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Post by auntym on Jul 8, 2011 23:20:10 GMT -6
travel.nytimes.com/2011/06/26/travel/in-peru-machu-picchu-and-its-sibling-incan-ruins-along-the-way.html?ref=travelThe Hidden Route to Machu PicchuBy MARK ADAMS Published: June 24, 2011 Piotr Redlinski for The New York Times Machu Picchu was first seen by an American 100 years ago. Close to a million visitors are expected to visit this year AS we neared the end of a very long climb up a very steep ridge, my guide, John Leivers, shouted at me over his shoulder. “It’s said that the Spaniards never found Machu Picchu, but I disagree,” he said. I caught up to him — for what seemed like the 20th time that day — and he pointed his bamboo trekking pole at the strangely familiar-looking set of ruins ahead. “It’s this place they never found.” He was pointing to Choquequirao, an Incan citadel high in the Peruvian Andes that so closely resembles Machu Picchu that it’s often touted as the sister site of South America’s most famous ruins. Both are believed to have been built in the 15th century and consist of imposing stone buildings arranged around a central plaza, situated among steep mountain ridges that overlook twisting whitewater rivers, with views of skyscraping peaks — known as apus, or mountain deities, to both the Incas and their Quechua-speaking Andean descendants — in several directions. Both are almost indescribably beautiful. But there’s no question about which sibling is more popular. An estimated 3,000 people make their way through Machu Picchu’s corridors on a typical day. Between breakfast and lunch at Choquequirao, I counted 14 people, including myself, John and a few scattered archaeologists. TO CONTINUE READING & SEE MORE PICTURES CLICK ON ABOVE LINK
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graveyardhound
New Member
No I am not jerking your chain, beg all you like.
Posts: 51
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Post by graveyardhound on Jul 11, 2011 9:21:18 GMT -6
Don't even think about walking the new drop-off spot unless you are in good shape and a real in-shape type from the old spot. Been twice, am in very good shape, and I thought I wasn't going to see America after 3 hrs. of walking up there.
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Post by skywalker on Jul 11, 2011 18:35:51 GMT -6
That's cool that you got to go there. I've been to South America a few times but haven't made it down that far yet. I might have to do something about that pretty soon.
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Post by auntym on Jul 18, 2011 22:46:21 GMT -6
travel.nationalgeographic.com/travel/top-10/peru/machu-picchu/visitors/?source=link_twt20110718mpvisitors Famous Machu Picchu VisitorsBy Mark Adams, author of Turn Right at Machu Picchu 1. Pachacutec (ca. 1450) This greatest of Inca emperors, whose name meant “He Who Shakes the Earth,” found time between territorial conquests to launch one of the greatest civil engineering campaigns of all time. Among the building projects he oversaw were the thousands-of-miles-long Inca highway system, the remaking of Cusco as a holy city, and the construction of several magnificent royal estates for his own use. Among them was Machu Picchu. 2. Hiram Bingham (1911, 1912, 1915) As this young Yale lecturer sniffed around Cusco for clues to the location of the legendary Lost City of the Inca, he heard vague reports that some impressive ruins might be found on a mountain ridge down in the Urubamba Valley. Bingham made the first recorded visit to Machu Picchu on July 24, 1911. He received history’s first guided tour of the ruins from a young boy whose family lived at the site. His reaction? “It fairly took my breath away,” he wrote. 3. Cole Porter (1939) Tourism to Machu Picchu was slow to catch on, but when the American songwriter (“Anything Goes,” “I’ve Got You Under My Skin”) saw a story about the ruins in an issue of National Geographic, he traveled to Peru, climbed aboard a horse, and rode up to the still partly overgrown citadel. His companion’s description of their campsite—a three-room building without plumbing that sat roughly where the $800-a-night Machu Picchu Sanctuary Lodge Hotel sits today, offers a rare glimpse at what conditions were like. Dinner one night was a freshly caught and killed chicken, with a few charred feathers still attached. 4. Pablo Neruda (1943) This Chilean poet’s visit to the ruins inspired one of his most famous works, “The Heights of Machu Picchu.” The poem is generally agreed to have reinvigorated Neruda’s stagnant career, and he eventually won the 1971 Nobel Prize in Literature. “Heights” marked a shift in how Machu Picchu was viewed, redirecting its reputation away from the novelty status of a lost city and refocusing attention on the grand achievement of the people who built it. 5. Che Guevara (1952) When the asthma-hobbled medical student named Ernesto Guevara departed Buenos Aires on a motorbike with his buddy Alberto Granado, the men planned to tour South America looking for fun and adventure. Along the way, however, Guevara picked up both a new nickname and a deep connection to the indigenous peoples of the continent, Peru in particular. In the book he wrote about the trip, The Motorcycle Diaries, he describes a visit he made at Machu Picchu, which he calls “a pure expression of the most powerful indigenous race in the Americas.”
CONTINUE READING PG 2 .... 6---10: travel.nationalgeographic.com/travel/top-10/peru/machu-picchu/visitors/?source=link_twt20110718mpvisitors#page=2
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Post by auntym on Jul 24, 2011 13:04:49 GMT -6
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Post by skywalker on Jul 24, 2011 20:14:20 GMT -6
My theory is that they looked into the future and saw that millions of people would one day be hiking up that mountain so they built Machu Picchu as a tourist attraction for the people to see so they wouldn't be disappointed when they got to the top.
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Deleted
Deleted Member
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Post by Deleted on Jul 28, 2011 13:39:08 GMT -6
That is no stranger a theory than some I've heard recently I think it was a city built 'in the clouds' so to speak so that enemies couldn't sneak up on them or if they did...they'd be too darn tired to fight.
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Post by Steve on Jul 29, 2011 17:27:33 GMT -6
They should do a television show called..... 'Michio Kaku at Machu Picchu'. Steve
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Post by auntym on Jul 29, 2011 18:58:17 GMT -6
They should do a television show called..... 'Michio Kaku at Machu Picchu'. Steve ;D
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Deleted
Deleted Member
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Post by Deleted on Jul 29, 2011 21:18:33 GMT -6
Steve...displaying his 'frisky' side. I LIKE it
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Post by auntym on May 2, 2014 14:37:04 GMT -6
SO YOU WANT TO CLIMB TO THE TOP OF MACHU PICCHU?
Published on Dec 7, 2012
Machu picchu and the life defying hike and climb of Waynapicchu by Adam,Angela,Eddie,Jackie,Jeremy and Mateo. The gripping views and gripping of stairs on the steep climbs adds to our excitement. Karina and Max sacrifice their chance to summit this peak this time so that the others may conquer. sun up to after sun down. Picacchu's and rainbows at the end. Some spell it Huaina picchu.
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Post by swamprat on Jul 4, 2016 10:39:40 GMT -6
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Post by skywalker on Jul 4, 2016 13:28:22 GMT -6
That's probably why it was restricted.
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