by Shuntavi
This was certainly an unforgettable weekend. While Saturday got off to a rough start, with forgotten student ID’s and an early morning trip to the doctors, we were on the road by 9:30am. We drove for 5 hours through the valley. Santa Teresa appeared out of nowhere, a stunning city nestled between the mountains. We settled into our hotel with new roommates and rested for a while. For lunch, Ruben, our bus driver and friend, brought us to his family’s restaurant where we ate a delicious meal of soup, rice, chicken, and plantain. In the evening we went to the hot springs where we got yummy drinks.
Sunday we hiked all day in order to reach the city right next to Machu Picchu. Shelley, Abby, and I played Contact for 2 hours and sang trail songs to distract from the bugs, cold, belly pain, fatigue, and rain. We reached Machu Picchu town utterly exhausted and collapsed in the reception room of our hotel–or what we thought was our hotel. It was the wrong building. Once we were arrived and settled in at the right location, we were able to get out and explore the city. It was spectacular. A large river split the main street into two smaller walking paths. There were three bridges arching over the water covered in small metal locks–names and initials preserving the memories of families and couples that had been there. That night a bunch of us bought our own locks to hang up.
Monday was Machu Picchu. Around three quarters of the group hiked. I wasn’t able to hike and took the bus instead. We made our way up the mountain on wide switch backs until suddenly we were above the houses and roads where we had just been. We could see the trail we had hiked the day prior and the massive river that ran alongside it. The view was absolutely breathtaking. We were up in the ruins for 3 hours, the whole time eyes wide, jaws dropped. It was unreal to be so high in the mountains and yet be walking through an entire ancient city–by far one of the most beautiful things I have ever seen.
It was no doubt a feat to get to the top. As a group we had 2 sick bellies, 94 bug bites, 1 incomplete flip flop pair, and only 14 empanadas, but we made it with memories we will never–ever–forget.