We arrived at the town of Agua Calientes by train in the early afternoon and then took a bus up steep switchbacks to Machu Picchu. We entered the ruins late in the afternoon. This turned out to be the best time as most of the other visitors had left the park and it was cooler than during the mid-day.
Machu Picchu is certainly worthy of the status of being one of the seven wonders of the world. In fact there is a movement to have it listed as such. The site itself is divided into a agricultural area and an urban area. The current thought is that the settlement was the home of the women who were selected and raised as possible sacrifices to the gods. There is also a school of thought that the site was also a sort of university for training astronomers. There are a number of temples throughout the runs to the major gods (sun, earth, sky). It is very easy to distinguish a holy site from a "practical" one because the nature and quality of the stone work is much more precise around the holy sites.
Archaeologists think it probably took around a century to build Machu Picchu and the resident population was probably several hundred individuals.
We were the last ones out of the ruins in the evening. It was very special to have the place to ourselves for a few minutes.
Tomorrow we'll do a sunrise walk and then take a long hike up to the Sun Gate.
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