Machu Picchu

Well, I have just spent the past two days in Aguas Calientes and Machu Picchu and want to give you all a brief rundown.

Monday--In the morning, we visited a class of 5th graders in a local school. They were so fantastic and hugging us and going nuts. Nearly all of them want to be tour guides when they grow up. I never knew the Peruvian economy was so bad, and evidently tourism has turned everything around. Then we took the train from Ollataytamba to Aguas Calientes, the small town just 25 minutes driving from the ruins.

We got to the ruins at about 230 or so and it was beautiful--more spectacular than you can imagine. We walked around for three hours taking in most of the lower level sights, though we did climb to a high tower that houses the "hitching post of the sun." We also got the classic picture of the ruins with the mountain behind.

As we were leaving, the sun was setting and we were basically the only people at the ruins. I´m not sure much can compare--even my years in Alaska. Later that night all of us went to get pizza and beer (no kidding). We played a hilarious game called Sapo where you try to throw gold coins in a metal frog´s mouth. I, of course, sucked at it.

Tuesday--we got to the ruins at 7 a.m. and my mother and I walked with a married couple on our tour, and with our tour guide, to the top of the mountain you always see in the Machu Picchu pics. Yes, the top of that f´ing tall mountain. We climbed a total of 1500 feet I think. This is fairly remarkable considering our hotel was another 2000 feet lower than the ruins!

I´ll describe the ruins in another blog. They were magical. And we saw chinchillas in the wild among the ruins. And llamas too. We took the train this afternoon and now we´re in Cuzco, the first city of the Incas. Can´t wait to explore tomorrow.

Talk to all of you soon. Sorry to be brief and not very detailed. It´s killing the writer in me, but I figure it´s neater to get something out while we´re actually here in Peru.