Lost and Found

"And that's the wonderful thing about family travel:  it provides you with experiences that will remain locked forever in the scar tissue of your mind."  Dave Barry

Going to the airport instead of the train station was one of those panicky freaky moments that none of us will ever forget.  That feeling of anxiety and running out of time is the worst part of any travel experience.  We arrived at the station in Cusco with a massive sigh of relief.  Of course in true Peruvian style we then had to hurry up and wait.  Finally we boarded the shiny blue train and headed down hill to Machu Picchu.  Yes, weird to think it was all downhill from here.

“It's my experience that most folk who ride trains could care less where they're going. For them it's the journey itself and the people they meet along the way."

David Baldacci

There was a real sense of camaraderie onboard, we chatted with some Canadian airport staff, a couple from Singapore and a lone South African travel agent.  The group bonded on the few hours it took the train to follow the river through the incredible scenery.  We snatched glimpses of trekkers on the Inca trail crossing the river on flimsy rope bridges and watched locals walking alongside the life blood of the railway.
  

"Travelers never think that they are the foreigners." 

Mason Cooley

Over 1 million people visit the site every year, the majority of whom are foreigners.  The government has tried to limit the vistor numbers to 2500 per day in an attempt to  protect the UNESCO World Heritage site.  In its hey day it is thought around 2000 Inca lived in this remote farming and ceremonial city.  Built in the late 1400's, Machu Picchu became lost when it was never found by the Spanish.  The structures and masonry escaped the pillage and destruction that befell  other Inca sites.  It was rediscovered by Hiram Bingham, a Yale professor and explorer, in 1911.  The jungle had grown over the city and local farmers led the American to discover a site that would make him famous and immortalize him as the name of the plushest train plying the route.  Run by the Orient Express the Hiram Bingham train is the most opulent and elegant way to arrive.  Needless to say we were on the Vistadome special. 

“There are many paths to the top of the mountain, 

but the view is always the same”

 Chinese Proverb

Declared one of the new seven wonders of the world, Machu Picchu is the most visited tourism site in Peru.  Judging by the, crammed to capacity, train it was easy to believe.  Each person aboard represented a different route up the mountain.  Where they came from, where they would stay, the experience they would have.  I craned my neck to see the peaks and wondered what we would find in the "Lost City"

“I've learned that everyone wants to live on top of the mountain, 

but all the happiness and growth occurs while you're climbing it.” 

Andy Rooney

Machu Picchu means "Old Peak" in Quechuan and I was starting to feel old and peaky myself after four hours aboard Peru rail.  We began to see the outskirts of a settlement and the homes of those who actually lived on top of this mountain.  Shortly, the train arrived in Agua Calientes, our base for the next three days. Machu Picchu was elusively still a 30 minute bus ride further up the mountain.

  

"When you put your hand in a flowing stream, you touch the last that has gone before and the first of what is still to come." Leonardo DaVinci

Splitting the town in half, a river rages down the mountain side.  The white water courses over the river bed boulders loudly.  The name comes from the hot springs situated at the top of the village.  

“You cannot climb uphill with downhill thoughts.” 

Unknown

Naturally our hotel also involved a long trek up to the top of the village.  As we panted up from the station, past the markets, we realized Agua Calientes was a mish mash of hotels and restaurants that have sprung up to service the needs of the tourists.   

"Every Chess master was once a beginner"

Chernev"

Once again trip advisor had served me well and the hotel was well worth the exertion to reach.  We spent the afternoon chatting to our tour guide, planning for the following day's excursion and playing chess.  I had already organized our tickets for the bus ride and entrance to Machu Picchu, all that was left was to set the alarm and be waiting in line for the first bus at 5am.  It was incredible to discover that most of the other 2500 visitors that day had decided the first bus would also be a capitol idea.  A throng of people were shuffling around in the dark, luckily Patrick our guide was an old pro and had been saving a spot for us since 4.30 and we were only a few people back from the front of the queue.

"Remember when life's path is steep to keep your mind even." 

