Inca Trail and Machu Picchu - Done!

Yep, we are now back in Cusco after completing the Inca Trail and seeing Machu Picchu. The Inca Trail itself was just amazing. 45 kilometres in 3 and a bit days seemed like a big ask but in the end it was tough but quite do-able. The hardest day was day 2 when we had to hike 16 kms including a steep climb up many rocky steps to what is known as Dead Womans Pass which is at 4200 metres above sea level. So not only was it a long walk but the altitude meant that it was very slow going. Every now and then i would look up and see the top of the mountain that I was aiming for but it didn't seem to be getting much closer. One guy on my tour got through it by listening to angry music on his iPod. I got through it but trying to remember as much as I could about the Smurfs, Fraggle Rock, Star Blazers and Astroboy. Cartoons got me there in the end although trying to remember the name of Gargamel's cat from The Smurfs (Azriel) was too much for me. I had to ask an Irish couple for the answer to that one!
What amazed me was the porters. For 12 tourists and 2 guides, we had 18 porters carrying up to 20kgs each on their backs, cooking awesome meals, putting up tents etc. Those guys are so fit. We all got to try on one of their heavy backpacks during day 3 for a photo and then 4 of us guys decided to just walk up a small hill while wearing them and it nearly killed us! I reached the top and was really struggling for air!
Day 4 was just a two hour hike before the sun came up in order to reach Machu Picchu. The sun illuminated an awesome view of the Incan city ruins, surrounded on all sides by mountains. The tour around the ruins itself was great too. You get to walk amongst them, climb the steps as the Incas would have etc. A few of us finished it off with a hike up a mountain next to it called Wayña Picchu which was a very steep climb of about 50 mins which ended with us (and so many other tourists) jostling for a position at the top of the mountain and looking at an awesome 360 degree view of the area. It was quite dangerous up there with very little in the way of ropes or anything to stop you falling off the side. There is no way it would be allowed in Australia. The only safety precaution they really had was a limit of 400 people per day and a system where you sign in when you start and sign out when you finish. I guess at the end of the day if someone hasn't signed back out, they go looking for bodies or something. Crazy. Still, it was well worth the climb and we didn't die so that was pretty cool.
Back in Cusco for a free day it has been both entertaining and frustrating. An ATM machine has confiscated my bank card cos it reckons incorrectly that the card has expired but today is a public holiday so i cant retrieve it. We fly out to the amazon jungle tomorrow and hopefully I can do something about it tomorrow before we leave. It's a concern although i have a visa card i can use in the interim. The public holiday is for the feast day Corpus Christi. The whole city is celebrating with music, massive crowds converging on the city centre etc. There are lots of stalls too where you can buy the local delicacy - roast guinea pig. Not just a slice of meat, it looks like a charred rat. I guess you just gnaw away at the meatier parts. Every time I see them I think of the guinea pigs we used to own as kids. Poor little Tweedle-Dee, Tweedle-Dum and Alice! (Geez, those names were bad! :) )
I have heaps of photos of the hike and of mountains and Machu Picchu etc and will upload a few when i get a chance but right now i dont have the right cable on me so it will have to be some other time.