Mamma Mia Machu Picchu!
April 3, 2019
“Oh ya ya, Mamma Mia”
-Ivan C., tour guide
It can be interesting when traveling to try and pick up small distinctions in accents. I once heard a story of a Chinese man who learned Spanish from a Minnesotan so he had a very distinct Fargo-like accent. Here in Ollantaytambo, Peru, our stopping point after the hike, the front desk guy Freddy has a very distinct British accent. (Freddy is definitely not British). Which leads us back to Ivan, our sweet tour guide for the hike to Machu Picchu. He learned Mamma Mia somewhere along his English journey and it became the soundtrack for the trek. I was hoping it was because he learned Engligh from an Italian or something wild like that but he learned English in high school in Peru so I guess it will always be a bit of mystery – but a sweet one nevertheless. Beautiful view – oh Mamma Mia! Watch your step – oh Mamma Mia!
Oh Mamma Mia – welcome to Machu Picchu!
It’s me again!
(This is the 2nd picture of Machu Picchu ever with me in it 🙂 )
The Inca Trail gets you to the Sun Gate in the morning and you get an amazing view of Machu Picchu. However, as you hike closer to MP it gets more and more crowded. There are limits to the number of people who can hike the Inca Trail each day (a couple hundred) but there are something like 2,500 visitors a day to MP directly. Once you get to the site you have to hike out of MP and then re-enter through the main entry gates. It’s a bit of a process.
With that done, you are officially in Machu Picchu. It is truly beautiful if you allow yourself the opportunity to just sit and take it in. I found the location the most beautiful. The site surrounded by the mountain peaks in every direction and sparrows flying at eye level it did feel like you were in the clouds.
The theories are countless about Machu Picchu and the Inca Trail hike. All along our hike we were told again and again that the Inca Trail hike was a pilgrimage path – versus the Salcantay Path (which seemed much easier but longer) which is considered the commercial path. Seemed to me like the Inca Trail might have been the first path but then they figured out the Salcantay Path was easier so why keep doing it the hard way, but that’s just the way my mind works. The real truth is we’ll never really know anything for sure about MP or the Trail because there was no written language and most of the oral history was lost in translation. Even our guide had lots of explanations for MP – it was a religious center, it was an agricultural center, it was a university, it was a lookout – and it was probably all of these things. There are even theories that MP was just the summer home of the Inca King. (I had to not spend too much time thinking about that theory during the hike….).
In the end, if I ever felt so inclined, I would visit Machu Picchu again on the winter solstice (in the Southern Hemisphere) – June 21st and really enjoy all the amazing sun related features of MP (the sun dials, the Sun Gate, the Three Windows). Those aspects of MP are what really make it mystical and intriguing and super special.
And I’d probably take the train.
So with that I’ll leave you with the theories and the mystery and some more pics and let you decide what seems true to you.
The Temple of the Condor was the most beautiful part of Machu Picchu to me.
And finally – more Alpaca/Llamas (I think these are Alpaca because it’s likely that all the Llamas are wearing cute clothes in Cusco for tourist pictures)
(PS. That’s me on the left in case you couldn’t tell with my face (geez…only pic ever with an Alpaca and it might be my worst lol))
Oh yeah – then you finish the trek by taking a train back to somewhere else. Our train went to Ollantaytambo, Peru and then this happened. I’ll leave the rest up to your imagination.
Adios Machu Picchu!
Buddha & Boots 