Swimming for midgets

Wednesday, July 14th
Today the plan of attack was to hike to a waterfall, go for a chilly swim and then continue down the inca trail to base camp at Aguascalientes. Well since our guide was still drunk and high on cocaine from the previous evening, the day didn't exactly go as planned. We arrived to the waterfall which we were told was "huge and we could swim underneath it" to learn that the waterfall was in fact 35 meters high but at the base sat a pool of water only about 2 feet deep. Totally swimmable for midgets like the Mccarron family! I waded it and went for a chilly, shallow dip. Then we had to drove for a lil bit to reconnect with the inca trail. We ate some lunch which later gave a few guys in my group food poisoning. Then we continued to hike down the trail to the touristy base camp, aguascalientes. The hike today was absolutely amazing. The Peruvians built a railroad that runs along the widest part of the trail. This is what we trekked down for the next 4 hours. The flat trail was at the base of the Andean valley and it followed the river the entire way. It was great to be able to look at my surroundings as I hiked becuase the day before you always had to watch where you were stepping to make sure you didn't fall off the edge of the mountain. As we got closer we could barely see the ruins of Machu Picchu high up in the distance. As soon as we got a glimpse of the ruins we all felt as we had accomplished something phenomenial and we had done it together. Once we arrived in Aguascalientes we were relieved that we have almost completed our mission. Aguascalientes is pretty little town that sits at the base of Machu Picchu mountain. Clearly, the town's main purpose is to attract tourists to Machu Pichhu and overcharge the crap outta them with inadequate food, dirty hot springs, and overpriced personalized tours of the ruins. We had a mellow dinner and we were told to get to bed as early as possible becuase we had to wake up at 3:30am to start our ascend up the mountain at 4am to reach the sun gate by 5:30am. I couldn't fall asleep till 11:30pm becuase my mind was racing with excitement.