I spent hours researching routes to the mysterious, yet  famous, Machu Picchu. In the end, we skipped the pricey tours and several days-long trek of the Inca Trail, and created our own journey to the “ultimate” destination. We went at our own pace and skipped places we thought would be less entertaining in interest of our tight six-day time in the area. Between Cusco and Machu Picchu — a 76-mile route that only took the Incas four days to travel on foot — Mom and I took a bus to one stop in the Sacred Valley, where we caught the train and another bus to finally reach the entrance gates. Because it’s not only about the destination, but also the journey, here’s notes from our trail. 

From Cusco, we took a collectivo van to Ollantaytambo for a few bucks each. In the back of a van stuffed full of locals, we flew down bumpy unpaved roads at the mercy of a driver who couldn’t lay off the horn for the whole two and a half hours. Along the way, the sights were arguably more impressionable than the dusty destination of Ollanta itself. The road wound along the Urubamba River through the Sacred Valley as red mountains with a patchwork of potato fields loomed above. Farmers whipped oxen pulling old-fashion harvesting plows while women followed, planting new seeds by hand. Men heaved half a dozen whole pigs over their shoulders, crossing busy streets to shove the dead animals into a car’s trunk. Passenger vans, such as ours, sped around tight corners, frequently screeching headlight-to-headlight with other vehicles — predicaments that quickly turned to honking wars in the fight for space on the narrow “highway.”

At a drop-off for other passengers, I jumped out of the van for an emergency bathroom break. The impatient driver, however, tried to leave without me as he yelled to my mom in a language she did not understand. If it weren’t for my mom, standing half-in, half-out of the van, prepared to be dragged down the road in an effort to both guard our belongings that were strapped to the roof and not leave her only daughter in a foreign country — I might still be lost somewhere in southern Peru. To be fair, the driver was trying to tell her we were just 5 minutes from the train station, but knowing my sense of direction, I might still be lost anyway if it weren’t for her desperate stance to stop the driver. (Thanks Mom!) Both in tact, we finally arrived in Ollanta.

A snapshot of Ollantaytambo, Peru: Ollantaytambo is a dusty town with little more than what was there 700 years ago: Inca ruins.  The homes are crumbling with cracks in stone walls, muddy grout and gap-filled rooftops. The people are a mirror image — just as weathered — with wrinkled skin, dirt-caked fingernails and toothless smiles. There’s only a flash of color in the smattering of beige. On the homes, it’s swaying on the clotheslines hanging on their porches. On the people, it’s woven in traditional textiles slinging on their backs; the colorful cloths carry a day’s harvest, handicrafts or bouncing babies under wide-brimmed floppy hats.

Houses and a clothesline.

An old man enjoying the day on a bench in Ollantaytambo’s plaza.

The ruins in Ollantaytambo feature quite extensive architectural remains. Terraces that the Incas specifically designed and used for farming stretch from the valley river up to the summits of surrounding mountainsides, which overlook the city that local townspeople continue to inhabit. It is believed that about 400 people lived in the city during the Incas’ era, the mid-15th century.

Mom and I about midway up the hill full of ruins. Below you can see the farm pastures.

The ruins in Ollantaytambo.

Look at the steep hillside. My mom says to ignore her goofy hat.

The view from the top.

After a night in Ollanta, we continued on the trail, this time, by rail — the alternative for people too lazy or time-pressed to trek the days-long Inca Trail. For us, the rail would also be my first train ride, sealing the deal for us to ride to Aguas Calientes, better known as Machu Picchu Pueblo.

Mom and I switched our prime-view seats with another passenger in order to sit together in seats not so great for sightseeing. I eventually felt motion sick, took a pill for the nausea and passed out. But before all that — the journey was beautiful. The railroad tracks run along the river in the scenic Sacred Valley. Another scene all in itself: Backpackers looking for either adventure or to save money, or both, walk along the tracks where they narrowly escape being demolished by the oncoming locomotives. Honestly, the space to stand between the tracks and the tunnel walls or hillsides is a narrow one, and watching the backpackers squeeze out of the way of a charging train — horns blaring — was nerve-wracking.

Note: The few extra bucks for a nicer train is worth the money. We took the cheap “express” on the return journey and screeching, violent wobbling made the trip practically unbearable; not to mention, I feared for my safety, feeling as though the train would certainly 1) derail or 2) lose a car, at any moment. I wish I was exaggerating.

About to board the Peru Rail to Machu Picchu Pueblo!

Another train passing. Photo by Melissa Fryman

Aguas Calientes is a gorgeous gateway to the unbelievable sights at Machu Picchu. However, the little town was essentially built to cater to those tourists, and therefore, lacks genuine culture and charm. If you can get past the swarms of camera-happy gringos and local vendors heckling for every dime, Aguas Calientes truly is a scenic stop. The barren and drab mountains in Ollantaytambo turn verdant green in the not-so-far Aguas Calientes. Colorful, humble homes line the river that leads to the town’s namesake “hot waters” (believe me, the town doesn’t get its name from its shower temperatures). The hot springs looked too grimy for me, though, and I settled for the cold shower.

Aguas Calientes

In an attempt to make the pretty town more than just “the place where we spent the night to get to Machu Picchu,” I decided to taste the Peruvian delicacy, alpaca, which is an animal in the llama family. The slab of meat, described to me as “just like beef” by locals and other daring tourists, wasn’t quite so. The texture was similar to beef, but it had a tinge of “rotten” taste that reminded me of skunk. Maybe the cut was … rotten. A few hours later, I found myself hunched over with a terrible stomachache followed by subsequent unpleasantries that I’ll let your imagination describe. Come to think of it, perhaps I shouldn’t have tried the delicacy at a dilapidated, empty restaurant where stray cats jumped in our laps begging for scraps. Lesson learned.

But — mission accomplished — I won’t remember Aguas Calientes merely as “the place where we spent the night to get to Machu Picchu.” It will now forever be etched in my memory as “the place where I tried alpaca and got food poisoning.”

Alpaca meat and a “salad.”

Tourist trap and food poisoning aside, a night in Aguas Calientes was worth the head start it gave us to reach Machu Picchu at dawn the next morning. And although Machu Picchu is certainly the main attraction, the journey of anticipation is half the experience.

—JDF