Hi everyone! This is Claire and Liza. We have just come back
from our overnight hike on the Incan trail after starting the journey
yesterday. We left at around 9 AM and hiked for around 3 hours with a lunch
break and several snack breaks. Overall, the trip to the Pumamarca ruins, which
is where we set up for the night, took us 5 hours. Before we reached the real
mountain trail, our guide Porfirio told everyone to put a fist sized rock in
their backpack which we then carried for an hour. In the Incan culture, the
rock symbolizes the carrying of your sins. Supposedly, if the rock feels
heavier as you walk up the mountain, you are a big sinner. Then, when we
reached a certain point on the mountain, Pancho (our other guide) and Porfirio
gave us three coca leaves which we had to hold with both hands. Pancho told us
to close our eyes as he recited a prayer in Quechua.
He asked the “Apus” (gods) for a safe journey,
good health, and good studies. We stopped for lunch around
an hour later, and
they had already set up the tables and chairs. Most of the hike was unfortunately
up hill. We arrived at our nighttime campsite around 3 PM. We had free time and
we played cards and explored some of the nearby ruins. Teatime was served at 5
PM and everyone devoured the popcorn and hot chocolate they served. After
teatime, we played man-hunt in the dark. Despite the fact that we couldn’t see
anyone, people fell down mountains, and stepped in lots of donkey poop, we
still had a lot of fun playing. For dinner we ate rice, steak, and French fries
at a candle-lit table.
After dinner,
everyone went star gazing. The stars were beautiful. We could see all the stars
in the southern hemisphere, the Milky Way, and even a few shooting stars (which
we were pretty sure were not satellites).
We also had a sing along where we relived our middle school years by
singing Taylor Swift, Hannah Montana, Ke$ha, and Katy Perry songs for about an
hour.
After singing Call Me Maybe, Sra.
Vera informed us that nobody would call us… After these activities, everybody
went to their tents of 2, 3, or 4 people.
At 8 AM we ate breakfast and made our way up the mountain to
see the Pumamarca ruins. Despite the lack of oxygen, we all made it safely up
the last stretch of the mountain. Porfirio told about the the Quechua town near
our campsite and the history of the Incas and their ruins. Pumamarca was a
military base used in the battles against the Spaniards. He then told us why it
was named Pumamarca from stories he had heard from his Quechuan father.
Apparently there were many pumas around the base at the time of the Incas and
the area itself was called Marca. We proceeded to go down the mountain and
return to Ollantaytambo.
As Claire, Allie, Grace, and Mr. Pomeroy were almost in
Ollantaytambo, they came across a group of American High School students from
Seattle whom they talked to for the duration of the journey. Some of them knew
Gates McGavick, a rising sixth former.
Due the fact that we don’t have any American friends here, and it is the
Fourth of July, we invited them to El Tambo (our meeting location and former
home) for a party where we ate and watched Brazil beat Colombia 2-1. Before
this gathering, a few of us ran into Liberty Potter’s (a rising fourth former)
younger sister who will be coming into third form next year, as we were trying
to exchange money.
Even if the hike there was tiring, we arrived safely back to
Ollantaytambo, made new friends, and continued to have a good Fourth of July
(even though there aren’t any fireworks).
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