Alternative Treks to the Inca Trail

by Kraig Becker on

Yesterday we wrote about The Inca Trail, one of the best known and most popular treks anywhere in the world, culminating with hikers arriving at Machu Picchu following a stunning four day journey through the Andes. Unfortunately the popularity of the trail is also one of its drawbacks, with literally hundreds flocking to it on a daily basis during the high season. Those crowds can deminish the experience for those who prefer solitude on their adventures.

Fortunately, there are some excellent alternatives to the Inca Trail that offer more challenging hikes, little to no traffic, and scenery seen by only a select few. Here are three of the very best of those alternatives:

Salcantay Trail
This trail is named after the tallest mountain in the region, but has also garnered the nickname of “Machu Picchu’s Backdoor”. Much like the inca Trail, this trek is four days in length and ends at the lost city. For now it remains light on traffic, although a number of hikers are switching to this trail with increasing frequency, as the Inca Trail continues to sell out earlier and earlier each year. Unlike the Inca Trail however, there are no ruins along the path, and altitude is more of a consideration as the Salcantay climbs as high as 15,420 feet, nearly 2000 feet higher than the Inca. But those who choose the Salcantay get quieter campsites and smaller crowds, with a similar payoff.


Choquequiro
Another amazing trek that ends in an ancient Incan ruin, this time a mountain fortress known as Choquequiro. While not as famous as Machu Picchu, Choquequiro is no less spectacular, with much of the place still being reclaimed from the jungle. The trail to Choquequiro is virtually unknown outside of the backpacker crowd, and the virtually empty route reflects that, but this one is not for the tourist crowd. Far more challenging and remote than the Inca Trail, without the same high altitudes, this hike allows visitors to get up close and personal with the people who inhabit the Andes Mountains in Peru, more so than any of the other trekking options. One of the other draws for this hike is that it can still be done independently as well. Experienced backpackers are able to hike to Choquequiro on their own should they choose, although a guide is still highly recommended.

Cordillera Huayhuash
Peru has some of the best hiking in the world, with stunning landscapes all over the country. Not all of the best hikes are in the Cusco region close to Machu Picchu. Take the Cordillera Huayhuash circuit located north of Lima. This particular trek is not for the faint of heart. While the Inca Trail, and the alternatives listed here are just four days in length, this epic trail takes 16 days to complete, with more demanding hiking across its length. Trekkers pass through 12 distinct high passes and climb above 18,000 feet, surrounded by glacier covered mountains and some of the most stunning vistas in the world. The Huayhuash Circuit is one of the premiere hikes on the planet, and should only be considered by experienced adventure travelers with plenty of trekking experience. Those that do undertake it are rewarded with an adventure of a lifetime.

So, there you have it. Leave the Inca Trail to the crowds, and take one of these other hikes. Enjoy the solitude of the Andes, without giving up the adventure.

Amazing Race 14: Romania is simply gorgeous

by Jamie Rhein on

Going to Bucharest, Romania from Salzburg, Austria doesn’t seem to be that difficult–unless you’re Tammy & Victor who were on the first flight out–that plane had engine troubles and returned to the airport–or Brad & Victoria who decided to take a gamble and fly to Amsterdam for an earlier flight possibility. Instead, they missed their connection. For everyone else, the trip was smooth.

What I noticed during this episode of Amazing Race 14 was that as teams criss-crossed each other, often ending up at the same place at the same time, they seemed to enjoy each other’s company. In my opinion, this is making this season’s race more fun to watch. I mean, my goodness, who wants crabbing in Salzburg? This episode also was a chance to take in Romania’s beauty while seeing how the show would tie in Romanian themes.

When the teams left Salzburg, they headed to Munich on the train with the goal of flying to Bucharest. The train trip was a piece of cake. Except for Victor & Tammy and Brad & Victoria, the flight was smooth as well. Because of their flight’s engine trouble, Victor & Tammy ended up on the second plane instead of being the only team on the first plane out.

