We have arrived in the Inca Empire. To be exact, in the ‘Valle Sagrado de los Incas’; the sacred valley of the Incas. This valley north of Cusco is about 100 km wide. The Incas, who populated the region of Cusco until the year 1000, managed to make themselves masters of the entire valley in the 400 years that followed. Other indigenous tribes were convinced to submit or (by force) overpowered. They were certainly not sweethearts, those Incas. However, when, after the ‘discovery’ of South America by Columbus (1492), several hundred Spanish soldiers found their way to Peru, the Incas got a taste of their own medicine. In 1572, the last Inca ruler, Túpac Amaru, was executed and that put an end to the Inca rule. In addition, the natives died in droves from the contagious diseases that the Spaniards had brought from the ‘Old World’. All in all, not a rosy history. Yet there is also much to tell about the Incas, such as the wonderful way in which they built, without cement and yet earthquake-proof. The colourful clothing and the golden art objects and jewelry that they made are also impressive. In addition, it is a miracle how they managed to farm at an altitude of 4000 meters without any help from pack animals and often by means of terraces on steep mountain slopes. Almost half of all food plants that we know today come from the farmers in the Andes region!

The Spanish, however, had little regard for the culture and traditions of the Incas at the time. Except for their gold! For the Incas, this had no monetary value. It was mainly a representation of the sun that they worshipped and it was used as decoration. The Spanish soon discovered that plundering the tombs of Inca rulers was a lucrative activity. And so the great destruction of the heritage of the Incas occurred.

Well, I think that introduction was appropriate before I tell you about our visit to the Sacred Valley.

After a few beautiful cycling days, during which we see a beautiful example of Peruvian-female-power, we arrive in Pisac. We have been ‘warned’ for a high ‘hippie-content’ and indeed… before we get off our bikes we spot the first tourist dressed in ‘turd catcher pants’ walking barefoot through the streets. A4 sheets are stuck on restaurant windows advertising retreats, yoga courses and ayahuasca ceremonies. In souvenir shops there are cloths with prints of the Chinese Yin Yang symbol and the Indian chakras. Nag Champa incense, with its recognizable blue box, is also in abundance. It gives me a strange feeling. The people here have an incredibly rich culture to draw from, beautiful fabrics, jewelry, mysticism and spirituality… why do they bow to the apparent(?) desire of tourists for Eastern symbols and philosophy? Is that really necessary to bind a certain type of tourists to them? And is that necessary to generate sufficient income? Paul and I try to figure it out, but we don’t really understand it.

We are happy with the simplistic little hotel we find. In our room hangs a large photo of a poodle, a beautiful Peruvian woven rug… and a purple batik flag with Yin Yang sign. There’s something for everyone…

However, we are not here to marvel at fellow tourists, but for the ruins. There are two ways to visit them: either you climb them via the original staircase, 400 meters up along terraces, towers, army base, etc., or you take a taxi bus to the top and mainly view the highest point, namely ‘the village’. We choose the climb and set off well prepared with sunscreen, bottles of water and a packed lunch of sandwiches and fruit in our backpack. It feels like an ‘outing’, only the carton of juice is missing.

We can start the climb directly from the village. If you look at how small the Peruvians are and assume that the Incas must have been at least as small, it is unbelievable how high the steps are. It is clear that we are well acclimatized and often exert ourselves at this altitude, because we regularly overtake panting red-faced tourists. However, it is not busy on this route, we have all the time to look around at our leisure. Sometimes it even seems as if we have the (Inca) empire to ourselves. It is amazing how exactly the boulders that were used for building fit together and how enormous some of them are. We discuss the existing theories that aliens must have had a hand in this creation… but come to the conclusion that it seems more likely to us that the Incas simply had a lot of time (and attention) to build. The only thing that had to be done was to cultivate the land to provide for their food…

