Inca Trail Day 2: Up Up Up

 Our wake-up call was 4:30am. We were greeted with our usual hot coca tea. The tea helped settle our stomachs and cure any altitude sickness we might have. There was more snoring and it stunk but it is what it is. 

We stayed at the equivalent of a person's front yard. They had all sorts of farm animals just roaming around the yard making noise (we woke up to a rooster, no joke). There were pigs, cats, dogs, ducks, chickens. etc. There was a decent actual flush toilet which was nice! I'm sure the tour companies pay each household for allowing them to stay there. 

We had breakfast at around 5:15am. It was FANTASTIC. Pancakes, a granola-like thing, hot chocolate, and more. We were so spoiled! We left the campsite at around 6am for the day.

The hike started by climbing up through the jungle. It was nice to walk by the water. We saw a bunch of plants and birds like hummingbirds. Sergio was always observant and would point things out to us to make sure we were looking. 

Overall, it wasn't too tough of a climb. We did a hike in Washington state last year that was 100% worse than this. Sergio had us stop often and drink lots of water. Guessing by empty bottles, we drank probably 3.5 liters of water each throughout the day. Altitude sickness didn't get close to hurting us the whole day.

We hiked for about 2 hours or so up along the creek and under the trees for about 2,500 ft elevation gain. That part of the trail ended at a place called Ayapata. In a normal, non-COVID year, some companies camp here and have a longer first day (we might have even done that in a different year). There were bathrooms and beautiful views back down the valley we hiked up. From here, we could just barely see our highest point of the trail. 

We had a snack and spoke to the NY couple we had seen the day before. We learned they were from NY and exchanged pleasantries. They were about our age (in the middle). As we mentioned, they were the only ones on their hike as well so it was nice to have someone to wave hi to on the trail. 

Dead woman's pass has its name for a reason. From our lunch spot up to the pass, it was basically all steps straight up for about 2.5 hours. It was only a 1,500 ft elevation gain but felt much steeper and more exposed to the elements and at a higher elevation. Again, we never felt any real altitude sickness but we would set a goal for going to a certain spot and then taking a 15-30 second break. Sergio said our "pace was fantastic" about 100 times. He did a great job of keeping us motivated and happy. 

We reached the top! The top in this case is 13,980 feet above sea level. Considering we slept at about 10,000 ft elevation, this was a big increase. We definitely felt it in our lungs. We took lots of pictures and videos for Salkantay. It was fun doing that with some of the other tour groups around. One guy said we must be famous (we assured him, we are in fact not famous). It was pretty darn windy and chilly at the top. Lacey and both put on the layers we brought with us. 

We also spent some time at the top talking to the NY couple, Derek and Olivia. They love to travel too and are not engaged yet (I had a good time teasing Derek about that). 

We started the trek down and it was VERY steep with very tall steps. We had to take it slow to keep our feet under us. The hiking poles came in clutch for this part. We didn't really use them at all on the way up. It took us a little over an hour to get to our campsite. Sergio said it usually takes people about 2 hours to go down, so that was encouraging to know we "beat" that. 

When we walked into camp, our porters had already beat us there (of course). They gave us some delicious juice. Sergio and the media people were about 15 mins behind us. We had the trail almost entirely to ourselves the entire way down which is incredible on a trail as popular as this. 

We ate a later lunch (like 1:30pm) with the same incredibly large amount of food. Appetizer, soup, and lots of main dishes. Ideally, we would have hiked a while longer to get to a different site. Unfortunately, that was not possible since our group was going to get inspected that night. 

So instead we rested in our tent. Both of us napped for a good portion of the afternoon since we had slept so poorly the last few nights. 

Then we ate dinner with the usual snack beforehand. It had only been about 4 hours since we last ate so we did not eat that much. Everything we ate was delicious of course but we had not built up much of an appetite. The media guys and Sergio though? They ate so much! Sergio said none of them eat food like that normally so they take advantage when they can haha. 

We were in bed by about 7:15pm. There was a large tour group sort of near us who were loud until about 8 or 9pm. They were playing games and yelling and laughing. It made us just a tad bit jealous that we didn't have that kind of camaraderie on our trip. Overall, we're happy it's just the two of us but the social aspect was a little low. 

I didn't feel super great (I had a cold, no covid) so hoping that would go away after sleeping. Lacey and I both did a prayer for no snoring. I used earplugs.

Day 2 complete!

Other random notes:

• The media team guys do not speak much English so meals are kind of funny. The only English word Ricardo knows is the word "soup" lol.
• Toilets in this campsite were full-on squat. It's... an experience.
• Highlights: the views/nature, making it to top relatively easily, and talking with NY couple
• For the most part, we were happy with our clothing choices for the day (warmth, ease of hiking, etc.) Sergio was always impressed with our MN blood as we would be in a T-shirt while he had a jacket and hat on.