Choquequirao is an ancient Incan city that was abandoned shortly after the arrival of the Spanish in the 16th century. Now all that remains are the ruins of the village, and some pretty extensive terrace work. It is very difficult to access the ruins today, the only way being a 32 kilometer hike (64 kms round trip) deep into the mountains southeast of Cusco.
Most people doing treks around Cusco opt for the famous Inca trail, a 4 day hike on an old Incan road through various Incan ruins leading up to Machu Picchu on the final day. This is a great hike, don´t get me wrong, but my friends and I wanted something a little more off the beaten path. On any given day, up to 500 people can be hiking the Inca trail at the same time.
Knowing this, my friends Kayla, Tamara, Farhat, and I contracted a guiding service a couple of months ago to lead us to the more removed Choquequirao. Normally we are pretty budget travelers, however, in this case we spared no expense.
On Thursday, July 8th we set off on the trail to Choquequirao from the small town of Cachora, about 4 hours southeast of Cusco by car. Our team was made up of 12 people - the four of us, three other Americans, our guide, three mule drivers, and a cook.
Our packs, sleeping bags, cooking equipment, and all other equipment were carried by six mules. The mules allowed us to only have to worry about carrying small day packs with water, snacks, sunblock, and other odds and ends weighing no more than 2-4kilos.
Despite having the mules, and walking on a good trail (the Choquequirao trail was built in 1994 with the help of a $5 million grant from the French government), the hiking through the mountains at an altitude of around 3,000 meters was still extremely challenging at times. The first day of hiking we did 21 kilometers, the last 9 kilometers being a steep ascent down to a footbridge alongside a river.
View of the valley we trekked down and out of to reach the ruins of Choquequirao.
Upon arriving to our campsite each day, we would be greeted by the mule drivers, who had gone on ahead, setting up our tents and laying our packs on a tarp for us to pick up. They would direct us to a shower house nearby while they and the cook began working on our meal. Like I said...we spared no expense for this trek.
After showering, getting into clean clothes, and some stretching, we would have our supper. Each meal usually consisted of 4 courses - an appetizer (such as bread), followed by a soup, then the main course, and a dessert. The food was pretty darn good.
I should probably introduce our company on this hike, which was so important to making the experience what it was. Our three co-hikers and guide were:
Mike - 70 years old, from Santa Barbara, California. Currently, an economics teacher at a local community college, he had spent his entire career in higher education, specializing in history and political science. Fluent in Chinese, and extremely well traveled, Mike was also a strong hiker. Several years before he summited Mount Kilamanjaro in Africa with his son.
Nancy - roughly 60 years old, from Durango, Colorado. She is a teacher at a local Montessori school located on an indian reservation. Nancy was also an avid hiker, hiking regularly around Durango, and also having done trekking in Nepal. Nancy was a free spirit. Her daughter seems to have a similar personality, and is a rafting guide on the Colorado River.
Patsy - Nancy´s sister. She currently lives in Encino, California, and is around the same age as Nancy. She and her husband are retired.
Alex - Our guide, age 34. He has an American girlfriend that he met while on the train back from Machu Picchu one day. He has a son with her, and his dream is to get a work visa to the United States, and eventually become a citizen, to be with his girlfriend and son.
From the start there was a mutual respect and interest between us. I think Mike, Patsy, and Nancy really enjoyed our company and sense of humor, while Kayla, Farhat, and Tamara and I loved to hear of their experiences, and also respected their physical strength as hikers.
On the second day of hiking, we got started around 5am and knocked out the remaining 11 kilometers to reach the Choquequirao ruins. The second day included an ascent from the river of roughly 1000 meters over 7 kilometers, which was pretty challenging.
Our third day was dedicated entirely to exploring the ruins. During the tour of some of the terraces, I kept pressing Alex, ¨but how much of this has been restored?...which parts?¨. Some of the terraces where in extremely good shape, the local workers were even growing corn on some of them, and I really wanted to know what the stonework looked like without any restoration work.
At the bottom of an extensive set of terraces I was finally able to satisfy my curiosity. The land below the bottom step of terraces seemed to give way to thick vegetation and trees, but upon closer inspection, the terraces continued! They continued not just one or two levels lower, but as many as 15 levels below!
¨I´m going down,¨ I informed the rest of the group. Alex advised me to be careful, watch my footing, and keep my walking stick in front of me to scare away snakes.
I slid down a hole in the vegetation where some old Incan steps and drain continued downward from the restored terraces above. Finally getting down a level, I could see that the stone terracing, the steps, and drainage system had held together very well! All that was need to do to restore them was rip away bushes and other plants that had established themselves in the walls, and then perhaps apply a layer of mortar on top to protect the wall.
It fascinated me to see the design and craftsmanship of a set of Incan terraces that had not been touched in 500 years, but were still in good condition.
