Spring Break 2023, Day 6, Machu Picchu!

April 5, 2023

We had to wake up super early today!  We were meeting our tour guide at 5:30 and breakfast started at 5:00.  So we had to be ready to go by 5:30.  We found out that the hotel will hold what ever we don't want to take with us for when we get back.  If I would have known that, I would have brought my other backpack!  I just had a mesh bag with my toothbrush/paste, nightshirt, might guard, and yesterday's underwear as well as my prescription medications to leave.  Also, the little bag of things from the alpaca farm and a few other odds and ends I picked up yesterday.  Melinda (not her actual name), let me put my items in her slightly larger bag that she was leaving.  Then we met out guide and got on the train in the dark.  The upside of going so early (and it being only just post-pandemic), was that we had very few people to shoot pictures around or wait for them to move on.   One thing about Machu Picchu is that there are bathrooms (baños) at the gate--and no others. You need to use the bathroom before and then hold it until you're done.  We learned so much and I took so many pictures!  Machu Picchu was fabulous, but I fell in love with the mountains around it!!  Looking out at them made me feel serene and at peace.  They spoke to me.  I can't possibly tell you all of the things our guide told us, so I will simply show you the pictures.  If you need more information, book a tour yourself!  Some of the pictures are there to explain, some are just to try to show you the beauty of this exceptional place in the world.

The llamas they imported to impress the tourists! 
(Llamas typically live in higher altitudes)

There it is!

the mountains

I have discovered the lost city!

Glaciers in the distance.  They city used the glacier melt
for their irrigation and drinking water

Steep mountain sides increase defensive strength

Our guide at work--you won't believe how many of these he took!

The sun rising above the mountains!

The terracing

Terracing on a steep mountainside

there is a movement where women take pictures of
themselves topless in poses like this.  That thought
came to me as I was posing!

The sun gate

This is the royal part of the city

They are pretty much sure that they found the bones of the 9th Inca
king, Pachakutiq Inka Yupanki, who transformed the kingdom of Cusco
into the Inca Empire.  Ultrasounds look good.

windows

What a view! 

Huayna Picchu, this mountain and Machu Picchu mountain
are on opposite sides of the city

My mountains!

This is the lower entrance to what they believe is the tomb of
Pachakutiq Inka Yupanki, the ninth king

A chinchilla

These are the neighborhoods of the common people.  It took only 90 years
to build Machu Picchu by a people that did not have metal tools or the wheel.  They 
worked three days on, then a few days off in teams to complete it.

This was a bed.  A wooden frame would have been built over and around it. 
The space between the stone and wood was filled with herbs that made it smell
 nice and deterred insects and other critters.  Also, that space had an
 insulating factor.

One of the towers for defense--you can see everything from there!

They analyzed the soil in the terraces.  It was all brought in from other
places to provide fertile gardens.  They people of the city did not use these terraces for food, even though they were completely self-sustaining.  They used these terraces for growing herbs and plants for medicines and as a test lab to develop herbs and plants for other uses.  Amazing!  The crops were grown in further out terraces.

Another neighborhood

Inca stairs are still working 400 years later!

I'm in love!

This is the quarry where they got the rocks for building

This is a coca plant (the spindly one in the center).  It is one of the few
plants not labeled--maybe they don't want tourists to pick off and chew the coca leaves?

Bromeliad--in a planted garden.  Also a sign of the surrounding rainforest

Just in case you wanted to stop!

An uncompleted temple.  When the spaniards approached and 
took over other cities, the Incas left and went into the rainforest to escape and so that the Spaniards would not find this holiest of cities (they didn't!)

And alter for the neighborhood is here

Notice how carefully the stones are cut to fit together--without metal
tools, and without mortar.

The right side of the wall started to fall apart when one of the scientific
teams tried to unearth something below it.

60% of Machu Picchu is visible, the other 40% is underground--tombs,
irrigation and drainage, foundations, etc

The sun dial, which wasn't used to measure time, but rather to make astronomical observations

Ancient Inca stairs

A field for recreation

The Incas carved this to look just like the mountain behind it 
(unfortunately I did not get both of them in the same photo!)

This guy joined us for part of the tour

The posts on the tops were to help support the roof

These two basins would be filled with water at night (no roof in this space),
to reflect the stars

Each of those bumps along the roof line have holes in them
and were used to tie down the roof

I believe this is part of the drainage/irrigation system.  I saw a few inside the
stone blocks

My mountains

The rapids river in Agua Calientas (also called Machu Picchu town
by many!)

Welcome to Machu Picchu!