Machu Picchu, the Lost ‘City’ of the Incas (and guinea pigs)

Wow, my photo looked just like the brochures

Through another set of uninteresting events I found myself in Peru with (having travelled there via Amsterdam and La Paz, Bolivia). I thought I shouldn’t waste this opportunity by spending all my time in smoky bars and decided to do a little exploring before I was due back in the office.

I googled the words ‘Peru’ and ‘Tourism’ and it appeared the biggest attraction in the country was something called Machu Picchu. That probably sounds seriously uncultured of me, I am not a hardened tourist like some of my fellow authors, though I do get about a fair bit. Sadly much of my time is spent in the aforementioned smoky bars (and smoky offices) so I don’t have much to write about, despite andyfied’s constant demands for (remotely) interesting anecdotes. Having said that most of his involve doing impressions of Joseph Stalin or nattering on about how cold Mongolia is….

Anyway I digress, back to Machu Picchu. After some investigation I found out that this place was only ‘discovered’ in 1911, nearly 400 years after the Spanish conquest of Peru. The native Peruvians are still a little irked about the conquest, yet still claim Bolivia (or ‘Upper Peru’) as their territory despite it being independent for 200 odd years – go figure. The place was discovered by a geezer called Hiram Bingham and consists of a large number of buildings. Seeing as the place had been voted one of the ‘new seven wonders of the world’, I thought I may as well go have a look. I subsequently found out that Peruvians had been encouraged by their government to vote in this online poll and people don’t necessarily take it seriously.

To travel to Machu Picchu is not as simple as taking a taxi from Lima, Peru’s capital. First you need to fly to Cusco, the ancient capital of the Incan empire, not that you’d notice by looking at the buildings, which look like a provincial Spanish town. This was by no means a straightforward journey, having got onto a plane in Lima destined for Cusco, it took off in time and within minutes was flying over the Andes with barely a cloud in the sky obscuring our view. We got to Cusco and were set in holding pattern doing loops over this historic town. Having blagged myself a good seat (1A) by virtue of my BA silver card, I was able to make out landmarks and was looking forward to exploring this wonderful place. Sadly not to be, it was too windy in Cusco, so we were directed back to Lima! Another flight later and I was back over Cusco, and the plane managed to land this time.

Once in Cusco you have two options, either walk 30 odd miles across mountains over four days, or get a train. Having thought about it for some time (5 seconds) I elected to take the train. In my defence I was burdened with a load of work stuff that I didn’t fancy carrying over mountains, maybe next time [1]. Having taken a tour of the Inca’s ‘Sacred Valley’ which pretty much meant climbing up a load of stuff to look at Inca ruins from the top, I arrived in Ollantaytambo. From there I got the train up to Agnes Calleus, the nearest town to Machu Picchu.

The train station was surrounded by people selling all kinds of multicoloured llama wool based products, plus plastic ponchos, keyrings and other souvenir crap. I had a free few hours so I decided to get some food. I was in luck because this two appears to be wall to wall restaurants, bars, souvenir shops and internet cafes. A particularly persistent gentleman encouraged me into his establishment. Having found out I could smoke inside I had a look at the menu. The first thing that caught my eye was the guinea pig (it was at the top of the menu). I thought ‘sod it, when in Rome do as the Romans do etc’ and ordered one. I apologise to you dear readers, I neglected to take my camera and couldn’t photograph the culinary delight that arrived on my table but I have provided an artist’s impression. The animal arrived spread out on top of fried potato with a salad to the side. The waiter encouraged me to eat it with my hands, I refused and demanded cutlery. I started by tucking into the guinea pig’s hind legs having turned the plate to move the least appetising parts of the dish (the head and salad) away from me. At first the animal tasted good, like pork with a texture of turkey. It was a bit hard going to extract meat, but I was doing my best. I then moved to further up the animal’s abdomen. My cutting inadvertently put pressure on the spine and I found myself staring into the face of the guinea pig, with it’s teeth intact. I am sorry to say that I could not continue eating. I hurriedly paid for the bill and almost ran from that restaurant to a nearby bar where I stayed the rest of the afternoon/evening.

Anyway the point of the story was that the next day I was going to Machu Picchu. My guide and I had a discussion about what time to start. He recommended 6 am, I stared at him as if he was a mentalist and we agreed on 8am. We travelled up the mountain in a fairly large coach with a driver taking corners as if he was the long lost Inca half brother of Colin McRae. After 25 minutes of this terrifying journey we arrived.

Machu Picchu is described as a long lost city. It only had 80 houses so long lost ‘village’ or ‘hamlet’ would be more appropriate, but it wouldn’t have the same ring to it. The Incas hadn’t invented writing, so sadly no one has a fucking clue what the place was originally for. During my guided tour I overheard a number of different theories, including it being an Inca scientific research centre, a palace for noblemen, a prison and a trading centre. As such there is an awful lot of guess work involved in the contents of the tour. If I had this job I’d just make shit up – e.g. ‘Yes, this is where the ceremonial shit eating took place, to worship the great god of the dog shit, Shiv Gee’ etc.

The place is pretty impressive; however no one seems to know when it was made. My guide, Alvaro said tests had been carried out to date the stonework from the 14^th century. He then described it as being the 1400’s – an easy mistake to make, one I did back at school, however I’m not showing people round historic relics. The place is apparently split into three distinct sections, an agricultural section (they’ve even stuck some Llamas up there to ensure people really see that it was the agricultural bit). The most impressive bits are the religious section where the ‘temples’ and ‘guesthouses’ are. The final section is the residential section which was a bit of an anticlimax.

My tour guide explained to me in detail how the ‘temple of the sun’ was designed so that the sun shined through windows at perfect angles on the two solstices. I’m not an expert, but I would have thought by the year 1400 someone would have given them a calendar for Christmas, but I’m not an expert in world history. They used completely different brick work for the temples to the houses and suchlike, however I wouldn’t be surprised if they used a dodgy guy with an accent who knocked on their door for most of it, bricks weren’t even straight.

Overall though Machu Picchu is an incredibly impressive sight, and if you ignore the fact that in the timescales compared to say the Coliseum or the Tower of London it is a 1960’s prefab council estate, you will be in awe of the place and the effort it must have taken to construct it. Well worth a visit if you’re in the area.

p.s. I admit I may not have done Machu Picchu justice, but andyfied imposes a strict-ish word limit on the posts….

Notes:

1. Kinda connected to this – I was told very recently that if I was to climb Mount Kilimanjaro you get a geezer carrying all your luggage for you and it’s a relatively easy walk. Maybe this is one of them things to do before you’re 30?