Machu Picchu

Ahoyhoy my wondeful Britaniches,

As planned I have spent the day waiting and getting to and from Machu Picchu (11 hours) and actually seeing the place (4 hours). I have taken loads of photos and there is so much to tell you about the place but this is impossible so I´ll just post a few pictures so you can get a feel of it if you haven´t been. It was all well worth it although I didn´t have high hopes when I had to stop the bus from Cuzco to Ollantaytambo as I though I would barff. A bit of fresh air settled me down and we made it to Ollantaytambo where some cough inducing deisel electrics promised to get us to Machu Picchu station although only at 15-20mph. As a side note the problem with polution here isn´t the numbers of vehicles its the fact that they all churn out suffocating nasty black exhaust fumes.

This train ride was the best I have ever been on. The train was clean, comfortable, on time and the view was pretty spectacular as we followed a chocolate river of rapids along a green sided vally floor. Here and there bits of Incan masonry could be seen. About half way the scenery changed to more jungle with huge Tarzan vines:

On arriving at Machu Picchu station my guide was waiting for and I really struck lucky. This is Professor Nilo Zambrano of the Cuzco university history department who has been involved in Machu Picchu research and is doing the tour guide thing out of term time. WOW! And ontop of all this he was a nice guy.

We took the bus to ascend the 500m to the citidel and this is what I saw on rounding a courner of rock:

Before heading down into the citadel Nilo gave me a 30min chat about Macchu pIcchu´s history and so to better understand the sight a background in Incan culture, religion, astronomy and loads of stuff. This made the whole experience far better. In summary, King Pachacuti ordered it be built in 1450. It was being built and used (never completed) for 70+ years then the Spanish came, buggered everything up and it was abandoned to become overgrown and used for a bit of farming by locals. In 1911 Hiram Bingham stumbled upon it, asked the farmers what it was and was told its Machu Picchu. But there is so much more to it than that like part of the layout looks from above like a condor, a creature associated with the upper tier of the three levels of Incan existence and creatures in the milky way and more and more and more. I shant bore you with it all know but WOW! To escape the plethora of tourists we went up to the top tier of the terrances and beheld this:

Then down into the city we went with its locally hewn granite whose quality depends on the status of the building and if it was going to be covered with plaster:

The most important buildings were the Temple of the Sun & the King´s house (with en suite). Below the Temple of the Sun was a temporary mausoleum (royalty being burried or whatever you do with mummies in the capital Cuzco) and just look at the intracy of the masonry in conjunction with the living rock of the mountain. The step looking things repesent the three levels of Incan existence i.e. heaveny type place, earth and the underworld:

But it wasn´t all just old stone. I was several cool lizard dudes and a humming bird although you´ll have to take my word for the bird (and the bird is the word) as the photo isn´t exactly crystal clear. The flower is an orchid growing out of a thatched roof:

Here you can see the train station belwo by the river, the twisty ribbon of road (that I didn´t miss riding), the mountains and the terrances. The terrances serve two purposes, first they stop things sliding off the mountain and secondly they provide flat safe farming land:

After being so lucky for so long eventually it poured down for 15 mins then eased off and the fog came in but at least it offered the chance to see the 500 year old and full functional drainage system:

After all this we popped on the coach back down to the station:

At the station one of a pair of retired American ladies basically told me it was immoral for me to do this trip but with the help of a young Australian couple I made the point the yanks can´t distinguish between accents to save their lives. I then went for broke and suggested repatriation of the former colonies but this didn´t go down too well.

The long ride home had me back at the hotel for 9pm so a pretty long day but I had to wait up as Nilo had arranged with a journalist colleage for me to be interviewed for Peruvian national radio at 10pm but the guy never showed. So having stayed uo I woke up and decided to blog this rubbish.

Tomorrow Nazca and then Lima where I hope to get new tyres and an inner tube. Back on the road!

TTFN,

Incan King Tiggacuti