Rare Adventures

Tag: health

  • Inca Trail Day 4, the Monkey Steps, Sungate and Machu Picchu

    Inca Trail Day 4, the Monkey Steps, Sungate and Machu Picchu

    After the drama of Day 3 dinner with the guides and the tip issue the night before, we were in bed very early, with only the very brave (or foolhardy) venturing out into the night for the makeshift toilet. The heavy rain on the tent overnight didn’t lift our spirits for the long trek in the dark.

    Day 4 started early, the pots were clanking for breakfast at 2.30am and we were all woken up at 3am for breakfast, which I must admit was pretty hard going but we needed to stock up for a very long day ahead.

    The porters were all over the gear like a rash, packing tents and equipment for their early departure. It later transpired that the porters had to lump everything, including waste of all kinds, back down the mountain to the catch the 6.30am train home. A more motivated bunch I have rarely seen.

    By 4am we were packed up and ready for the trek from Winay Wayna gate to the Inti Punka or the Inca Sungate, or at least to the gate to the national park to start the trek. We loaded up and started down the trail in the dark and the wet, and to my surprise, within 3 minutes we had arrived at the gatehouse. The Winay Wayna camp was right on the boundary to the national park, so we now joined a queue to enter the park, which opened at 530am, talk about anticlimax.

    Luckily, we were one of the first groups to mobilise and were inside the waiting shelter. As the rest of the campsite decamped the queue grew over the next hours to several dozen people, most of whom were stood out in the rain. We were then horrified to discover the gate doesn’t open until 6am, so all this early start was for the convenience of the porters, who had just had a huge tip!

    One of the American lads had picked up a particularly bad stomach bug overnight. We had heard his mate complaining about the noise he was making throwing up, and now in the queue he was laid out on the floor but fortunately improved as time went on.

    It was at this point that we realised how big the risk of a stomach bug is on a trek, because if we had all picked up this bug we wouldn’t have been going anywhere.

    At 6am, the gate to the park opened and after sorting out the tickets we were on our way. The young people seemed to be in a race and hurtled off, but with Wooksie still adjusting to altitude we trundled along at the rear with Todd, who’s knee was reminding him of all the years of basketball abuse it had enduring.

    After 3 days of trekking, the 4th day was tough. It was 2 hours of climbing and staying mentally focused on the prize ahead. Wooksie was starting to struggle with the stomach bug by now, one could only imagine how tough it would be if the bug had developed 2 nights earlier on the trek.

    Dawn bought daylight and more stunning views through the gorges and valleys through which the river flowed. Eventually we arrived at the legendary and dreaded monkey steps, the toughest climb of the trek and the last tough push, the each step was 2 or 3 foot high, and each required a big effort to get up, there were over 100 of the monster steps built by the ancient civilisation, yet another example of their incredible engineering skills.

     If you are young and fit then you can bounce up them but if you were old and suffering with body pains, they are hell. It is a task that requires arms, legs, knees and the occasional helping hand from friends, I scrambled up them OK, Wooksie followed but Todd dropped behind and made it in his own good time.

    Eventually, we came over the ridge to look down on Machu Picchu from the Sungate. There was a feeling of elation, I had expected some mythical sunrise but it was past 8am by the time we got there, so we hadn’t made it for dawn, but we had made it and the view was magnificent.

    The next hour was spent getting the Instagram shots done, shaking hands with others and generally enjoying the incredible view from hundreds of feet above Machu Picchu. We then started the much more enjoyable trek down into town, stopping to look at the wild Alpacas but not getting too close, they are cuddly but evil.

    The walk up to the Sungate from Machu Picchu is 3 hours alone, so we were glad to be walking down. As we approached the town the views got better as was the feeling of relief at seeing the end of the adventure.

    On arrival we saw crowds of people queuing for access from for day tickets and many climbing the up the mountain to get a better view of the town. To be honest the day was a bit of a blur, we did a 2 or 3 hours tour of the buildings and infrastructure, but after 4 days of trekking and being up for 8 hours, our energy was lagging.