 Horace

The altitude, the traveling and the lack of sleep was starting to take a toll on our family unit.  There were few smiles as we wound our way back and forth up a series of hairpin turns, climbing hundreds of feet upto the pinnacle which was Machu Picchu.  Incredibly, in the dark, there were people running up the mountain, precariously clinging onto the edge of the narrow dusty road while the bus roared past.  I began to lament on my own self pity, how could I complain when these idiots had it worse?  


On arrival to the entrance we were dismayed to see the first light illuminate a huge crush of bodies already trailing down the entrance steps.  As we pushed and shoved our way forward it was not only the light that started to dawn but an awful realization that I had not brought our passports with us as a form of ID.  While everyone else proudly brandished their national identities.  I swallowed a lump in my throat and blinked back tears as my folly became the last hurdle to overcome.  So close, yet so far.  We were told that we would have to go all the way back down the hairpins to the hotel to bring back proof of who we were.  My belief in "where there is a will there is a way"  was tested to its utmost that morning.  I pleaded and begged alongside Patrick to have the rules bent slightly to accommodate our situation.  Out of 1 million people why did we think we were so special?  My other ethos of "catching more flies with honey than vinegar" was pushed into action with a sympathetic female who had been uniformed into officialdom.  She took pity upon us, or perhaps we were just blocking the turnstile enough that they wanted rid of us.  Our penance was that we would have one entry only, which translated into us not being able to step back beyond these barriers to use the bathrooms if needed.  With a slight nagging feeling from my bladder I shrugged off the penalty, mentally vowing to evaporate my excess fluid via my skin. We stormed through the narrow mechanical gate with jubilation.  It was time to huff and puff and pant our way up the cobbled path, Machu Picchu was still shrouded by a thicket of greenery, until we rounded a corner and there it lay, found at last.

Our hearts are drunk with a beauty our eyes could never see."

George W. Russell

The black clouds framed the distant peaks and created a spectral arena for my first glimpse of the Lost City.   I would never see the beauty of what it had been, all I could perceive were the ghostly footprints of those who had breathed this thin air over 500 years ago.  The cold mountain breeze swirled around, chilling and pulling at my strength as we climbed ever higher along the ancient paths in search of first light photo opportunities.  Greg of course slipped into work mode and with the ever present panic of missing that first precious camera light, he slipped off ahead with Patrick.  The kids and I were left with the lamas and the majestic views at every turn. 

"The past is a ghost, the future a dream, and all we ever have is now.”

 Bill Cosby

The perfectly mowed grass and the roofless house outlines made me wonder if these were ruins of the past or half built homes of the future.  It would be phenomenally challenging to erect buildings up here in modern times, unimaginable to understand how the Inca's did it 500 years ago.  Yet the Inca trails and roads connected settlements and cities with efficiency and precision.  Their organization of agricultural techniques allowed a sophisticated culture to flourish.  The farming in Machu Picchu was achieved along the steep terraces carved out of every face of the hillside.

"Vertigo is the conflict between the fear of falling and the desire to fall."

Salman Rushdie

Each terrace seemed harder to navigate than the next.  Greg and I entered a doomsday race between heaven and earth, grasping at each rock face with a white knuckle death grip.  I'm not sure if it is really vertigo that I feel in those situations, perhaps merely panic?  It's just that when one of the kids gets a little too close to a very long drop, my legs draw up in pain which can only be relieved by bringing my knees closer to the ground.  Crouching seems a much better proposition, unfortunately this is not the best stance for crawling out of precarious places.  We pushed on with the tour and tried to soak in the facts and figures Patrick was droning into us.  

Strange and haunting, the path of the sun…” 

Jim Morrison

The Temple of the Sun is one of the finest examples of how the Inca fit the stones so closely together with finite precision.  When the sun of the winter solstice shines through the central window it hits the ceremonial stone. There are many other stones which act as sundials at Machu Picchu, they give precise readings of summer and winter solstices.  This incredible understanding of the equinoxes highlighted the complexities of the Inca rituals and religion.  The Intiwatana, the "Hitching Post of the Sun" is a sculpted stone which sits precariously at the top of 78 steps.  It is both a sun dial and a ceremonial alter.  In 2000 a crew, filming a beer commercial, damaged the stone with a crane and questions about adequate protection were raised.  At one point there was even talk of privatizing the ancient site.   

