Aguas Calientes is nestled in a valley below Machu Picchu, surrounded by towering walls of rock and the cloud forest. It’s located on the Urubamba River, while train tracks run through the center of town. This is undoubtedly a huge tourist town, but after so much nature lately, I don’t mind being showered in cuddly llamas and alpaca blankets – at least for an hour or two.
Our return to Cusco is partly by train (to Ollantaytambo) and then by Llamapath minibus. But there’s already a problem. PeruRail have canceled our 2pm train and we’re told we have to pay extra for a seat on the 4pm service. Our broken Spanish is insufficient to truly understand the situation or to communicate our concerns (that Llamapath will not wait for us at Ollantaytambo and that we’ll miss our evening bus connection from Cusco to Arequipa). Initially, the harassed staff at PeruRail waves away our concerns, but then something wonderful happens. Something that often happens, I’ve found, to a stranded traveler. Human kindness takes over, and Christi and I are suddenly ushered onto the 2.20pm service (where did that come from?) and life is good again.
We’re dropped outside the Llampath office during a monster thunderstorm. We collect our packs, say goodbye to the staff, and wolf down a dinner of Peruvian fried chicken and fries at a nearby restaurant before taxiing to the Cruz del Sur bus station. Collapse into our second class seats on the upper level of this double-decker bus in time for a prompt (8.30pm) departure, our somewhat disheveled faces caught forever on the company’s security video.
Blog post by Roderick Phillips, author of Weary Heart – a gut-wrenching tale of love and test tubes.
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