her knee so she couldn't hike and our director didn't feel like hiking either.  Needless to say, Mark and I left for Machu Picchu on the bus at 6 a.m. alone.

On the bus getting ready to leave for Machu Picchu.

First glimpse of Machu Picchu/Waynapicchu

Llama



Getting ready to hike Waynapicchu
(that's the big mountain in the background)



We were towards the beginning of the pack for the Waynapicchu hike.  What happens is they let 400 people hike it everyday.  Two hundred at 7 a.m. and another 200 at 10 a.m.  We obviously were in the first set of 200 people.  The hike up was definitely a hard one, but it was so worth it to get to the top, but literally it never stopped going up...every corner turned meant there was another set of stairs.  It took us 55 minutes to get to the top and we definitely stopped many times, but only because we wanted to take pictures, it was in no way because we couldn't breath or our legs were tired.

On the way up, looking back on Machu Picchu

A small cave we had to climb thru





Almost there! And you can see the road

we took in the bus on the way up.







Finally at the top!





We made it!!!



Now for the hard part..bajaring.. (If I refering to subiring or bajaring, that was our Spanglish for the day: subir = to go up, bajar = to go down).  Now you wouldn't think going down would be the hard part right?  Oh so wrong!!!  Mark and I had two choices in arrows..one pointed one way and said "Machupicchu" and the other pointed in the opposite direction and was blank.  Now, if you were two college students exploring Machu Picchu for what will probably be the only time in your life, what would you do?  Yep, we decided to explore the scenic route.  Boy did we get ourselves into an adventure.  We went completely down the backside of the mountain and ALL the way back around!  It was crazy during the hike and I have a love/hate relationship with the experience, but it was soo worth it!  We went down many many stairs (and a random wooden ladder that we came across) and the whole time we were so glad we didn't have to climb those up, however, our knees did start to hurt from the impact and also we came to the realization that we were bajaring SO much that eventually we knew we would have to subir again. 

Stairs:  happy to be going down them

Random ladder... :)

We finally arrived to the Gran Cavern..and it was wonderful and so peaceful.  We really did take the scenic route.  You know that Robert Frost poem "The Road Not Taken."  Yea, we definitely took the road less traveled by.  The path was mostly covered with leaves and when we got to the caves (on the other side of the mountain) there were only two other people there (one was reading and the other napping).  It was soo peaceful, so not only do Mark and I get to say we went to the top of Waynapicchu, but we get to say we went around it as well.

Cave equipped with Incan sofa

Another cave equipped with a fireplace. :)

After we were done enjoying the scenery and peace we saw our worst nightmare..(cue DUH DUH DUH music)...

One and a half hours!!!!!  You've got to be kidding me!!! Luckily, it didn't take THAT long, but it was at least another hour and that hour consisted of going up stairs and down stairs...

Best sight we've ever seen..Machu Picchu!!!

See those white arrows..yea we did all of that!!!

We got into Waynapicchu at 7 a.m. and left at 10:30 a.m.  I'd say that was a good hike!!  We actually ended up passing our group as they were heading in.  Also, it was so funny on the way down people kept asking how it was and if they were almost there.  Mark and I definitely flat out told the truth, "Sorry, you still have a ways."  Of course we did way more than the average person, but still, we weren't going to get their hopes up.  Okay, so I'd say this is a long enough blog for the night.  This still isn't the whole Machu Picchu day, but it's coming soon to a blog near you!!  Also, coming soon, Machu Picchu por video!! ¡Qué divertido!