Once in Bucharest, the first stop was the gymnastics hall where Olympic gold medalist Nadia Comaneci trained. Here one member from each team donned a leotard to learn parts to three routines: balance beam, parallel bars and floor exercises. Tammy had a time of it. Poor girl. She couldn’t do a cartwheel if she tried for a hundred years. Her somersaults weren’t much better. Luckily, she didn’t have to be perfect. I sympathized. I can’t even touch my toes. Never have been able to and never will.

One of Tammy’s problems was that she was so focused on how their first place status was gone that she wasn’t able to concentrate. As a metaphor for life, it’s hard to stay balanced if you’re not balanced.

After the gymnastics routine, it was off by train to Brasov, the town where the castle made famous by Dracula is located.

In Brasov, at Biserica Neagra, also called the Black Church, the teams found the clue to their next task. There were two from which to choose. One of tasks involved loading up a bunch of miscellaneous belongings, mostly junk, on a gypsy cart and hauling it to another location to unload it. The other task, hauling a coffin downhill and unlocking the chains to open it in order to get to the old wooden framed tablets inside, was at the grounds of Bran Castle of Dracula fame. To complete this task, each tablet was impaled Dracula-style on a stake in order to find the next clue. As the wooden tablets were impaled, blood spurted out which made for an unusual exercise.

At the gypsy settlement, while the teams struggled with their loads, gypsies looked on or did tasks similar to what one might see in a circus. Some played whimsical instruments. Gypsy life sure looks like fun. At least it does if the Amazing Race helps organize it.

The gypsy cart loading was a bit problematic for Mel & Mike because of Mel’s groin injury and the fact that the goods included part of a car and huge tires. But this father and son duo kept their good humor which helped.

Amanda & Cris had a minor setback when they couldn’t find the fanny pack with all their money and passports, but instead of freaking out too badly, they found it where they had unloaded their cart. One reason they were able to find it so quickly was Amanda’s calm demeanor. While Chris freaked out, Amanda said things like, “We’ll find it.” This helped maintain focus.

Victor & Tammy continued to have issues that kept them falling behind because of their interpersonal dynamics. Victor took them up the mountain in search for the coffins on the wrong path. No matter how much Tammy told them they were going the wrong way, he wouldn’t listen. Their game turned into Victor’s power struggle. Eventually he stopped pushing against reason and they headed back down the mountain to find the right trail. Unfortunately, one of the keys to the coffin came off as they dragged it, but Tammy kept calm giving them enough focus to find the key in the leaves. If I were this pair, I’d feel badly that a camera person was filming my every move.

This time it was Mike & Mel to arrive at the Pit Stop first. Their first place win granted them a trip to Costa Rica.

Brad & Victoria’s side trip to Amsterdam cost them. Brad, covered in red goo from impaling the tablets, and Victoria who was still smiling even though it was dark, took their elimination in good spirits. When they lost, I was thinking “You guys are going to love Thailand.” Ko Samui is the site of this year’s Elimination Station. Of course, it would be more enjoyable without having to lose a race in order to get there.

This episode made Romania look like an accessible and beautiful place to visit. An afternoon of wandering along cobblestone streets edged with architecturally interesting buildings would make for a visual treat. The mountains look perfect for hiking, particularly if you’re not on a race. Plus, The Pit Stop was at Villa Panoramic overlooking the castle. Not too shabby.

Photos from Amazing Race Website.

Bowermaster’s Antarctica — In the Footsteps of Shackleton

by Jon Bowermaster on

Fortuna Bay, South Georgia

Ernest Shackleton had an intimate relationship with South Georgia. He stopped here for a month in 1914 before sailing the “Endurance” to its crushing fate in Antarctica; a year and a half later with five others he sailed the gerry-rigged lifeboat “James Caird” 800 miles across the Scotia Sea to King Haarkon Bay, arriving on May 9, 1916; and in 1922 he returned, died and is buried here.

