Getting to Machu Picchu is not difficult, but it does require some advance planning.  Pop and I were rather more lackadaisical in our planning efforts. We wandered into the train station the day before we wanted to go and tried to buy tickets. Luckily for us there were internet terminals where you could make your purchases online and print your ticket out at the counter.  We were presented with a such a limited hodgepodge of choices that there is no way we could have figure this out in Spanish. We ultimately ended up booking a train for the next day leaving out of a town called Ollyantambo. That morning we got up fairly early and made our way by collectivo to Ollyantambo, spent a few hours sitting around and going to the market, then caught the train to the town Aguas Calientes. It is a collection of restaurants and hotels with some kinda dirty hotspring fed pools in easy walking distance. I found it lacking character. Like Disney land without rides. Perhaps my unfavorable image of the town has something to do with my time there. Since we took the train up, we needed to get up super early (4:40) in the morning to catch the first wave of buses to Machu Picchu to be there in time to watch the sunrise. Anticipating a long day ahead we went to bed around 8pm to try to get some sleep. Around 8:30 a club across the street turned the volume up to 11. It was then that I realized I forgot to pack my earplugs. The party picked up steam, culminating in a very enthusiastic drum session around 1:45am. It sounded fun. It sounded like the kind of experience you wouldn´t want to miss….unless you had to get up in three hours.

The alarm went off, we rolled out of bed and were in line for the buses by a quarter after 5. There were about 50 people ahead of us. Right on time the buses started rolling. We made it to the gates by a little before 6, got our Waynapicchu stamps and headed in to see the place. WOW. It was really amazing; worth rising before dawn even. It got even better when we got a guide. Appearantly Machu Picchu was used as some sort of agricultural and astronomical laboratory because both jungle crops and highland Andean crops would grow there because of it unique geographical location. Well, it looked great for being 600 years old. There is another peak nearby, Waynna Picchu, that priests used to climb for more astronomical studies. That was a hike to get up, but also well worth it. From there we could see the whole complx spread out below us. Really cool. We took the bus down a little early and had some Peruvian nachos: guacamole with some schredded cheese on top. Then it was on the train back to Ollyantambo. This experience was probably the highlight of Peru.

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