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Leaving Cusco

WE LEFT Cusco early the next morning following breakfast. It was a clear day as it had always been every morning so far here in South America, having rewarded us with a fantastic view outside the dining hall across the array of terracotta roofs over the city as we ate breakfast. As usual we had only been given. To our horror we had discovered last night exploring the city that most jam in this country was branded under the name “Fanny”. I now found that most disconcerting seeing a jar of red viscous fluid on the breakfast table that I now knew was branded “Fanny”. Clearly that was a very unfortunate thing lost in translation. The fanny jam on the table really put me off breakfast. Thankfully we had more than made up for it with the bright view.

As I was trying to contemplate breakfast, Ryan and Kristen from my group arrived and joined me in the tiny dining room. They were from the Gold Coast less than a hundred kilometres from where I live. They had just married and were on their honeymoon. We hadn’t heard anything yet as to how Michael was going with his recovery from the stomach bug he had caught in the Amazon. We will be starting to walk the trail tomorrow, so we were hoping he will be well enough to do it with us. Once breakfast was finished, we had packed up and assembled outside the reception area with our array of luggage.

Our tour leader Luis arrived announcing all thirty three of the Chilean miners who had been trapped for a month deep underground had been successfully rescued using an ingenious rescue capsule. The rescue had taken all day and all thirty three had been extracted seven hundred metres to the surface one by one without incident. We were all very happy they had been rescued.

Fortunately Michael was feeling quite a bit better this morning, having been prescribed some medication yesterday. It was obviously working. The van took quite a while to arrive, but once it was parked outside in the turning bay, we left the hotel and walked along the narrow lane and piled in.

The van ambled its way precariously down the very narrow streets which were hardly wider than the van itself, into the city. We passed through the middle of the city before heading uphill to follow the highway out of the city heading south. The highway followed the route of the Inca Trail, which when built five hundred years ago started in Cusco and ended at Machu Picchu.

The highway climbed to the highest suburbs around the bowl valley giving us a great view across the city. The road followed next to a surprisingly steep graded railway line, probably one of the highest in the world. Finally we crossed over a small saddle at around three thousand six hundred and fifty metres above sea level still following the railway line and still in the outer suburbs of Cusco which spread out in the gully beyond.

We followed the road downhill along the bottom of a valley for a short distance before turning off to the right off the main road. From here we could see snow for the first time in some distant mountains directly ahead of us. We will be walking amongst those mountains over the next few days. The main road we had turned off continued working its way downhill until eventually reaching Lima some nine hundred kilometres away over about thirteen hours’ drive away. By now we were out in the countryside in amongst farmland.

The side road off the main highway we took was well sealed. It was a very well-travelled road, being the main tourist route between Cusco and Machu Picchu. Almost immediately the road started going gradually uphill again, winding through fertile farmland with brown grass and fields of potatoes.

We eventually reached a turnoff in the Chinchero area about half an hour after leaving  Cusco. At the turn-off a couple of children excitedly greeted us. They were dressed in brimmed dark red hats, and matching jackets very elaborately decorated. We picked them up and headed towards their village by following a gravel road climbing steeply uphill along a valley with a cascading stream just below us. Then the road turned on a hairpin bend to head up the hill until eventually reaching a ridge. Then the road doubled back and followed the ridge moderately uphill for about a kilometre or two before reaching a village. We were above 3700 metres above sea level here, almost level with the height of Mount Cook, New Zealand’s highest mountain.

I had been at this altitude once before earlier this year whilst climbing Mount Kinabalu. By this altitude though, we had been far above any signs of civilisation. Here in Peru living at this altitude seemed as normal as living at sea level in Australia.

Ahead lay the small village of the Incan descendant farmers.

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