On a warm and sun-filled morning we land at Fortuna Bay, to repeat the last chunk of Shackleton’s legendary and unprecedented climb across South Georgia. A steep and muddy tussock hill leads to fields of broken slate, which climb gradually to 3,000 feet. The higher we get, the more stunning the landscape grows: tall, spiky, far off peaks covered in snow, clear mountain ponds, tufts of soft moss scattered among the shattered scree, waterfalls tumbling off nearby walls.

It was the whalers of South Georgia who first warned Shackleton that his route to the northern edge of the Antarctic continent was likely to be barred by unusually heavy concentrations of ice that had arrived the year he sailed for the Weddell Sea in December. He went anyway; we don’t know what he was thinking when he left South Georgia then nor what exactly when he thought when returned via the “James Caird.” In retrospect would he think it had been a mistake to take the “Endurance” down that season?
Exhausted by the 16 days it took from Elephant Island in the tiny boat, they narrowly negotiated a landing and crawled ashore on the southwestern side of the island, at Cape Rosa. But ultimate safety lay on the north side of the island, at the whaling station called Stromness. Leaving three of his crew under the upturned “James Caird,” Shackleton along with Tom Crean and Frank Worsley set off with minimal equipment (stove, binoculars, compass, an ice ax and ninety feet of rope).

Shackleton wrote of the beginning of the climb: “The snow-surface was disappointing. Two days before we had been able to move rapidly on hard packed snow; now we sank over our ankles at each step. High peaks, impassable cliffs, steep snow-slopes and sharply descending glaciers were prominent features in all directions, with stretches of snow-plain overlaying the ice-sheet of the interior …. The moon, which proved a good friend during this journey, threw a long shadow at one point and told us that the surface was broken in our path. Warned in time, we avoided a huge hole capable of swallowing a small army.”

At one point they had detoured badly and had to drop down to Fortuna Bay, which is where we picked up their trail.

Standing at the crest of the hill, the point at which Shackleton would have seen the sea on the eastern side of the island and possibly evidence of the whaling station at Stromness, it is hard to imagine what must have gone through his mind, after a year and a half being lost. One big difference is their journey in May was through deep snow; we see barely a snow patch on this mid-summer day. What told them they were in the right place after thirty-six hours of climbing, across twenty-two miles of previously unexplored and inhospitable terrain, was the very civilized whistle of the whaling factory’s wake-up call.

“Men lived in houses lit by electric light on the east coast. News of the outside world waited us there, and, above all, the east coast meant for us the means of rescuing the twenty-two men we had left on Elephant Island.”

Clambering downhill, past the tall waterfall Shackleton allegedly rappelled down, we cross a wide, wet plain of saw grass and glacial melt. Rusted remnants of the whaling station still stand, though today it’s tumbling down and off-limits due to being filled with asbestos and flying sheet metal. Thousands of fur seals wait on the beach to greet us; they have taken over the place, aggressively chasing us down the beach as soon as we step onto the sand.

Playing for Change: The U.S. Tour

by Brenda Yun on

Awesome. If you haven’t heard of “Playing for Change” or its international renditions of “Stand By Me,” “One Love,” or “Don’t Worry,” you no longer have to worry: the documentary’s favorite musicians are coming to a U.S. city near you during the month of March only!

General Admission to all shows are just $20, or opt for the VIP (including a meet-and-greet with select musicians) ticket for $100.

Here’s a little clip of the documentary trailer, which gives just a brief glimpse of how we can unite the world through music.