When we reach the highest point of the ruins after climbing 400 meters, we meet the many visitors who have been dropped off there by taxi. In the absence of a slide, we decide to take this path of least resistance down as well. My knee has held up well, but of course we mustn’t exaggerate. Still, I thought the climb up was perhaps the most beautiful part of this visit. Moving between these structures. Not studying them in detail. They don’t move me the way the beautiful nature here does. Would Machu Picchu do that? That wonder of the world? After all, we make a considerable ‘detour’ for that and we will also have to pay quite some Soles…

To get to Machu Picchu we first have to go to Ollantaytambo, an old Inca city at the other end of the valley. But when we are on our bikes Paul gets a bad stomach ache again. We thought he was cured after a course of antibiotics and some kind of parasite-killing pill, but nothing could be further from the truth. Halfway to ‘Tambo’ we stop in the city of Urubamba. If we want to have Paul’s stool tested somewhere we have to do it here… here are the laboratories. Apparently you can just walk in there and ask for a test. Paul is sent to the toilet with an empty container and comes back a little later with a gray face… with a full container. We decide to stay in the city that night so that we can pick up the results live a few hours later. While I am sitting on the sidewalk guarding the bikes Paul walks out with his arms full of pill boxes and a large bottle of pink liquid. It turns out: he has the Giardia parasite. A persistent parasite that makes itself heard from time to time but can also easily go underground for a week (and you think you are ‘better’). Now we have the right weapons to fight the parasite! EN GARDE!
Price tag: €7.50 for the examination + €12.50 for the medication. It’s a bargain!

The next day we cycle to Ollantaytambo. Fortunately, the road is paved. Paul’s stomach cramps painfully and he sits on the bike with clenched buttocks. Fortunately, we have an address for the coming night(s), with a German/Peruvian couple who live outside Ollantaytambo and have led cycling tours in the region for years. We are welcomed kindly and are given our own room with bathroom, something that is extra welcome now. Steffen and Maria are warm hosts and tell us practical information about Machu Picchu as well as about their former careers as technicians of the ‘Blue Man Group’ and on a cruise ship where they met. Paul and Steffen bake pizzas and bread rolls in a stone pizza oven outside. They taste delicious!

After two days of medication, Paul is feeling a lot better and we prepare for the trip to Machu Picchu. There are two options to reach this sanctuary of the Incas. Either you take the very expensive ‘Inca rail’ (the train) or you take your own transport or bus with a huge bend around the piece of land in question and then walk from the ‘end of the road’ another 10 km along the railway tracks to Machu Picchu pueblo (village near the site). We choose, like everyone who can’t or doesn’t want to pay for the train, for the second option. Along the road we flag down an almost empty taxi van. It goes exactly to our destination, to pick up tourists there. HOORAY! That’s easy! But our initial joy soon gives way to nausea, annoyance and ultimately fear of death. Our driver is a maniac! With almost 3000 meters of altitude up and 4000 down over a distance of 150 km, almost the entire road consists of bends. Our ‘driver’ seems to think he’s in a computer game instead of being responsible for a safe journey for himself and a few passengers. He accelerates, brakes and turns the steering wheel at every turn (constantly). Just when we think it can’t get any worse, he turns onto a gravel road. With a steep mountain wall to our right and a hundreds-meter deep abyss to our left, he tears like an idiot over this path that is sometimes barely 4 meters wide. Despite this, he manages to overtake other taxi vans both left and right. I don’t know if his driving behavior is the result of arrogance, a death wish or a combination of both. I’m happy, Paul is furious, and we’re both a few liters poorer when we get out of this murderous vehicle after 5 anxious hours.

The walk along the train tracks is beautiful. Due to the low altitude (2000m above sea level) we walk through a tropical environment. It is beautifully green around us. The walk is easy and after about 2.5 hours of walking we see the first ‘walls’ of the ruins appear high above us. First, however, we will have to enter the village that lies at the foot of the mountain on which Machu Picchu is built. From the jungle we walk into the most touristic village I have ever seen. According to Paul it looks most like a winter sports village, but then in the jungle. It consists almost exclusively of hotels and restaurants and has a huge souvenir market. Because we have heard ghost stories about the queues for the ticket sales (first get a ticket for a time when you are allowed to buy your entrance ticket) we go straight to the sales point. Apparently we are lucky… because with our ‘card for a ticket’ we can go straight to one of the two empty counters. It also turns out that there are still tickets for our desired ‘circuit’ the next morning at 10:00. PERFECT! Slowly our death ride memory fades into the background… Our little hotel (cheapest here, most expensive for us so far) is not disappointing. In the evening we listen… well I listen… (Paul: zzzzzzzzz….) to another podcast about the Incas to be a bit prepared for the next day.