    The history and splendour of Machu Pichu is like nothing else on earth and you cannot fail to be amazed when you are there. But there is only so many buildings, channels, drains, and terraces that you can take in one lifetime, and by lunch I had reached my fill. The guide who took us around was full of energy, and we tried to be enthusiastic but I’m sure our eyes gave it away.

    I was also very glad we had not taken the additional package to climb little Machu Picchu, peak that is part of the park, the climb up another peak would have been too much, it looked incredible but by now I just wanted to sit down and have a decent meal.

    We were shipped back to Aguas Caliente. Most of our fellow trekkers gathered in the same restaurant and we had a last meal together, chatted about our experiences, how much we needed a comfy bed and it was time to find our train, the one of those that had passed so close by us on the second day and enjoy the trip back to Ollyemptambo and the bus back to Cusco.

    One last thing do not underestimate how much fun the train trip back is. Not only does it have a fantastic glass roof, comfortable seats and people coming around selling coffee and refreshments, you even get a Spanish style guitar band with a trumpet, so there is no chance of sleep until you get on the bus.

  • Inca Trail day 3: Cloud forests, precarious toilets and a tip ambush

    Inca Trail day 3: Cloud forests, precarious toilets and a tip ambush

    Eventually, we wandered into our second campsite. To find the porters had all been busy again, the tents had been built, the canteen tent was laid out ready for dinner and we had bowls of water sitting outside our tents for washing.

    Another smashing evening chatting with our companions, good food and it was time to re-engage with my wandering mattress in the tent for another night chasing it around the tent floor. After such a long period without camping the hard ground started to take its toll so the early morning stretch was getting tougher.

    Same routine with breakfast and then we set off on a long day of climbing. The downside of coming through the valley was that we were way below the altitude needed for the Sun Gate at Machu Picchu. If we had gone over Dead Woman’s Pass we would have been coming down so day 3 would have been the easy part of the journey.

    The Incas were very busy step builders and we were regularly negotiating steep climbs and drops using the stairs they had built 500 years ago. The path meandered along the hillsides, dropping occasionally but it was never any relief, because whenever we went down, we knew we would be coming back up.

    Best scenery of the trek

    The scenery on day 3 was stunning, mostly we climbed through the cloud forest, which is pretty much what it says on the tin, the altitude of the forest means that there are shrouds of clouds in amongst the trees, I guess we would normally call the fog!

    The comradery of our fellow adventurers was great but the strain of the climbing was making an impact on Todd’s knees and he really started to slow up, as did Wooksie who was struggling again as we started to hit altitude, plus the endless steps up through the terraces. The young people didn’t have any of these issues and I made it my business to try to keep up with them, but it wasn’t particularly successful.

    There were some spectacular structures along the route which left us in awe of the Inca ability to turn uninhabitable hillsides into fertile terraces for growing crops of raising animals, probably Alpacas and Lamas.

    Into the afternoon we finally crossed the path coming down from Dead Woman’s Pass which marked the end of the serious climbing for that day. Soon afterwards we were at probably the most impressive of the remote Inca temples and settlements, stunning views, great photo opportunities and an end of the climbing.

    We headed up for the last push to the next campsite only to find that we had actually arrived and it was only 10 minutes away. The porters were busy assembling tents on the terraces and putting the food together for the evening.

    We had a big chunk of the afternoon to ourselves for recovery, which the young people used to climb up some of the trail to Dead Woman’s Pass to prove they had done it, meanwhile, Wooksies decided she would just go and have a lay down, whilst Todd and I went and found ourselves a nice bench and talked about to right the wrongs of the world, and the looking threat of a Trump presidency.

    Precarious Loos

    This was our last camp, and due to it’s location at the end of the trail it was very busy. The conditions were crammed and toilet facilities were at a premium. Each night the porters erected a toilet tent, and tonight was no exception, however, due to the precipitous location of the camp site, the toilet tent was literally hanging off the side of the cliff.

