Peru Adventure: Inca Trail Day 3

The next morning, my growling stomach woke me up. Outside our tent, the misty rain we'd heard about but not experienced yet set us on a gloomy start. We didn't know it yet, but today would be the hardest day of the hike. We knew it would be the longest.

The most impressive breakfast yet- a cake!

I suppose it's ok to eat cake for breakfast if you are about to exercise for 8 or 9 hours, right?

Same routine as before; re-pack all of our bags and all of the unnessesary extra clothes we packed and head out. I was glad we purchased the cheap ponchos before the hike, but they were a nuisance to walk in, they kept billowing out and I couldn't see where to put my feet. The rain made the stone steps slippery and of course even scarier for someone not 'surefooted' like myself.

My highlight of the day was this ceremony. We gave thanks to the mountain ranges around us in the native Quechua language. Then made a wish silently that we are not allowed to tell anyone.

Hans' was the most reverent of all. Eyes closed, he whispered the prayer, gesturing to each of the mountain ranges gazing into the sky, and made his wish. At the end of the offering, you place 3 coca leaves- small, medium, then large topped with a found rock. Hernan told us about the offering while we were at Dead Woman's Pass, so we knew to look for a rock in advance. Bean found one for me.

I haven't mentioned yet that this day our muscles were very tired and our feet swollen. It only felt better to keep walking. Since we reached the peak yesterday, it was all downhill from there. Which meant countless steps and lots of concentration. We were all a little quieter this day.

We went through a cave, which Bean really liked.

Since our camp was with lots of other groups, the trail was more clogged than the days prior. The eerie mist makes the cities we found look even better, but the other hikers certainly don't help!

This is Runkuraqay.

Next was Sayacmarca.

It had the main city, then an incredibly steep staircase up to the top. I was excited and scrambled up to the top, then realized I had to take the same steep stairs back down. Ugh!
(see the person in the yellow near the bottom?)

My favorite were the times the trail flattened out and went through the jungle.

This was my favorite lunch: rice, veggies, and chicken. And of course soup and tea and water.

Another cool rock formation we walked through.

Here's what most of the day looked like:

Another city: Phuyupatamarca.

I love how the rocks are covered in moss. We found a wall of moss on some stones in the jungle portion of this day. If you touched it and pressed in, it would drip water!

And this is a summary of the scariest and most difficult thing I've ever done. Aside from those steep steps earlier in the day. There's Bean near the bottom, about 10-15 steps ahead of me.

And the last city of the day we saw from a distance. I don't have the name but it was 'extra credit' aka another hour hike. Or we could go back to camp. At this point, we just saw it and had a couple of hours to decide if we wanted to see it any closer than this. At this point, I was seriously considering it. I mean, when will we ever be at that point again?

A little while later, and more downhill stairs, and we decided we were more tired than motivated and we'd done enough. So we went back to camp and once we stopped, it was hard to move again. We had just enough time to sit down, then use the restroom and change clothes before Elsy and Matt (of course they decided to hike the extra hour!) made it back to camp for dinner.

I forgot to mention our bathing options at camp. We brought large camp body wipes that I used on my feet and pits, plus face wipes for our faces. That's about it. At a couple of campsites they had showers and sinks but they freaked me out and apparently the water was freezing so we skipped it.

And finally a couple of pictures of our dining tent. In the first picture, the flash startled everyone! You can see how cozy we were. We laughed a lot and called ourselves a family. When we first started out Hernan referred to us as a family and said he would be the 'Dad', and Hans would be the.......'other Dad', and we all laughed.

After dinner, we pulled together some cash and had the ceremony to thank the porters. They had to leave extremely early the next morning to catch the train home. Otherwise they had to stay overnight and that's just not worth it. For some reason, the company that runs the trains back from Aguas Calientes only allow porters to ride home on the 5am train. Meaning they/we have to be up, breakfast eaten, and packed up as early as possible so they can run all the way to Machu Picchu and catch the train back.

We all went around and said thanks. I went first and I couldn't find the words. Bean told them they were the hardest working people he's ever met and Hernan translated into Quechua. I don't think they realized what a huge compliment that is, coming from someone who works as hard as he does. Elsy's was the best, she got choked up and I think we all appreciated it. She was able to convey what we were all feeling.

It was kinda (ok very) sad to go to sleep knowing we wouldn't be camping all together the next night. But the promise of walking up to a lifelong dream and one of the 7 wonders of the world, plus the promise of a shower and a real bed the next night were worth it.

I already felt accomplished and proud of what we had done at the end of Day 3. The journey really was more than a means to the end- it was everything. There's nothing more gratifying than staring down fear and then beating it to a pulp. When the trail was slippery and we could have fallen to our deaths; when the steps were so steep it seemed better to just crawl down; when our leg muscles stiffened and it seemed impossible to continue.... we did.