“There is always one moment in childhood when the door opens and lets the future in.”

 Deepak Chopra 

“The sun burnt every day. It burnt time.” 

Ray Bradbury

The Temple of the Three Windows is yet another amazing feat of masonary which is lost amongst the incredible grandeur that makes up the Machu Picchu site.  The trails and stairways are a maze of climbing and balancing acts.  As the sun slipped higher into the sky under the cover of the rain clouds, we managed to shelter from a couple of rain showers at the entrance to Wayna Picchu, the large mountain towering above the city.  Our time was being consumed as was our energy as we wove our way down the face of the terraces towards the exits.

“Every exit is an entrance somewhere else” Tom Stoppard 

The secrets of Machu Picchu are endless, to itemize each stone robs the magic from the monument.  It is a place to savor and each individual's trek to these ancient stones is a personal journey.  It is impossible not to be reverential towards the masonary accomplishments of the Inca, however my real appreciation is for how people from 500 years ago have reached out and chiseled a new perspective within me.  From an ancient world of lamas, maize and potatoes, a culture evolved which valued the sun and natural elements.  A culture that was able to overcome the altitude, the mountain and the hardships.  This was unlike anything I had seen before, it astonished me more than the pyramids, it awed me more than the great waterfalls.  It moved me because 500 years ago the Inca had thrived in this place where I struggled to exist even with all my western world advancements.  The ghosts of the Inca were laughing at us in our millions as we puffed and panted through their world.  

"The best climber in the world is the one who's having the most fun." 

Alex Lowe

“The key to immortality is first living a life worth remembering.”

Bruce Lee 

The kids were not caught up in the history of the site and what it had been.  They focused on the present, on the living.  They saw the maze of paths as a giant jungle gym and enjoyed the antics of a baby lama more than the stories of the dead.  

The day had been tough, the planning had started months ago, the anticipation weighty.  It had sapped our energy to get up so early, to queue aggressively for the shuttle, protecting our precious place in line.  We had endured the sickening lurches of the bus and the dismay at the turnstiles.  We had coped with the crushing, rushing crowds and overcome the urgent panting climb and struggle for first light photos.  We had trudged all around the highlights and attempted to avoid getting too wet in the downpour.  We had overcome the high altitude headaches, the cold wind, the hot sun, sore feet, dehydration, hunger, being grumpy and tired.  After all of that, as we pushed through the exit gate I was left to wonder if we had accomplished the best visit possible. Did we see everything?  Should we have climbed Wayna Picchu?  Should we have bought a 2 day ticket?  

Machu Picchu is so much to take in during your visit that it is only the next day when you sit at the bottom of the mountain and recount your day do you start to really feel the wonderment of what you did.  The further away you move from the site the more the sense of accomplishment grows.  As the days go by it starts to dawn in your mind how special the experience was.  Flashes of the remoteness start when you arrive back at sea level and the modern world highlights the antiquity.  As more time passes the experience of Machu Picchu is starting to stand out as one of my favorite Wonders of the World.

The train ride back to Cusco was the end of our trip in Peru.  Machu Picchu had been the pinnacle even if not the actual highest point.  Peru had been everything we had imagined and so much more.  Considering the amount of tourists it was refreshing to see that the local people were welcoming and not jaded towards the influx of people.  More importantly the people of Peru were able to look beyond my blonde hair and understand my Spanish.  I was grateful to have Washington DC to look forward to otherwise I would have carried my despondency home.  The long train journey back to  Cusco and our onward flights gave me time to reflect.  It was goodbye to Peru but I was eternally grateful it was not the end of the journey.

One approaches the journey's end. But the end is a goal, not a catastrophe.

George Sand