The Canadian Sscouts - Day 1 on the trail (Easy section)

At 3:30 am, the group woke up at the Mama Simona hostel to move our large packs into storage bags and board the bus for the Inca Trail. There was a long,  bus ride through Cusco down small, narrow, winding roads overlooking the Andes Mountains. Once we arrived at the small town of Ollantaytambo, over 2,000 ft lower than Cusco at 9,160 ft, we stumbled out of the bus to have breakfast. Clearly, we had not worn enough clothing, as everyone was shivering.

Breakfast was buffet-style in a small restaurant filled mostly by our group and another about to make the trek. Cold as we were, our first thought was to rush for the coffee and tea. The coffee was a dud; so strong it dyed your hands if it spilled on you, and was not made better by the curdled milk. Other than that, the food was fantastic. We enjoyed scrambled eggs, mini-pancakes and the delicious buns we had come to love so much. 

With breakfast over, we boarded the bus again to head to Ollantaytambo’s main square. Alfredo, one of our Inca Trail guides, gave us a small tour of the town, pointing out the differences between Incan and Spanish architecture, noting particularly the wide-base wall design that helped protect against earthquakes. We finished our tour with some free time in the main square to pick up any last minute purchases (lip balm, wool gloves, decent coffee etc).

Final purchases made, we were on the bus again to finish our ride to checkpoint ‘km 82’, the beginning of the Inca Trail. As a pleasant surprise; the weather had changed from freezing cold to very hot. The group, along with many others, waited there to take a group photo, go to the bathroom, and allow the porters to pack their bags.

With everything sorted out, we headed out to the check-in for the trail, where there was (as usual) some confusion about documents but our trail guides quickly had it under control. In high spirits, the group crossed the bridge that marked the beginning of the trail. We had finally begun.

Since IntiSun trek’s usual group size was a maximum of 8 people, our group was divided into three smaller sections for the trek. 

“Los Macho Piccu Muchachos” consisted of: Jean Marc, DCS, Benjamin, Jordon, Calvin, Christopher, Martin, and their guide, Carlos. 

“Los Burros Loccos” included: David Ross, Andrew, James, Alex, Connor, Ryan, Jake, and their guide, Alfredo. 

“Las Hermanas Martellas” (The Hammer Sisters) contained all the girls: Tracey, Lindy, Anna, Alison, Heather, Anya and Jackie, along wither their guide, Jesus.

There was a good three or four hours of hiking to be done before lunch and the groups headed out with relish, happy to be out on the trail at long last. They found it to be quite flat (especially when compared with the next day) and there were breaks to learn more about the Incan Empire, local flora and the trail itself.  One point of interest was that there are actually two different Inca Trails. One runs over the mountains and was reserved for priests and higher classes, while another winds through the valleys and was used by the common people of the empire.

We stopped shortly to view our first real Incan ruins, Patallacta.  Actually being lower (~7400 ft) than our starting elevation, we viewed the terraced village from a cliff above.  It consisted of a half a dozen stone houses framed by about 15 terraces with a ‘snakey’ curving border at the base and a two-chamber storehouse along one edge.We learned that many Incan villages were shaped in ways to invoke different animals (most commonly: the snake, puma, and condor).  It is therefore no coincidence that I use the term ‘snakey’ to describe the borders of Patallacta; that is exactly what the builders were going for when they constructed this village.

We stopped for lunch at Tarayoc (exact spelling is unsure as Quechan is a spoken language and therefore spelling may vary), it was a pleasant surprise and a good idea of what was to come.  We spotted one of our porters who pointed us across a bridge to a large dining tent. Walking to the tent we passed many other trekking companies who had set up close by.  Inside our tent was a large central table fashioned out of smaller plastic tables covered by colourful Peruvian tablecloths and surrounded by plastic stools.   Table settings were laid out with tubs of water just outside the tent to wash our hands and faces.

Lunch itself consisted of: asparagus soup, rice, fried trout, steamed cauliflower, carrots, and beans. There were also slices of avocado sprinkled with parmesan cheese and sweet, warm lemonade to drink. The food was much more than we expected and helped everyone to recover from the morning and prepare for their afternoon.

With our first meal over, sitting comfortably in our stomachs, we headed out for another four hours of hiking before we would get to our camp for that night. The trail began climbing much more steeply than it had in the morning. This did not stop our groups and it certainly didn’t stop the porters, who actually ran past us with smiles on their faces. One of our break stops was located in a field with grazing bulls. It was quite an experience to sit on a bench right beside the horns of a three hundred pound animal.

Los Burros Locos and the Macho Picchu Muchachos met up at a checkpoint that weighed the porter’s packs and required all trekkers to sign in. We had some fun weighing our own daypacks on the porter’s scale; with David Ross and James carrying the heaviest bags; 7.9 kilograms each.

Those two groups ended up finishing the hike together, a very steep uphill climb during which they were passed by two porters bringing up goods to sell at the camps. Carlos and Alfredo met them on the hill, as they had waited for the girls to arrive at the checkpoint. Climbing down our last hill to arrive at Yuncachimpa where we were greeted to camp by our clapping porters who cheered us all the way in.  Yuncachimpa sits at an elevation of 10,800 ft  meaning we had climbed almost 2,000 vertical feet and hiked around 12 horizontal kilometres on this first day (no small challenge), and they called this the easy day! Once we had arrived there was the usual treatment of warm water for hands, faces and feet, followed by an eager porter carrying paper towel with which to dry ourselves.

Las Hermanas Martellas arrived in the dark and the whole camp erupted in cheers and hugs. The dining tent was then set up for tea, a very civilized affair. There was popcorn, crackers and of course, tea. Then, at 7:00 p.m., there was dinner that consisted of: cream of corn soup, noodles with vegetables, chicken legs that they called “Condor Legs”, fried potatoes stuffed with cheese, spanikopita pastry and more tea. With all this in our bellies we crawled into our sleeping bags, exhausted, to give our muscles a break so they would be ready for the challenging day ahead.