Camino Inka to Machu Picchu

First you fly to Cuzco in Peru, and maybe, like us, spend the night in a bar, bonding, dad and son, before retiring to the airport to crash on the floor for 3 hours before the first flight in the morning

over the snowcapped Andes


Those that want to make the effort go to Km 82
or 88 on the Cuzco-Machu Picchu railway and then hike the trail 40kms over the mountains, via the Gate of the Sun (Intipunku).
(Looking back from Machu Picchu, and preceded by the Steps of OhMyGodU: 20 metres, vertical)
Most people take the train and bus and get dropped off at the entrance, (but not us idiots). The Royal Trail is now the railway (built 1928, 3ft gauge) which follows the Urubamba River on its way to the Amazon:apparently the Emperor forced ordinary folk over the top.
The trail ascends about 300metres up a side valley to the first campsite over about 15kms. Day 2 is the killer, ascending a mile (A MILE STRAIGHT UP)to Dead Woman´s Pass (Three miles high: where is the air?)and then down a half mile (to the Campsite With No Beer). Myself and the 2 Merkin girls, paid for a porter. I think I would have died, carrying my own stuff, to be honest. The porters run up the mountain (and some run back home after). They have done it all their lives, and despite obvious inefficiencies (like not leaving some of the stuff up there (like tents), it keeps a lot of mountain people in work. "Porter!" and you get out of the way, and admire their calves as they pass, carrying 25kgs (or more, which was the weight of my suitcase coming home, carrying the boys excess books, and 25kgs is no joke).
My new friend Fitz and I celebrated 4000M with a beer and a ciggie


which was a source of amusement/disgust with passing trekkers, before we reached the summit to applause.

The third day was unremitting drudgery in cloud

to Campsite 3 which has a bar and a theft problem (apparently), but nobody cared by then. Fitz and I picked up some tips from the porters and were first at the campsite after the porters. I still had no luggage, although the American girls carried their own stuff. I can proudly say I was the last to pay for a porter. We spent the evening drinking too much Cusqueña beer with our fellow sufferers from Peru. I received inspirational comments from fellow travellers about doing the trail with my son.

Justin has done it before and had no complaints about the workload.It was certainly a pleasure to complete the trail with him, and to learn things from him that I hadnt known: he can sink a beer, he can open a bottle of beer with a tee shirt, he can chat with a Spanish speaker far more easily than he speaks to me.
And we saw the Southern Cross.
On the fourth day we reached Machu Picchu

and spent a happy if exhausting morning treading the ruins. Strange to think that this city lasted only only 100 years before it's abandonment and loss (known only to local farmers) and rediscovered in the early 20th century (although there were earlier northern explorers in the 19th century) by Hiram Bingham, who made up names for all the Inca sites