The day started super early at 3.30am. The plan was to have breakfast, get ready and get to the gate first. The control gate at Wiñay Wayna doesn't open until 5.30 but groups are let through in the order that they arrive. The aim is to be first through the control gate to trek the last hour or so of the trail in order to be the first to Intipunku, the famous Sungate. Our group was not first. In fact, we were about 8th. We stood in the line keeping warm in the ...

Early to rise to a nice warm cup of coca tea again, we wearily climbed out of our tents to a lovely view of Veronica, a nearby snow capped peak. We were tired and sore from day 2 but we had to press on. The uphill started almost immediately. We had about a 300m climb to the first ruins of the day, Runkurakay, a circular building that was believed to be a resting place for Chaskis (runners or messengers) on their way to Machu Picchu. It was a good place for us t...

Wake up time was early, though we were awake even earlier thanks to the local roosters. We were served a nice hot coca tea in our tents before getting up for breakfast. The valley was so beautiful and peaceful in the early morning but there was a flurry of activity with everyone packing up and preparing to set off. We had only about 10 minutes of relatively flat trail to get the knees warmed up before we started our 1,200 metre ascent. Today we would all walk at...

Despite little sleep we woke up super excited about commencing the Inca Trail. We caught a taxi to Peru Treks office where the bus picked us up. A few people were already on board then we proceeded to collect the remainder of the group. We were quite annoyed when the bus collected other passengers only a few blocks from our hostel given they had made us get a taxi! Nevertheless we were on our way! We drove initially to Ollantaytambo, an old Incan town nestled in...

As our taxi driver approached our new hostel, he warned that the area can be dangerous at night. Hostel Piuray was a couple of blocks past the edge of the Centro Historico, but we had booked it partly for this reason, and because the online ratings were good and mentioned pancakes for breakfast. When we checked in the owner Aydee was really lovely, allowing us to choose our room. She mentioned one had a new mattress so we took that. Aside from a few passing tra...