Machu Picchu

Our Christmas Day

No Christmas tree, no presents, no Christmas dinner, so we booked ourselves on a tour of The Sacred Valley on Christmas Day which is just a normal day in Peru as Christmas Eve is their main event.

Along with hundreds of others who had exactly the same idea as us, we visited a few spectacular sites with a superb guide who's every word was absorbed as he showed and explained the marvels of the the extraordinary Inca civilzation who ruled a large part of South America over 500 years ago.

In virtually impossible locations, stones weighing up to 100 tonnes were somehow dragged up mountains, then cut using such advanced techniques that the world's top engineers, archeologists and historians have never been able to replicate it or indeed explain how it was achieved.

After somehow being cut, these gigantic stones were lifted into position using a 'tongue and groove technique' which is still earthquake proof today. They even built an air conditioned grain store in the side of a mountain which a few years ago, experts made an attempt to build a replica one on the same mountain. It never worked. The Inca one still works today.

So baffling were their achievements that the local people actually believe that the Inca's didn't build these at all. It must have been some other being.....aliens!! Raucous laughter followed when we told this story but as we witnessed more and more astonishing things in impossible locations, everyone was just beginning to think.........mmmm???

The sun comes out, revealing an eerie Machu Picchu

The most remarkable thing was not just that we'd actually learned something on Christmas Day but that this civilization who created an empire, their own language, their own religion and thousands of impossible stuctures, weren't around for thousands or even hundreds of years. Just 93 years from start to finish. Then along came the Spaniards who stole, butchered and destroyed everything and the Inca's were gone.

Machu Picchu, 'the Inca's jewel in the crown' awaited us. It survived because its so remote and difficult to get to that the pesky Spaniards never found it. It was never high on our list to see as ignorantly we thought it was just a pile of old rocks but suddenly we were quite excited at the prospect, especially as it costs a small fortune to get there and its not the easiest place to reach.

A taxi ride to the bus station, a one and a half hour mini bus ride to the wonderfully named village of Ollantaytambo, from there a spectacular one and a half hour train journey to Agues Caliente and then check in for the night after buying bus tickets for the final half hour journey up the mountain. It was as simple as that.

Next morning it was a 4.30am breakfast in an attempt to beat the crowds which we did but unfortunately the weather beat us. Rain and cloud prevented us from seeing anything apart from a few sodden alpacas but we persevered. After six hours stood in the pouring rain there was a break in the clouds, revealing the ancient citadel below and the breathtaking location.

We realised just how lucky we were as we caught the train back to Cuzco.