After a restless night in which the nightlife noise on the streets around 4:00 turns into wake-up noise (sunrise at Machu Picchu), we pack our lunch again and set off. Machu Picchu has also been built impractically high on a mountain, this time the climb is about 350 meters. We can also take a bus for € 12,- one way (3km!)… but we can’t see a bus anymore, and certainly not for that money! The climb turns out to be beautiful and it pays to stop regularly and look back at the jungle that stretches over the surrounding mountains. Too early we are in the queue for the entrance, where we are stopped at the gate. Apparently this was the queue for an entrance at 9:00. We really have to wait another 10 minutes before we are allowed through the gate! We fill that time looking around at the other visitors. Half the world is here… Young and old, rich and… ‘backpacker’, Asia (Chinese and Japanese), a lot of Americans, Europeans (check!), only Africa seems underrepresented. We see many a pair of injected lips, high heels and deeeep cleavage. What they are for we will discover later. At 10:00 it is finally time, the park opens its gate for us too!!!

At first it is really a traffic jam. Standing still is not possible, but fortunately the best is yet to come. We soon arrive at the famous viewpoint. The place to take the iconic Machu Picchu, or better said ‘I WAS AT Machu Picchu!’ photo. We neatly join a row to also take that beautiful photo. The injected lips and deep cleavage are thrown into the battle for the sexiest Machu Picchu photo. We giggle a bit in Dutch and thank the friendly Japanese man who takes a series of photos of us.

After this hotspot, the crowd fortunately disperses somewhat and we can continue ‘our circuit’ more calmly. At a next less busy lookout point we stop for a moment. Only now can we calmly look at this wonder of the world. Because it is certainly impressive! Not least because of its location, with nothing but wooded mountains as far as the eye can see. How well those Incas had it figured out! And how difficult they made it for themselves! Thanks to the many guides, we regularly pick up facts about how life must have been here around 1500. We are lucky with the beautiful weather, a clear blue sky and bright sunshine. It is not as if we can spend an entire day here, as we thought. There is no real place to sit down and when we do try and get a sandwich from our packed lunch, we are immediately reprimanded by a guard. Even secretly adding another ‘circuit’ is made impossible by these men. So like good llamas we walk our route between the ropes. All this ‘fuss’ doesn’t take away from the fact that we visit Machu Picchu with admiration, but it does detract from the experience of this special place. We extend our stay a bit when the exit comes into view and eat a much-needed sandwich with a beautiful view out of sight of the guards.

My knee is holding up surprisingly well under all this and I decide to descend the 350 meters back to the village (much more difficult for me than going up the stairs). We find a lightweight bamboo walking stick and descend the (allegedly) 1600 steps. In the evening in bed, with a cheese, avocado, tomato sandwich (our diet), we reflect on the visit. It was beautiful, special… but neither of us were ‘moved’ by this visit. The entrance gates, crowds of people, guards, certainly contribute to that. It becomes a bit ‘artificial’, an attraction. And we are not used to that.
The next morning we make the journey in reverse order. The 10 km along the railway and then a bus that drops us off close to ‘home’. Fortunately this driver drives a bit more careful. Although the thick fog that hangs between the mountains and through which we often only have a few meters of visibility makes it quite exciting.

We stay an extra day at our host’s house and spend the evening at a lovely warm campfire in the garden. Now that we have completed this excursion into the world of the Incas, we have one more mission left: cycling the Peru Divide. Will Paul’s parasitic intruder be defeated? Will my knee really be able to cope with rougher terrain and more altitude meters per stage than we have cycled so far? You can read all about that in the next blog!