Visiting Machu Picchu – a childhood dream comes true…
I grew up and went to school in a working class neighborhood of Cape Town, South Africa. My father was a fitter and turner and worked as a carpenter and shopfitter in the building industry. My mother worked at the local creche half-days, looking after babies. I dreamed of becoming a photographer, but we only owned a Kodak Instamatic camera, and I was not allowed to use it. Instead, I pored over the National Geographic magazines given to us by a family friend, and marveled at the amazing photographs published together with articles on exotic and far-flung places like Egypt, Cambodia, Mexico and of course Machu Picchu. I dreamed that somehow, sometime, I would make my way to this awe-inspiring citadel high in the mountains of Peru and photograph it for myself. Of course, such childhood fantasies were scoffed at by most people I shared my aspirations with…the chances looked pretty slim of them ever coming true.
Well, forty years later on 19 May 2019, I boarded the IncaRail train with my partner Akhona, for Aguas Caliente, which is the launching point for most visits to Machu Picchu, unless one has the energy to to a 3 day Inca Trail hike from Ollantaytambo. The 5 hour trip was excruciating, and not only because it was costing us $320 return, but because we ran almost an hour late, and were seated in a train carriage which swayed dangerously from side to side when the train driver tried to pick up speed. Our ticket to Machu Picchu had an entry time of 13h00pm, and out train should have arrived at 12h34. With the 20 min bus ride to Machu Picchu, we would have entered right on time. Instead IncaRail squandered 50mins of our time. A curse upon them…
When we finally arrived at our destinations we dashed from the train station to the bus station, $24 pre-paid tickets in hand, and boarded the next bus up to the citadel. This proved to be another bumpy ride, but with each sharp bend we rounded, our expectations grew. After 20mins of hair-raising switchbacks and near misses with oncoming busses, we arrived at the entrance to my city of dreams. Gratefully there was no queue, as we had specifically planned an afternoon visit to avoid the crowds. Our $47/person tickets were scanned, and we were in!
We had decided not to hire a guide for this visit, as in our experience they simply repeat information which is easily found online in advance, and they also gobble up valuable time best spent shooting video and photographs of the place being visited. We knew we had to head UP to get the now famous first view of the entire city in all its glory, so that’s exactly what we did. I led the way, with Akhona hot on my heels.
And then, there she was, laid out before us, just as I had first seen her in National Geographic all those years before. It was a surrealistic moment for me. The working class boy from Bothasig had finally made it to Machu Picchu…
The photographer in me sprung into action – first things first – we had to get the typical shots of the citadel, first clean and without people, and then with each of us, and then both of us in the shots 🙂 We spent maybe 20mins getting these shots, assisted by two helpful American tourists who shot the pics of Akhona and I together. Then I shot some cool, more styled shots of Akhona in the bright Alpaca jersey we had bought a few days earlier in the Pisac market. I donned my Peruvian beanie for some shots, as well as my typical Alpaca jersey bought for just these shots. We knew that we had around 3 hours before the light faded, the cold set in and we would have to head back down the mountain. Time was of the essence!
Once the first rush of adrenaline subsided, we started to enjoy the experience more, and stopped to shoot a baby llama and its mother, before starting our decent into the city itself. There is so much detail that one could spend weeks there photographing doorways and structures. Akhona did her bit shooting lots of video clips, and also photographing me all around the site, From the moment I first met her seven years ago I had been going on about one day visiting Machu Picchu, and she really made the effort to capture the moment very thoroughly.
We had to follow a pre-determimed path which led us through the major parts of the site, and back-tracking is not allowed, so without a guide we had to keep our wits about us, but we managed to hit all of the major areas of interest in the 3.5 hrs we were there. I have always been fascinated by the precision with which the Inca built their structures in stone. Historians tell us that they used no tempered metal tools, so seeing these hand-built structures up close was just mind-blowing to me. I must be perfectly honest…on at least two occasions I was close to tears the emotions within me were so strong.
Because much of the experience of visiting Machu Picchu is so visual, I will post a selection of some we shot below, followed by a 10 min video edited from footage shot by both myself and Akhona. The video gives a pretty good idea of what we saw, and how we experienced the whole overwhelming Machu Picchu reality. Was it worth the $250/person for train tickets, entrance tickets, bus tickets and accommodation that night in Aquas Caliente. Absolutely 100%. Machu Picchu did not disappoint and I will remember the visit for as long as I live, as will Akhona 🙂
