Hiking The Inca Trail: Day Two
Link to the "Day One" entry.
I woke up to a cheery "Hola! Buenos dias amigo!". I poked my head out of my tent to find one of the porters had brought me some hot water to make tea with a basin of hot water to wash with. Washing on the trail is a rather hurried affair. It's cold in the mornings, so covering yourself with water, even warm water isn't that appealing, but a quick was in the privacy of one's tent isn't so bad. The tea was essential to start the day, I grabbed a handful of the dried coca leaves and then poured hot water over them in a mug to create some delicious coca tea. The coca plant is perhaps best known for being the raw ingredient in cocaine and as such is illegal in most parts of the world. In Peru and Bolivia though the plant is used as a flavouring, as tea and to chew. A major benefit is that it alleviates the symptoms of altitude sickness and so travelers and hikers consume plenty of it. Brewing tea with the leaves releases a tiny amount of the cocaine alkaloid which provides a stimulant effect not unlike a strong cup of coffee. Chewing is a different story though. To chew you take a small quantity (if you're a tourist and a large quantity if you're used to it) of the leaves and place it inside one cheek, then you add a little ash (a small stone of which is generally included when buying the leaves) and grind the leaves between your teeth. Once ground you're supposed to keep the pulp in your cheek to allow the various components to have their full impact. In practice though it's a foul tasting substance and keeping it in your mouth for very long is difficult. Keep it in long enough though and your tongue starts to go numb which I took as a sign to spit the bright green remains out. As disgusting as it sounds it really helps with the effects of the altitude and provides a little energy burst to keep you going.
I'd slept surprisingly well, I'd rented a light-weight roll-up Thermarest mattress to use in addition to the provide foam sleeping mat which was rather comfortable. Combined with a incredibly light and very warm sleeping bag to keep out the cold I had no trouble sleeping. A warm sleeping bag is essential as it can easily reach freezing temperatures on the trail in the winter which is the best time to visit because it's much more likely to be dry.
Breakfast was simple but filling with yet more coca tea. As a group we started to discuss the day ahead. The second day is considered the hardest day on the trail. Most of the day is spent climbing to the highest point on the trail - Dead Woman's Pass at 4215m (~14,000ft) above sea level. We'd all heard stories of people saying it was the hardest thing they'd ever done so there some nervousness in the air. Jeremy, our trusty guide, assured us that we'd all make it if we went at our own pace and reminded us that it would be very cold at the top and to make sure we were carrying warm clothes to change in to at the top. Before leaving though it was time to officially meet the support team of porters and chefs that were accompanying us on the trail.
Each person introduced themselves to us, told us their name, age, where they were from and their duties on the trail. Having a big team like this was great and made things much easier for us. For a start they carried most of gear, so we only had to carry some warm clothes, water, snacks and a camera while hiking. I saw many people hiking that were also carrying all their gear and I didn't envy them one bit.
The introductions over it was time to start hiking. It was going to be a long day. We all set off together but it didn't take long to spread out again into smaller groups of two or three. It's amazing how there can be so many people all hiking together, but apart from at the rest stops you rarely see anyone else.
Almost instantly the trail headed uphill. We were at only 10,000ft above sea level and had to get to 14,000ft before we'd start going down hill. The trail is not really that steep but at that altitude it feels a lot worse. Trying to climb at the same pace you would at a lower altitude leads to quick exhaustion. The morning went well enough with most of the trail weaving through cloud forest which provided some welcome shade. On reaching a large clearing we stopped for a break and to allow the group to get together again. Behind us the mountains loomed ominously, we still had a long way to get to the pass.
The next stop was for lunch. From here we could look along the valley and could just see the trail weaving up the side and up to Dead Woman's Pass. The pass is not named because a woman died up there, although it's easy to believe that could happen, but because the formation of the mountains apparently looks like the profile of a dead woman. I couldn't see it myself no matter how much I looked, perhaps if I did a lot more coca I might have done, but I just took Jeremy's word for and kept walking.
If there's one thing that I can recommend that makes the hike easier (other than coca) it's to take regular short breaks. I'd hike for about thirty minutes then take a five minute break, have some water, get my breath back and perhaps chew some coca before setting out again. That combined with bigger breaks at spots designated by the guide every ninety minutes to two hours made everything quite bearable.
When climbing up to the pass every corner looks like it might be the last one, but it always seems like there's more to go. Finally, though you round the last corner and can see the last few steps up to the pass. The relief at having made it is extreme and then if you had any breath left from the ascent the view soon takes that away.
From these photos it's hard to get an idea of just how far we'd climbed, but if you look to the lowest point in the valley, that's where we had lunch.
At the top it was surprisingly warm, even our guide was surprised and commented that it was normally much colder and could easily be below freezing up there. Not wanting to tempt fate and knowing that we still a good distance to go we started going down the other side. From that point on it's all downhill to the camp for the night. Shortly after you start the descent there are a set of toilets that are surprisingly well maintained for their location, so if you feel the need, it's a good place to stop.
The descent is pretty easy going, it's just long with the occasional steep section which requires some care - you really don't want to fall and get hurt here. By the time we reached the camp site it was starting to get dark. The camp site was crowded, every flat surface had a tent on it, but of course our porters had secured a quiet spot away from the main crowd and as usual greeted us with a round of applause. Unlike our previous camping spot the night before there was no private facilities, instead everyone was sharing a limited number of locations which lead to queues forming and unpleasant odor. Everything is cleaned regularly, but that can't really cope with two hundred plus hikers, a reasonable percent of which are likely suffering from the altitude, a change in diet and a touch of food poisoning.
The camp on day two is located in a valley and gets pretty cold when it gets dark, so we were all eager to have dinner and get to bed - there are no late nights on the trail!