    Going to the loo involved a lot of dexterity, but we had to hang on to the branch of a tree to stop us tumbling down the hillside into the bushes. There weren’t many late night visits to the loo that was for sure, and it wasn’t linked to heavy rain that started to fall during dinner.

    The tipping tradition

    The tradition of treks normally involves a tip for the porters which is collected as a form of thank for their services. In this case it was more a form of extortion, after dinner, the trek leader gave us a grand stand speech on how poor everyone was, and how we were rich.

    The poor old cooks and porters were made to queue up in the rain, and then they were marched in front of us bowing while we applauded their efforts. It was clear that it was humiliating for them and embarrassing for us, in fact, I eventually suggested that they should be allowed to get in out of the rain as they had worked hard enough and didn’t need to be going through this ritual.

    He then told us that we should have separate tips for the cook team and the porter team, and that each trekker should contribute $50 to each of the team, which was $100 each in total. Todd had his family of 7 with in, so in effect he was looking at a tip of $700 !

    It is fair to say that this rather the dampened the atmosphere as nobody was carrying that sort of cash. Between us we clubbed together and created a decent contribution from the group.

    Interestingly, when we did our feedback to Alpaca Tours on the bus home, everyone complained (without any co-ordination) and to be fair we were met in Cusco by representative who worked hard to resolve the problem, but be warned.

  • Inca Trail Day 2: Close encounters with trains and endless ancient step

    Inca Trail Day 2: Close encounters with trains and endless ancient step

    Day 2 of the Inca Trail trek officially started at the crack of dawn when the porters came to our tents with warm water to have a wash. Unfortunately, our day had started way earlier than that.

    This was our first night under canvass for many years, having had the luxury of an old VW camper for 20 years, the need to sleep on the floor was long passed. Consequently we paid the extra for the sleeping mattress, but during the night my body and the sleeping mattress parted company, or at least, I spent most of the night with limbs and torso only having the briefest of contact with the mattress, so the dawn chorus and the warm water was a welcome relief.

    Breakfast was all ready for us, with hot drinks, bread, toast and various local porridge type concoctions for us to stock up on. Day 2 was scheduled to be the big day, with a 1000m climb over Dead Woman’s pass, but we were heading off on our alternative route around the mountain.

    We set off along the valley, trekking through farmland and following the Urubamba River, which ultimately could take us to Machu Picchu Pueblo further along the Sacred Valley. The walking was nice and easy and Wooksie was recovering steadily at the lower altitude, and I was grateful we weren’t climbing a mountain, and I wasn’t the only one, Todd was really suffering with his knees.

    Time passed quickly as the adventurers got to know each other. I was inquisitive about the Mormon way of life and how their beliefs varied from mainstream Christianity, and the conversations meandered through numerous topics.

    We also had a lad from Sweden, I didn’t know anything about their social issues with drug related gang crime and I was even more intrigued to discover that there was still national service in Sweden, as you can tell, I enjoyed listening, talking and sharing views on anything that came up.

    Eventually we crossed a footbridge and found ourselves beside the train track again, we then realised that the alternative route was actually walking along the train track. It is probably fair to say that this approach would not have survived a UK Health and Safety risk assessment, but it was a lot of fun, but the walking was hard over the stones that the track was bedded on.

    There were plenty of tunnels and cuttings that involved sending a scout ahead to check it was safe, and then we would all run through the tunnel before any other trains came. Over time we all got used to our close encounters with the trains. They always blew their whistles as they must have known there were trekkers on their track, and it normally involved lots of waving to passengers.

    By early afternoon, we reached another river crossing and headed back across the bridge to pick up the trail. One of the discussions was around why would the Inca kings want to climb over a 4500m pass when they could walk along the river. It didn’t make any sense, so we concluded that the kings probably used this route along the river and named our trail the “Royal Route”, rather than the “Classic Route”. 

