ohhhh the smell of tea in the morning. I never thought I would say this, but, when their is a mucus icicle dangling gingerly from the tip of your nose, a hot pot of water and a sip of tea makes everything better. The final hike into the city of Aguas Calientes was easy. We didn’t get on the trail till about 9am, I woke to shoot photos of the small town that existed just down the road from our camp sight. I found a friend along the way, he was about 2 feet tall and furry, he became my guardian for the morning, as I followed the river into town. Imprinted in my memory to this day was the delight of watching the smoke from breakfast cooking on stone lined worktops inside the grass topped huts, engaging in a seemingly coordinated dance with the evaporating mist off the frozen rooftops. My friend and I sat together and took it in, waving to the men as they left to the fields to harvest the spoil of the previous day. The train ride was nothing to remarkable, we all gazed at th exotic birds and tried to catch a glimpse of the mountaintops through the vistadome. That day there had been fires along the inka trail, thus the smoke obscured quite a bit of the natural beauty of this place. We arrived late into Aguas Calientes, the shower was disappointingly cold, the dinner was amazingly warm, as were our beds which felt as you can imagine Splendid!!

3:55 am cam quickly, But surprisingly I was not tired, I think it was a combination of the adrenaline charged excitement of knowing we were about to see one of the worlds great wonders. It may have equally been the rich, extremely dark and potent shot of “cafe con leche” we indulged ourselves with that morning. We excited our hotel and were all surprised to see a line of several hundred people already waiting eagerly for the first morning buses to Machuc Picchu, but the day would just begin here.