The Peak of Our Trip

[Figure 1]

I had very mixed feelings about Machu Picchu at the beginning of our trip. I was excited but had heard both extremely good and not-so-great things about it. Some said it was just a beautiful as the postcards and that I would absolutely love it. Others said they were not as impressed and that there was a ton of people there that which took away form the uniqueness of going to such a remote place. I knew that at the very least I would be able to say that I saw it with my own eyes. Really, the only picture I ever saw of it was the typical overlook from Machu Picchu Mountain (kind of like [Figure 1]). I knew it was a large site, I knew it was Incan, and I knew that it was in Peru. The best part about my own visit was the fact that I knew what I was looking at. We got the see things that no one else even knew about, even if they were looking right at it.

The winter solstice is a very exciting morning for Machu Picchu. A lot happens, and you have a few minutes to actually see anything. On our first day at the site, the actual winter solstice, I was assigned to the Temple of the Condor [Figure 2]. The wait was long and I spent a good amount of time getting ordered around by professional photographers. And then I got to see what the Incan people planned. The sun came up over the mountains and illuminated a small cave between the ground rock and the two condor wings. It was pretty much a perfect line up, and mildly interesting to see firsthand [Figure 3]. I took a good amount of pictures because it was a class assignment and a little bit away to get some prettier pictures of the sunrise. I can back to the stone condor again before I planned on meeting up with everyone and was pleasantly surprised at the change. The light shone stronger and brighter over a larger portion of the bird, right into the cave [Figure 4]. The cave was green with moss and it seemed to glow in the light it only saw a few days out of the entire year. It was a definite Indianan Jones moment.

[Figure 2]

[Figure 3]

[Figure 4]

The next day we some more of the same type of magic. the light wasn't as precise as the day before, since the sun began to move south again. But still we saw a sliver of light through a window that must have taken a good amount of time to calculate [Figure 5]. Just down the stairs from that we saw the formation of a triangular shadow that pointed to corner, forming an 'X' on the wall [Figure 6]. 

[Figure 5]

[Figure 6]

I wonder how many tourists have been to Machu Picchu for the sunrise and didn't even know about all the effort the Incans put into these parts of the architecture. At each of the points, you can still look east and see rays of sunshine peaking over the tops of beautiful, tree-covered, Andes Mountains.

From studying this amazing group of people, I was able to walk through doorways and rooms, through passageways and up stairs and understand why this wall looks different than that, and how they got those gigantic stones up that high, and what each part of the site was used for all those centuries ago. It was a fulfilling experience and I wouldn't have wished for it any other way. 

[Figure 7]

As overwhelming and unbelievable the ruins were, my favorite view was not of the stone structures. After getting up at 4 in the morning, walking to the bus stop freezing, and taking the bumpy ride up a zigzag road for forty five minutes, I was determined to get a good picture of the sun coming up behind the mountain rage. Watching this unfold before me and trying to convince myself that is was all real, right in front of my eyes was the best part of the two days we spent at Machu Picchu. I took about five hundred pictures over the duration of two days. Here are some of my favorite:

[Figure 8]

[Figure 9]

[Figure 10]

If anyone were to ask me about Machu Picchu, or if I heard they were going, I would tell them to do some research and learn about it first. I know that people would have a much better time seeing and comprehending what I saw and understood. 

[Figure 11]