    The Inca Trail isn’t really the route used by the Incas, more a route that takes you through some of the Inca sites on the way to Machu Picchu.

    Once across the river we picked up the normal trail again and started the climb. After an easy day along the valley, it was good to be in the forest again, climbing steadily past waterfalls and magnificent views, and we started to pick up the Inca constructions in the form of terraced hillsides.

     We then realised how incredible the constructions were. Basically, these hillsides were very steep and covered in small loose rocks, and useless, The terracing of the hillsides enabled them to use the steps for farming and turn the whole area into a form of industrial farming complex. Among the constructions there were houses and temples that reflected their way of life.

    Late afternoon, we wandered into our second campsite. To find the porters had all been busy again, the tents had been built, the canteen tent was laid out ready for dinner and we had bowls of water sitting outside our tents for washing.

    Another smashing evening chatting with our companions, good food and pretty quickly the day light was gone and it was time to re-engage with my wandering mattress in the tent, and another night chasing it around the tent floor.

  • Goodbye to Puno and on to Cusco for lower altitude

    Goodbye to Puno and on to Cusco for lower altitude

    The trip from Puno to Cusco was largely without incident.  Wooksie was recovering from her hospitalisation, probably the best way to describe her was fragile, having a 10 hour bus ride with her feet up looking at the landscape as the altitude dropped was a good way of spending the day.

    We stopped off to have a look at a museum and some ancient sites. It started to become clear that the history of the indigenous people was pretty vague and did not seem to develop into anything significant before the Inca nation emerged by conquering what existed before.

    We arrived at our hotel in central Cusco with Wooksie feeling better and able to go for a gentle walk around the town. My alarm bells for the Inca Trail were ringing loud as it was only 72 hours before we were due to head off on the Inca Trail so the recovery needed to be fast.

    It is worth noting that if you do the bus trip from Puno to Cusco, the bus  drops you outside of the main city, so you have to get a taxi into the centre, this is a pain if you haven’t organised one when you book the bus.

    We found our way to the hotel and I left Wooksie in our room to recover and went of a scouting mission to get a bit of orientation around Puno.

    It is basically a beautiful town square in classic Spanish Central American style. The Incas has plenty of gold so the Spanish invested time in beautiful buildings.

    The town spreads out in all directions, including up a cliff behind the main square, there are lots of boutique hotels up on this hill as they give great views down through the valleys.

    As with everywhere in Peru, there is lots of traffic and every trip is fraught with danger when crossing the roads. Cusco is busy but the town square is where most tourists head for and to be fair, it can be quite peaceful when the traffic calms down.

    Checking out online I discovered they had two Irish Bars, both of which claimed to be the highest Irish Bar in the world. So I headed over to investigate and found they were only about 50m apart. I’m guessing the lower of the two was first and was pretty annoyed when the other one turned up.

    They both provided great sources of safe food for Wooksie and part of her recovery, live music and lots of fellow adventurers from all walks of life and all ages to chat.

    The unexpected treat that I discovered was a Starbucks on the other corner of the square, this place was turning into a little bit of heaven for us as we got a bit of western culture back into us before heading back into the wilds.

    Our investigations of Cusco were largely based in the streets around the main square. The ancient Inca museum was probably the highlight, as that was where all the artifacts from the archaeology were displayed.

    it further reinforced our view that pre Inca, little was known about the civilisations that existed before, and most of the items on display were rudimentary tools which we would associate with the Stone Age in the UK.

    The side streets were attractive, colourful, full of hawkers trying to sell us stuff and great place for Wooksie to continue to acclimate herself to the altitude.

    Then it was time to prepare for the early morning departure to the Sacred Valley of the Incas and more altitude adjustment time for Wooksie..

  • Puno, Lake Titicaca and Altitude Sickness

    Puno, Lake Titicaca and Altitude Sickness

    Our altitude strategy was to prepare for the Inca Trail trek was to spend 4 days at high altitude on Lake Titicaca, at 3800m to adjust, and then travel down to Cusco at 2500m and we should have been ready to go.

