Inca Trail - I is for Incredible, N is for Not to be repeated, C is for Completely exhausting and A is for OARSOME!

Welcome! One of our biggest goals of the fantasia trip was to complete, without serious injury, the Inca Trail to the sacred city of Machu Picchu. Before we give you a run down on the highs and lows, we would just like to say to anyone thinking of doing it that a couple of training walks up Mt Vic does not help you at all in walking over a thousand metres uphill, in high altitude. Get fit.

We met up with most of our GAP group in Lima. We had had a few drinks that afternoon so the meeting we had was very amusing for the other group members who thought we were nuts -especially with our mix of Kiwi/Aussie slang and twang to the Spanish. It could be called Spiwi - ¨don´t give ´er any carniee¨ translates to ¨she is a vegetarian¨. Flew to Cusco and spent the night there getting used to the altitude - pretty crazy feeling all dopey. Had to be a bit careful crossing the roads in the town as if a car sped towards you you couldn´t actually run to get out of the way!

We spent a couple of days cruising the Sacred Valley, visiting locals and their alpacas, visiting a local ´pub´ (they make their own corn beer) and doing a mini walk which I think they make you do before starting the trail to check if you are going to be able to handle it. They gave us the go ahead - which is weird cos we nearly collapsed puffing after walking about 100 metres up a slight incline.

The next day we started the real thing. Look at us, all keen, with our new boots and walking sticks. This was also our last chance to give up and get the lazy peoples train (note traintracks in front of us). Despite all secretly wanting to, none of us took the train and instead we pulled the bird and yelled ¨lazy expletives¨when it went past.

Day 1 was flat for ages, with lots of flora and fauna to keep Lyndsay happy (Team Fantasia´s botanist/FnF expert). Eventually there was a couple of hills. We puffed lots and were pretty happy with our efforts until our guide Percy told us that was nothing compared to what tomorrow would bring. Awesome.


At lunch and dinner time we discovered how amazing our porters were. As if carrying all our stuff in rubber jandals whilst running past us up the rocky uneven steps wasn´t enough.....By the time we arrived at lunch camp they would have set up a lunch tent and a cooking tent, 12 individual water basins, cooked us a three course meal complete with napkin origami. At night time, they had put up our tents so we could relax while they cooked us fresh popcorn and then dinner. Yep, we were roughing it.

Day 2 started good. Our wake up call came with a cup of tea or coffee to enjoy in our tents. It was all downhill from there. Or actually extreme uphill. We lost count of the amount of times we had to stop and try our recover our breath (aka, looking at the view, taking a photo, adjusting our packs, oh look at that view again). By ¨we¨, we should mention that we dont mean the whole GAP group. Half of the group were very fit and it seemed like they ran up the hill. The Team Fantasia half of the group were down the back with the second guide Victor (who carried the oxygen tank). We like to call ourselves the ass end of the group. There were good views back there, we think they were better and deserved more stops to admire them. And reflect on life generally. And whether we would survivve the trail. Or whether it was too late to go back and get the train.

Day 2´s aim was to conquer the Dead Woman´s Pass. It is 4200 m above sea level, and is shaped like a ¨womens chest¨as Victor politely described (we were more crass, insert boob and nipple). We started the day at 3000m, so that was over 1km up. That is a lot of hill and steps. Then it decided to rain. So we put on our hot ponchos, which didn´t really help. So yeah, picture us all completely shattered, out of breath, wet standing 4200 metres high...Does it look like this:

Jacky spewed shortly after this photo. Lunch looked the same as it had on the plate, which just goes to show it is true that it is harder for your digestion to work at high altitude. Our prize for getting to the top was going down. Pity that the trail had turned into a river that you could have whitewater rafted down....That night we had to tell our guide that we weren´t even sure if we were still on the track. Apparently it hasnt been like that for 3 or 4 years, and Victor should have been with us, but even he had got sick of waiting for us at our special pace.

Day 3 involved more walking. There was some up, some down and a lot of undulating (a word we have never heard so often - it means up and down, but is a flash word they use to stop saying up and down so often).

Here is our guide Percy. He has done the Inca trail 400 times, including once in 7 hours (allegedly). He plays the flute and poses a lot. Although he has a lot of girlfriends, he also told us that he like to spoon the assistant guide in their tent at night. It was Victors first time with Percy. We felt sorry for him.

At the end of day 3, we arrived at our camp that was closer to civilization. There was a shower, sit down toilet and beer. Sweet. That night we also had our porter tipping ceremony. They got into their traditional clothes, but other than that it was more just us handing over cash rather than any ceremony. They did look cool, and no other groups had porters like ours.

Day 4 = get up at 4. We had a mad rush to the control gate, where we had to sit until 5.30am (it was like the Amazing Race). Once we were through it was a further mad rush to the Temple of the Sun to watch the sun rise through the mountains and hit the sungate. Unfortunately it was cloudy.

From there we ventured down into Macchu Picchu, which although you should be able to see from the sun gate, it was still completely covered in mist. After going through passport control (yes we got our passport stamped here - is that legal?) and other fomalities, we casually wandered through the outer stone huts and then it suddenly appeared.

Macchu Picchu was glorious! It is a huge lost city and much bigger and more impressive than the pictures show (and the warm up ruins we had seen along the trail). Percy showed us around and told us what heaps of the buildings were for.

Although Percy´s talk was interesting, we were all shattered and were told off for not listening. Sorry Percy. Jane should not have been pulling faces when Jacky was taking a photo. Jacky should not have been taking a photo of Jane´s said faces. Ainsley was listening - girly swat.

The last straw was probably when a llama strolled through our group and did its business in the middle . Who cares about Inca geology when theres that kind of photo opportunity!

From there, the fit people decided to go up Wayney-Picchu (or whatever the mountain in the background is called). The unfit people went and took more photos.

Full marks to Helen, the Welsh chick for getting into it and doing top tier and victory arm with such vigour. And the second tier Oldies, for putting your back into it.

Shortly after this, we headed to the hot pools and got some pizza and beer before getting on the painfully slow train back to Cusco.

All in all a great trip, as demonstrated below, where by the end of the trip our group was participating in Ugly Photos...

To anyone thinking of doing it, if we can you can. Do it.