We´re back in Cusco now after a few days doing an alternative inka trail. The real inca trail was a bit too pricey for us and also needs to be booked around 4 months in advance so there was no chance of doing that! Instead we opted for a 5 day trek called the Salkantay trek which leads to the town just below Machu Picchu. It´s a bit tougher than the inka trail as it goes up a bit higher (up to 4650m) and is a bit more in the mountains - circling Mount Salkantay which is one of the biggest in the area (6271m).
We nearly did the trek on our own but in the end opted for the guided option where mules can take your bags, food is cooked for you, and you´re told where to go (useful as we couldn´t get hold of a map) etc. In the end I think we chose a rather too cheap option as our guides were pretty crap, couldn´t even get into machu picchu on the last day as their licence had expired apparently! but everything else was fine and a lot easier than carrying our stuff everywhere!
The area is amazingly beautiful, the trek took us through some spectacular mountains, through some cloud forests and through the amazing mountains surrounding machu picchu (we walked around the base of the machu picchu mountain before acsending it on the final day).
Machu Picchu really does live up to its incredibly high expectations. It is an amazing ruin which is suprisingly intact and well built. It´s situation is also incredible, right at the top of a very steep mountain in the middle of nowhere! Anyway we´re having a few days to relax as i think we´ve only slept in past 6 twice in the last 2 weeks!
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