Machu Picchu is a lot of work

Today we hiked Machu Picchu and Waynu Pichhu. We woke up at 5:30, took a bus up to the base of Machu Picchu, and entered the historic ruins. The fog was still quite dense, so we really could not see much at first, but within 30 or 45 minutes it had cleared mostly, and by that time we were at the top of the ruins.

Indiviually, not part of the ruins is that spectaular even though the guide books suggest this piece or that is a must-see. But in totality they are quite impressive. It is not clear exactly what this place was, but it is so high up in the mountain, in such good shape still, and so expansive that you wonder how the Peruvians were able to build something like this. But then you remember the Greeks, Romans, Chinese, and Egyptians all made some pretty impressive stuff and you realize maybe it is not that far-fetched. Still impressive though.

Probably more exciting was the true hike up Waynu Picchu (the mountain in the background of the above picture). I need to find out how high up it was, but we hiked for at least an hour up incredibly steep and rough rocks/steps covered in a thin coating of moss and mud. It was an intense and tiring climb, but the views from the top were quite impressive and offered a great vantage point for taking in all of Machu Picchu below (as seen in the picture below). After not making it to the top of a mountain we climbed the day before (when you see the pictures of the "staircases" as steep as ladders placed right at the base of a wall that stretched literally 100+ steps high you might understand why) this was a great feeling of accomplishment and a good way to burn some calories.

In an hour we board a train back to Cusco and then go directly to our 22-hour bus ride to Bolivia. Peru has been good to us, but we have heard from a number of people that Bolivia is one of their favorite countries in S.America. We will be in some even more remote places during these next few days, so posting will likely be more infrequent. We also continue to have incredibly slow internet (maybe because we are in the middle of the Andes, who knows) so I can not upload pictures (nor can I find the apostrophe on this keyboard if you have noticed) but I have a bunch and will upload as soon as I can.