    Unfortunately Wooksie had picked up a tummy bug on the way back from Nazca so wasn’t on top form. We flew from Lima to Juliaco, all the guidebooks said avoid Juliaco unless you want to be mugged, which we didn’t so we got a taxi direct to Puno.

    The lack of oxygen at high altitude hits you really fast, when I got out at Juliaco it was like having a weight on my chest. During the taxi ride Wooksie said she was feeling really sleepy, I felt drowsy as well as my body adjusted to the lack of oxygen. I was particularly concerned because I suffer from asthma, so expected a tricky transition.

    We booked a lovely hotel on the banks of Lake Titicaca, on the basis we could sit around, enjoy the view, not do much and adapt. We pottered around for a bit and Wooksie decided she wanted a nap, this was exactly what every guide to high altitude said would happen, so I wasn’t particularly concerned and went for a walk to push my lungs and push my transition.

    That night we had dinner in the hotel and an early night, next day we went for a walk around Puno, which I have to say isn’t a very exciting place.

    Unexciting unless you are in the fruit market when the train comes through, at that point all the stalls are dragged off the tracks until it has gone.

    We strolled around the port, bought some medicine for the stomach bug, but Wooksie was tired again and went back to bed in the afternoon, while I got in a 10km walk without much trouble so I was doing fine.

    We then did a 2 day tour of the islands on Lake Titicaca and I became increasingly concerned about Wooksie as she was deteriorating rather than improving. She made the climb from the dock to the square, a climb of about 100m un altitude over maybe a kilometre, so steep but nothing terrible.

    It was obvious something was wrong, she gritted her teeth and climbed up, literally 1 step at a time. After a rest at the top, she perked up and made it back to the boat, but within minutes she was fast asleep again for the trip back.

    The walk from the cab to the hotel was painful, she was hardly moving and it suddenly hit me that we were supposed to be doing the Inca Trek in 4 days’ time. Surely this couldn’t just be just altitude sickness, so I got the hotel to call out the doctor to check her out.

    In simple terms, we normally have an oxygen level of about 95 in our blood. During Covid, if your oxygen level dropped below 80 you were admitted to hospital, and the human brain shuts down when oxygen level drops below 70.

    Wooksie had an oxygen rating of 72, she was on the verge of being critically ill, the sleeping was her body shutting down. Her body had been busy fighting the stomach bug she picked up in Nazca, it couldn’t cope with the shock of the altitude and her body was losing the fight.

    The doctor rushed her to the emergency clinic, wired her up to drip,  oxygen, antibiotics, hydration and anything else they could think of to help her survive and get her back up to speed. The solution was quite simple, we had to get down to lower altitude to help her recover.

    So, a mad panic to put our transport plans back 24 hours so she could have time in the clinic on oxygen and then it was on to a bus downhill to Cusco.

    I was fully expecting her to come out of hospital the next day full of beans and jumping around but it was nothing like that, her oxygen count was still only about 84 after 24 hours, so she still had no energy – this wasn’t the fix we were hoping for but it was the best we could do, and Wooksie took it easy as the bus wasn’t until the next morning.

    Meanwhile, not to waste and opportunity, I went out in search of a pizza to bring back to the hotel and found myself in this amazing little bar, luckily it did takeaway pizzas too. I took the opportunity to test their beer while I was waiting for the pizza. As the bar was empty, I couldn’t resist the temptation to fiddle with the music playlist and before i knew it I was on my second beer whilst choosing the music and listening to Blue Monday. If only Wooksie could enjoy this too, and they did a great pizza.

    I had been carrying a couple of spare Argyle scarves to donate to a bar somewhere, that was hosting the travelling football fan tradition of dropping your scarf off in a foreign country. I wasn’t going to get much further from Plymouth than Puno, so I donated my first scarf to their very small collection and I hopefully it is still there, the Green Army now owns Puno.