Start: Day 1 at 4:30 am at your hotel in Cusco.
End: Day 5 around 8:00 pm in downtown Cusco.
Day 1: Cusco – Challacancha – Soraypampa (16 km or 10 miles, 6 hours).
We will pick you up at your hotel to start the trip towards our starting point, and will head off towards Mollepata, which is a 3-hour trip. Once we arrive there, we will have to pay our entrance fee to the community and then we will have breakfast (not included) in a restaurant of a local family. There will be enough time to buy some last items before meeting with the group with whom we will make the trek. After receiving the guide’s instructions, we will board the bus again that will take us to Challacancha, where we will start the trek. We will hike the trail while observing the initial landscapes with mountains and valleys. After 3 hours, we will reach the Soraypampa camp at an altitude of 3,900 meters (12,795 ft.). Here we will have lunch and then have some time to rest and recover. In the afternoon we will go up to the Humantay Lagoon, a natural sight one and a half hours from the camp and at an altitude of 4,100 meters (13,451 ft.), where it is possible to see the glacier with the same name in the background if weather permits. Once back at the camp, we will rest for a moment before having dinner, where we will spend time together and listen to the guide’s instructions for the next day before going to sleep in our tents.
Day 2: Soraypampa – Abra Salkantay – Colpapampa (13.7 miles of trek, 10 hours).
We will begin the day with a coca tea in our tents to wake up with energy. After packing up and getting our things ready to go, we will meet for breakfast and then get ready to begin the trek. We will begin to go up the mountains while observing the different landscape from the previous day and making stops to rest as we gain altitude. Our destination is the Abra Salkantay at an altitude of 4,650 meters (15,256 ft.), where we will have views of the Humantay Glacier and the snowcapped Salkantay Mountain. At this highest point of the trek, we will perform a small ceremony of thanks to the Pachamama (Mother Earth) and the surrounding Apus (mountains), and then we will continue on to Huayracmachay for lunch, at an altitude of 3,800 meters (12,467 ft.). After recovering some energy, we will continue our descent while going from a cold, mountain landscape to a warmer jungle landscape until reaching the Chaullay camp (2,900 meters, 9,514 ft.), where we will have dinner and then go to sleep in our tents.
Day 3: Colpapampa – Lucmabamba (7.4 miles of trek, 5 hours).
We will begin the morning with a coca tea in our tents to wake up and then get our things together. After breakfast, we will say goodbye to the porter, who will go on ahead with our luggage, and then we will begin our hike. We will see different types of plantations along the route such as quinoa and pomegranate, and the guide will tell us about different flowers and their importance in the Andean culture. After hiking for 5 hours, we will reach Playa Sahuayacu to have lunch. After resting for a little while, we will then continue our journey by bus to Santa Teresa, where we will spend our third night. Here we can go to the Cocalmayo Hot Springs (optional, not included) during the afternoon to help our muscles recover from the days of hiking, which has 3 pools with different temperatures. At night we will eat dinner, receive instructions for the next day, and have time to hang out with the group and rest.
Day 4: Lucmabamba – Aguas Calientes (12.4 miles of trek, 9 hours).
The day begins with breakfast so we have energy to make the hike to Hidroeléctrica. We will continue observing the diverse landscapes, now at altitudes ranging from 1,700 to 2,000 meters (5,577 to 6,562 ft.), where we can see the jungle landscape all the way to our destination. After lunch we will walk alongside the railroad track for 3 hours to get to Aguas Calientes. Here, we will get settled into our hostel and then at dinnertime we will go to a restaurant in the town. After dinner, we will receive the guide’s instructions for the following day, as well as a snack for the trek between Aguas Calientes and Machu Picchu, and then we will leave to go to the hostel to sleep.
Day 5: Aguas Calientes – Machu Picchu – Cusco.
We will get up very early to hike from Aguas Calientes to Machu Picchu. A climb up the stairs to the citadel will be awaiting us, where we will meet with our guide to take a 1-hour tour with explanations about how the site was discovered, the time period in which it was built and the techniques used to build it, as well as other interesting information. Then, we will have some free time to explore on our own and take pictures or climb up one of the mountains (Machu Picchu or Huayna Picchu) if you included this optional service. After touring the site, we have to go back to Aguas Calientes to pick up our things and go to the train station a half an hour before the departure time of the train to Ollantaytambo. From there we will take a vehicle that will drop us off in downtown Cusco.
by denomades 
