Exploring the lost city

Named one of the “new” Seven Wonders of the World in 2007, its distinctive silhouette is easily recognizable. And because way too many of us choose to visit Machu Picchu, the legendary Incan “lost” city in the Andes Mountains, the Peruvian government is soon planning to limit the number of daily visitors to protect their most famous site from damage caused by its huge popularity.

I first read about Machu Picchu as a Spanish student at A.C. Jones High School in the 1960s, and the mysterious city has fascinated me ever since. I had always wanted to visit the spectacular ruins, but hadn’t gotten around to it…

…until last spring, when my cousin Patsy Chesnutt Tucker of Buena Vista, Colo., called to tell me that she was planning to visit Machu Picchu, and did I want to go with her?

It took me about 30 seconds to make up my mind to accompany her.

As I began reading about Peru, the Incas and Machu Picchu, I wondered how my body would react to the highest altitudes I have ever visited. Cuzco is 11,000 feet above sea level, and Machu Picchu is at almost 8,000 feet.

It was July 30 when we flew out of Houston and began our journey.

Arriving at Cuzco, a city in southeastern Peru, and at the Hotel Arqueológico we were greeted with cups of coca leaf tea, one of the most common recommendations for countering altitude sickness.

Either the coca tea was very effective or my body adapted very well, for I had no problems other than having to stop and catch my breath frequently when climbing Cuzco’s many stairs and steep streets.

In most of the cities they conquered, the Spaniards destroyed the original buildings and constructed churches and government buildings on top of them. However, the Incan walls throughout the empire were so well built that it was evidently easier to build on top of them, rather than to tear them down. As a result, one gets the feeling of being in a 15th-century Incan city.

We wanted to try traditional Peruvian food and that meant a taste of cuy al horno – roasted guinea pig.

The small animals have been raised and eaten for special occasions by the Andean people for centuries.

One has to hunt for the meat on these small animals. The taste was somewhere between chicken and pork, not bad, but not tasty enough to repeat the experience.

While touring the area, we ran into former Coastal Bend College Spanish student Reneé DeLisse, an A.C. Jones High School graduate, and her college friend who were getting ready to board the train back to Cuzco, from where they were traveling to Lake Titicaca, after having completed their visit to Machu Picchu. Our paths crossed at exactly the right time.

After several days of touring the area, including the Cathedral of the Plaza de Armas, we headed for our long-awaited destination. After a bus ride of hairpins turns and a hike up a short trail, we were at Machu Picchu.

There it was: that internationally famous view, mostly in the clouds. We had goosebumps for we could see enough of the beautiful ruins to appreciate the incredible Incan architecture.

From our guide we learned that Machu Picchu was constructed between 1438 and 1650 and probably served as a hidden refuge after the Spanish conquest in 1532.

The city of 1,200 was abandoned in 1650, possibly because an Incan woman had brought her Spanish lover or husband to the city, he said. Their slain bodies were found at the sun gate, the entrance to the city.

We saw the sun tower, with one window through which the sun shines directly on June 21 and another perfectly located for the sun’s rays on Dec. 22.

Nearby was a cave where mummies in fetal positions were entombed. Our guide said his grandfather’s theory was that the condors take the spirits of the dead back to the valleys, where they are reincarnated as babies, hence the fetal position.

That afternoon we hiked the trail to the Inca Bridge, an ancient draw bridge on an amazing trail across the sheer face of a tall vertical rock wall.

I’m not afraid of heights, but I definitely don’t like unprotected edges, so I endured the hike by hugging the rock wall. The scenery was worth it.

Our second day in Machu Picchu we poked around in the residential areas and climbed to the Intihuatana, the “hitching post of the sun,” as it is called, at the highest point of the royal sector. Incan astronomers studied the Southern Cross from that location.

Washington Gibaja Tapia writes, la Pachamama has projects for millions of years, not just for “right now.” She taught the Incas to respect one another and the beautiful earth, to think of the generations who would come after them, and to build structures that would last 1,000 years.

Perhaps we need to take some lessons from the Incas.