Friday, September 18, 2009

Inka Jungle Trail Day 2: The Real Deal

After an early wake-up call and a quick breakfast, we began our first real day of trekking to Machu Picchu. The early part of the trek was mostly uphill, so thank goodness we had our trekking poles, which The Aussie referred to as sticks. It was grueling at times, but Juan Pablo stopped for breaks plus nature and history lessons whenever he saw us doubled over, gasping for air.

We viewed Coca bushes, mango trees, papaya trees, coffee trees (yes it grows on trees!), banana trees, cacao trees, and Inka war paint trees. I can't remember what those trees are called, but the berries make for excellent neon orange face paint.

The day's trek put the "Jungle" in the Inka Jungle Trail, as we even stopped to rest at local homes with monkeys and huge beaver-guinea pig creatures that seriously look as if they are charcters from Narnia, about to smoke a pipe and tell a story.

We climbed over mountains, ascending nearly 2000 meters, then dropping 1500 or so, arriving just outside the town of Santa Teresa in the late afternoon, after 8 hours and 18 km of hiking. To rest, and much to our liking, we took oroyas (zip lines) across the river and rested our tired bodies in the hot springs of Cocalmayo. Amazing.

We had a nice dinner while listening to one minute excerpts from our favorite Spanish discotecha versions of 90s rap songs (would have made for an awesome Power Hour / Centurion playlist...). We probably would have stayed longer at the dinner table, talking with our trekking friends, except that the dive bombing cicadas the size of baseballs kept interrupting our conversations. So we retreated to our tents and again, passed out quite early.

Closer to Machu Picchu every day!

-- Posted from my iPhone

1 comment:

  1. I forgot to ask -- how did your asthma hold up in the high altitude? Was it hard breathing?

    Did you like all your company from Australia and South Africa?

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