Machu Picchu, Peru

Starting out. Those terraces you see in the middle/right of the photo were only discovered 7 years ago.

There were some great views hiking up. Unfortunately the iPhone couldn't capture the 22,000 foot mountain with ice caps in this shot.

The easy part...

...easy enough for these two guys! That's Brendan in the foreground and our amazing Guide Fernando below him.

We're about halfway up Huayna Piccu now, looking back at Macchu Piccu.

This is only about 20 metres from the top.

Brendan is doing his best not to fall over the precipice.

Here's the view of Macchu Piccu. I turned the camera a bit to make it a bit more disorienting...

...without turning the camera, when you look back at Macchu Piccu the entire city was built as a condor. Wings to the left and right, head facing left - and the spine of the bird is the famous Inca Trail...

...which you can kind of make out in the photo. It starts at the top left and goes into Macchu Piccu. That's at about 8500 feet above sea level. There are parts of the INca Trail that are at 14,000 feet. When he was 18 our guide Fernando ran the Inca Trail - which takes four days to hike - in 8 hours.

The Urubamba river about 2,000 feet below.

While backpackers have a nice picinic lunch.

Brendan and Fernando share a luagh with the condor behind them.

You hike up this mountainfor about 45 minutes - some of it with steps 6" deep X 14" wide...

...and THEN you have to go through a little cave to get to the summit.

But it's obviously worth the work!

Here's the view from 9,000 feet.

Brendan smiling before we begin the descent...

...until he saw this!