After leaving the terraces, we went up to explore where the main town was situated. We toured a home of what used to be Incan royalty, saw an old Incan bath, and checked out a huge building that appeared to used for gatherings and assemblies. The acueduct which supplied water to the town was still intact, and recently restored, although water had not yet been routed through it. A cut could be seen in the vegetation running from above the town, over to a waterfall where the water used to be routed to the town.
In all the ruins we visited during our time around Cusco, it was always impressive how advanced the Incans were in the central planning of their towns and cities. Their architects would always arrive to an area, determine how the aqueduct could be built to bring water for consumption and agriculture, decide where the religious temples would situated, what areas would be used for homes, and what areas would be terraced for agriculture.
One of the highlights of Choquequiroa was that we were pretty much alone with the ruins. As we toured the hike, there were probably only another 20 people in the area, and most of them spread out across the site.
The fourth and fifth days were spent hiking out back to Cachora, another 32 kilometer journey. Following the hike, we had lunch in Cachora, and presented our guide and other crew members with our thanks and tips. We took a group picture outside of the little shop we used as a base in Cachora.
The entire team after a successful hike.
That night, the seven of us and Alex decided to meet up for dinner in Cusco, where we shared one last meal and said our goodbyes. Some special friendships had been formed between members of the group. Kayla, Tamara, Farhat, and I now know we always have a place to stay in Durango and parts of California.
The Choquequirao hike has been my favorite experience during this adventure, mainly for the quality of people in our group.
Following the trek, there was one thing left to do around Cusco...visit Machu Picchu. Farhat and I still had not been to visit the ruins for which the region is famous for, and that are known worldwide.
After a day of rest in Cusco, Farhat and I took a taxi about an hour and a half to Ollantaytambo, where we boarded a Peru Rail train which would take us to Aguas Calientes, the town at the foot of the Machu Picchu ruins.
Once in Aguas Calientes, we found lodging, bought our pass to the ruins, and turned in early. Aguas Calientes is mostly a town where people stay for 24 hours, purely for the purpose of visiting the Machu Picchu ruins.
Around 3am Farhat and I woke up, gathered our things, and began the walk to the foot of the mountain where the ruins are located. To get up to the entrance to the ruins, one has to walk up a set of 1,608 stone stairs, which lead up to the ancient city.
We hiked up the stairs at a brisk pace, and around 4:40am reached the gates to the ruins. We were in the first dozen to arrive to the gates. As we arrived we were greeted with nods of encouragement or greetings of ¨welcome¨ by our early-risers. It was a motley crew from all over the world - French, Spanish, Swedish, Japanese, and other nationalities.
The reason for arriving so early is that the first 200 people to arrive are given a special pass to climb the Waynupichu mountain situated next the ruins. From the top of Waynapichu, one can see the ruins as the first light of the sun hits it.
We were let into the park around 6:30AM, and hustled over to the entrance to Waynapichu. Around 7AM we were admitted to Waynapicchu, and began to make the climb up on the winding staircase built by the Incas. I was the 4th person to reach the top, and the view was well worth it.
Looking down on Machu Pichu from the top of Waynapichu.
After resting for around 45 minutes at the top of Waynapichu, and taking numerous pictures of the ruins, we descended back down to the ruins of the main city. We took a one hour tour of the main sites, and then sat tired against a set of terraces to eat a lunch we had packed.
Around 1:30pm we left the park and descended back down the stone steps to Aguas Calientes, and at 3:30pm we caught a train back to Ollantaytambo.
Machu Picchu was incredible, but I left their feeling not so much euphoric, as relieved. A visit to Machu Picchu is a homage any serious South American traveler must make, and I felt like it had been hanging over my head.
Having satisfied the Machu Picchu visit, I felt free to continue on to other exploits with a clear conscience.
Upon arriving back to Cusco that night, I quickly hopped a night bus to Puno, a town alongside Lake Titicaca, and close the border with Bolivia. In the morning the next day I took another bus to the border, payed the requisite $135 entry fee for Americans (instituted two years ago by the Bolivian government in retaliation for various American foreign policies and the difficulty of entry into the US for Bolivians...the Europeans did not have to pay this), and successfully making the border crossing, continued on in bus to Copacabana.
Copacabana is also situated on the banks of Lake Titicaca, only on the Bolivian side. The conditions have been terrible since arriving here, with bitter cold and harsh winds creating high white-caps on the lake surface.
I had intended to make a trip out to the Isla del Sol, but woke up this morning to evaluate the conditions, and finding them not much changed, have decided to press on to La Paz, only 3 hours away.
As if to confirm the correctness of my decision, I was drinking coffee this morning inside a local café watching the light drizzle, when I realized it had begun to snow lightly. The café owner, a local, was mesmerized and said the conditions were some of the worst he has seen in 5 years.
Lake Titicaca, situated at around 3,800 meters of altitude, is the largest lake in South America, and one of the highest in the world. I would love to explore it more, but unfortunately it doesn´t look like that will happen this trip.
So onward to La Paz.
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