On our way to Machu Picchu we had stopped for a night in Ollantaytambo and were really taken away by how beautiful this place is. As we were driving back this way we decided to stay another few nights and explore it properly. Ollanta is set at the ‘intersection’ of a couple valleys that were important to the Inca’s. It is also the best surviving example of Inca city planning, with all the streets still exactly how they were laid out by the Inca’s. The town is in the shape of a corn cob and from any spot in town you can see the huge, steep terraces on the hills with the large Incan ruins on it. Looking the other way you can see the storage buildings up on the hill, with a clever system of openings in the building which allows the wind to enter and cool (preserve) the food.

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Machu Picchu is not an easy or cheap place to get to.  Getting there takes time, effort and patience.  There are a number of ways you can arrive at Machu Picchu:

• You can take a train from Ollantaytambo (2 hours) or Cuzco (4 hours) to Aguas Calientes town;
• You can hike the Inca Trail (booked out months in advance);
• You can hike one of the alternative Inca trails via a tour operator. Both of these has extra activities included like zip lining, mountain biking, a visit to the hot pools.
• You can take public transport or your own transport to Santa Teresa town via a long, steep, endlessly curvy mountain pass, get a taxi to the Hydroelectric station and then take a train or walk to Aguas Calientes town from where you can visit Machu Picchu.

Aguas Calientes is the service town for Machu Picchu.  Hundreds of thousands of tourists pass through this town every year to get to Machu Picchu either by taking a 30 minute bus from the town, or hiking up a steep 1.5 hour trail to the site. There are no roads into the town, making it isolated, and a total pain to get to.

We’re not organised tour group people and like to hike on our own terms having the ability to stop and take in the sights as we like.  We originally thought we’d take the train to Ollantaytambo but when we started doing the math this trip to Machu Picchu was going to be very expensive.   $300 USD for the train, and then we still had to add on accommodation and entry ticket to Machu Picchu costs.  By the way the ticket to Machu Picchu is exorbitantly expensive.

In the end we decided that the best option for us was to drive the car to Santa Teresa, a small town on the other side of the Valley.  Continue reading →

The Sacred Valley of the Incas is close to Cuzco, and is the gateway everybody passes through to get to Machu Picchu. The Sacred Valley is an attraction in itself and a pleasant area to visit while making your way to Machu Picchu.  There are a number of traditional picturesque villages in the Valley which are a pleasure to stop in and take some time to explore.  Incan ruins and pretty valley scenery (terraced hills, snow-capped mountains) abound, so it’s all very interesting to look at.   For those with a bit of time up their sleeves it is also possible to make some nice day hikes.

The land in the Sacred Valley is very heavily worked almost entirely by manual labour.  Fields are ploughed by bulls, terraced gardens are worked to the max, whole families live and work off the land (this includes young children).  Historically the land of the Sacred Valley was so highly valued that it didn’t belong to different individuals, or to a part of the Empire but to the Emperor himself.  Continue reading →

Arriving in Peru after a straightforward border crossing we immediately noticed two things: firstly that the land on this side of Lake Titicaca was being more intensively worked, and secondly, the quality of the road had improved.  Smooth sailing all the way! After our run-ins with the police and the navy in Bolivia, we were prepared for the worst in Peru.  We’d heard and read horror stories of police hassling overlanders and we thought we were bound to be hassled a bit.  But in the end we had no hassles with them whatsoever. We think this is partly due to the fact that our Chilean number plate looks similar to the Peruvian number plate. Continue reading →