07 December 2010

This morning while waiting for the ride to take me to the bus to Ollantaytambo, a guy and a drunk girl stumbled out of a cab. She didn’t seem to want to go anywhere and he kept trying to walk her steadily or get her back into a cab. He walked off several times only to stand off at a distance in hopes she would calm down. This did not work and she stumbled up to me and started slurring and grabbing my arm asking me to take her somewhere. This new development began just as my ride, which turned out not to be a taxi but rather my travel agent from yesterday simply walking up to the front of my hotel so he could lead me to where the bus was parked, arrived. He jokingly asked if she was mi nova.

The bus was a block away around the corner. There was an Englishman on board chatting away with his friend about his travels in Cambodia. You can shoot dogs for sport in Cambodia. They transferred him and his friend to another bus but we ended up on the same train anyway. Also on the same train was a guy I had seen last night while buying my rainbow hat. To replace the Englishman and his mate a large group of young school girls came aboard. 

All Aboard!  Choo-Choo!

The train ride to Aguas Calientes was two hours.  On the train a lady asked if we could trade our assigned seats so she could sit with her friends. It took me a minute to find my contact at Aguas Calientes. She took me to a restaurant and told me to wait there while she went to go purchase my entrance tickets to Machu Picchu. They wouldn’t take my student ID. The receptionist said he wanted to see an expiration date.  The expiration date was on a sticker which had fallen off a few years ago. So that increased the price of the trip by 20 dollars.  In my student ID picture I am clean shaven while now I have almost two years worth of beard hanging off my face.

The road the busses take up to Machu Picchu narrowly winds its way up the steep mountainside in a most dangerous manner. It’s not big enough for two busses to pass one another so when two meet one is forced to back up or move over or both.

There was a guide assigned to me from the tour company waiting for me at the entrance. I asked her how I could climb Wayna Picchu, the large mountain overlooking Machu Picchu, and she went to see if there were any spaces available since they only allow 400 people a day to climb it and it was now 12:30 p.m. She returned with the good news that there was one slot left.  I had made it just in time. I would be the last person of the day allowed up the peak. She showed me the pathway. I had to make my way through the maze of steps and steppes. I had no idea where I was going or if I was on the right path. I just headed in the direction of Wayna Picchu and eventually found my way. There is a hut at the entrance of the path to Wayna Picchu where you must sign in before you climb. I left everything I had except my hat and umbrella.

I walked as fast as I could to beat the rain I knew was coming. At first the path goes down. Then It goes up extremely steeply for the rest of the way. About 30 minutes of steep narrow stairs. There are ropes bolted into the rock to give you support. I stopped to take a piss but had to stop mid-stream when I heard footsteps approaching. Closer to the stop the steps are almost vertical. It is quite daunting on the way down. I was panting hard on the way up.

After several impossibly narrow sets of steps I came to a cave with an arrow indicating the the direction of the path but I was confused as to wether it was pointing into the cave or up. I bent down and peered into the cave but I didn’t see any light so I started climbing up the wall in what I assumed was the path. But it just didn’t seem right. There’s no way this could be the path. So I shimmied back down and inspected the cave a bit more closely and sure enough there was a shaft of light peeping through the other side. I had to crawl on my belly to emerge from the tight hole. A few more dizzying sets of steps and a wooden ladder and I was on the top of Wayna Picchu. Machu Picchu lay spread out below me and all around the Andes towered high. I was on the roof of South America. So was a woman meditating.

Macchu Picchu from the top of Wayna Picchu

I climbed a few rocks to get higher up so I was on the penultimate point of Wayna Picchu. The Andes towered high and the mighty Incan city of Machu Picchu was so tiny below. I could see the mists and clouds and oncoming rain. It is natural at such a sight to attempt to utter or think something profound but amidst the statuesque marvels of God’s nature man’s words are impotent. 

The rain started so I headed down. I moved the lady’s backpack under a ledge. She said she had been meditating for several hours. It took her two hours to ascend because she kept pausing to meditate and take it all in. In my haste it took me 40 minutes.

Getting down the nearly vertical ancient steps was less a challenge on the legs, lungs and heart than on the nerves. I cannot imagine how the Incas built this fortress on top of a mountain and did it all barefoot or in sandals.  The descent would have been quicker if not for the rain making it slippery.

I signed out and headed under a shelter to dry off. Right next to it was a huge rock where people were holding their hands up to it trying to feel its energy. I hiked around the ancient city for a while in the dank, humid air taking photos. I met a German named David.  After an hour as the fog began creeping in I headed back to the exit exhausted and in need of food and water. As I was hiking towards the exit at Machu Picchu a thick mist was beginning to enshroud the city. As I looked back the entire city had disappeared in the cloud and I saw it no more.

...a thick mist was beginning to enshroud the city.

In Aguas Calientes I ate at a restaurant where the lady actually haggled with me while I was pouring over the menu posted outside. Three courses for thirteen solas. Pretty nice. Turned out to actually be twenty-one solas because the water was not included even though she said the drinks are included. The drinks included were under the dessert or juice portion of the menu. In other words I had to choose between a dessert or a juice to drink. I wasn’t happy about that at all.

Dessert

I meandered around town for a bit looking at shops and I sent my sister a postcard. It was wrinkled and cheap but it was the best one there. I spotted two LDS missionaries kicking a soccer ball around and in surprise I started talking with them. Aguas Calientes is an extremely minuscule mission field but they are based in Cusco and travel to the surrounding towns on a rotating basis. There’s a lot of LDS in Cusco. The Mormons come over and tell all the locals that Jesus visited South America shortly after his resurrection and then they pray about it and get a burning in their heart and that’s how they know the missionaries aren’t just putting them on but are telling them the real truth of the matter. He suggested I get a book of Mormon when I return to the states and this opened the door to a lengthy and reluctant theological conversation on the falsity of Mormon doctrine which I got lost in while speaking because I was still exhausted from ascending Wayna Picchu and my mind was not entirely focused.

Mural in Aguas Calientes

I wandered through the market next to the train station after the missionaries and I parted company. Because of its remote location everything here is very expensive. On the ride here I read the Canons of Dort and some of the Belgic Confession. I will most likely sleep on the train ride back to Ollantaytambo and on the bus ride to Cusco. I was charged one sola for my train ticket at the restaurant where I picked it up. I was told it was a fee for the fax machine. But I still don’t have my bus ticket. Someone is supposed to meet me at Ollantaytambo with the bus ticket.

On the train I chatted with an Australian named Simon and his girlfriend Kate about freewill and Jesus and grace and calvinism and the gospel and even a bit of reformation history. He saw I was reading from the Belgic Confession and asked about it. He insisted that God is in all things keeping them together because he created them. He also insisted that God is the creator of sin.

On the bus ride back to Cusco my contact wanted an extra ten solas but I told him I paid everything yesterday. He called someone to ask about it presumably and then walked away.

Back at my hotel the girl from this morning was with a friend of hers in the room right next to mine.  She insisted we go out dancing but I was too tired and even if I hadn’t been tired I don’t think that would have been a very good idea.