Proceeds go towards the Playing for Change Foundation, which aims to connect the world through music. The foundation provides musicians around the world facilities to play music and enhance their skills, therefore not only making their lives better but also demonstrating how music brings people together regardless of cultural and socio-economic differences.
Here are the dates for this special (and limited) concert series:

Austin:
Thursday, March 19th, 2009
Momo’s
618 W. 6th St.
Austin, TX 78701

Friday, March 20, 2009
Opal Divine’s Freehouse
700 W. 6th St.
Austin, TX 78701

Los Angeles: Monday, March 23, 2009
The Knitting Factory
7021 Hollywood Blvd.
Los Angeles, CA. 90028
323-463-0204
www.knittingfactory.com
Concert starts @ 9PM

San Francisco: Tuesday, March 24, 2009
Slim’s
333 11th St.
San Francisco, CA. 94103
415-255-0333
www.slims-sf.com
Concert starts @ 9PM

Seattle: Wednesday, March 25, 2009
The Showbox at the Market
1426 1st Ave
Seattle, WA. 98101
www.showboxonline.com
Concert starts @ 9PM

New York City: Tuesday, March 31, 2009
Highline Ballroom
431 W. 16th St.
New York, New York 10011
212-414-5994
www.highlineballroom.com
Concert starts @ 9PM

Those of you in Austin, L.A., San Fran, Seattle, and N.Y.C. are the lucky few who will be able to share in the musical revolution sweeping the globe. If you are privileged enough to attend, please let Gadling know how the concert is!!

Classic Treks: The Inca Trail, Peru

by Kraig Becker on

Peru is, beyond a doubt, one of the top adventure travel destinations in the entire world. It offers an amazing array of things to see and do, perfectly blending culture with both mountain and jungle settings, along with ancient artifacts and ruins that rival those found in Egypt. Of course, the most spectacular and famous of those ruins is the lost city of Machu Picchu, located at 8000 feet above sea level, in the Andes Mountains, near the town of Cusco.

Machu Picchu is the number one tourist attraction in a country full of tourist attractions, and there are multiple ways of getting there. Most take a train to the site, preferring to enjoy a scenic ride through the mountains. But one of the other ways of reaching the “Lost City of the Incas” is hiking the Inca Trail, an option that has grown in popularity over the past few years.

The Inca Trail traditionally consists of four days of trekking through the Andes, culminating with hikers catching their first glimpse of the fabled city while passing through the Sun Gate, another small ruin not far from Machu Picchu itself. Along the trail, travelers will experience tropical jungles, cloud forests, and high alpine passes. They’ll also have the opportunity to visit several other ruins as they travel the ancient Incan highway.This option for reaching Machu Picchu is obviously more demanding than taking the train, but more rewarding as well. At least three of the days on the trail are fairly rigourous hiking, and altitude comes into play, with the trail reaching as high as 13,800 feet in a place called Dead Woman’s Pass. Nights are spent camping in tents, and the weather can vary greatly depending on the time of year. But the hikers taking the Inca Trail are there to soak in the scenery and rough it a bit anyway.

In recent years, the trail has become extremely popular, forcing the Peruvian government to put a cap on the number of hikers who can set out each day. During the peak season of June through September, the permits for the trail can sell out weeks in advance, so if you’re planning to hike the trail, get your reservations in early. During the high season, you can expect larger number of hikers, up to 500 per day, and crowded campsites, which can ruin the experience for some. Off peak season means a bit more solitude and open trails, but less predictible weather, usually resulting in more rain or snow.

The payoff for the days on the trail is at the end, when the hikers emerge from the mountains and descend the Incan Staricase from the Sun Gate into Machu Picchu, much the same way that ancient travelrs did hundreds of years ago. Completing the hike is a reward in and of itself, but finding the lost city at the end, and exploring it for several hours, just caps the whole experience.

The Inca Trail is considered by many to be one of the great treks of the world and still holds a high place on many hiker’s “life lists”, despite the fact that it has now become so popular and crowded. For many adventure travelers, it’s still worth the hike, and will always beat taking the train.

If you are interested in trekking the Inca Trail, there are dozens of guide services to choose from. A guide is required by all trekkers, and you are also required to book at least a month in advance, although that too can be flexible when you’re in Cusco. Expect to pay between $300-$500 for the trek, depending on the guides and services they offer.