Trails and Treasures

Finally, it’s time to move on to my primary reason for traveling to Peru–hiking to Machu Picchu via the Inca Trail.  Usually some version of this walk makes any list of the top treks in the world, so it’s no surprise that it has been on my bucket list for a long time.  Since I’m not getting any younger, it was time to go.  I chose the classic version of the trek, 45 km starting from Km. 82 in 3 1/2 days.

First, some background about the trail.  The Inca were great road builders.  Just like the Romans, they needed the means for moving troops around and for communicating with their far-flung administrators in an empire that stretched some 2,400 miles from Quito south to the Maule River in Chile.  By the time the Spanish arrived, an estimated 40,000 km of roads existed, and, also like Roman roads, these roads were built to last since the Inca expected to be around awhile.  On the other hand, none of the Andean peoples had developed the wheel, so there were no wide carts or wagons moving along the roads, just men and llamas.  Of course, without horses or oxen to pull something with wheels, there had been no reason to invent such a conveyance.  Thus, Inca roads tended to be narrower than Roman roads.  Moreover, the engineers who laid them out had no need to worry about creating smooth, gradual inclines to insure horse-drawn wheeled vehicles could make it over the mountains.  Thus, steps were obviously the best way to get up or down steep inclines.  And why would you use switchbacks which require more linear distance than steps to achieve the same change in elevation, especially when the trail is being carved out of bedrock? 

The roads were paved with flat stones.  When necessary, retaining walls and culverts were used to insure the road could survive the summer monsoons, and, occasionally, a tunnel was somehow hand-carved through a rocky outcrop that could not be circumnavigated.

Most of what we call the Classic Inca Trail was the road built by the Inca Pachacuti to provide access for building his new retreat at Machu Picchu.  It was built so that the bearers who carried the Inca on his litter to his retreat could give him a smooth ride.  (As a person prone to motion sickness, I just can’t imagine that riding would be better than walking.)

Classic Inca Trail Schematic Map

Classic Inca Trail Map

Another version with North on top

Today’s classic trek usually begins near kilometer 82 of the rail line between Cusco and Aguas Calientes.  While the tracks hug the bank of the river through the narrow gorge on the last leg of the trip, the road stops at Piskacucho.

Access to the trail is restricted; only 500 people, including guides, cooks, and porters, can enter the trail per day, and one cannot travel solo without a licensed guide.  My group of three trekkers was accompanied by a staff of nine.  If that ratio of 1 to 3 were consistent across trekking companies and group size, only 125 trekkers could start the trail per day.  Reservations are a must!

Not all trekking companies are equal.  Nina booked me with Llama Path.  The staff are treated very well by the companies’ owners, which include a former porter.  On the trail, they are easy to recognize as they wear red uniforms, carry real (red) backpacks (not baskets or tarps or blankets loaded with gear), and have real hiking boots (not sandals).  Moreover, their loads seem to be lighter.

Llama Path Staff

The evening before departure, we three trekkers met for the first time at the Llama Path office.  My companions were a young couple from West Los Angeles–Andrew and Yvette.  They were one month into an 8+-month around-the-world tour.  Our guide was Romero.

Not all versions of the Classic Inca Trail are equal in difficulty.  There are multiple campsites along the first section of the trail, and where your company chooses to pitch its tents effects how far you will hike and how much elevation you will gain and lose in a day.  If you have done any training at all for the trek, it is easier to walk further the first day so that on day 2, which has the most elevation gain,  you start higher and have less distance to travel.  We camped the first night at Ayapata after a 14-km walk with a gain of 1,900 feet.  As a consequence, we had a 3,000-ft climb to the highest point on the trail the next morning rather than a 4,000-ft climb.  Friends who took the trek a few days later with another company spent the first night at the lower camp and found that climb an exhausting way to start the day.

Our Inca Trail itinerary was as follows:

Day 1: Km 82 (8,923’) to Ayapata (10,829’) with lunch at Wayllabamba (9,842’).  The 12km to the lunch spot was estimated to take 5 hrs; the 2 km from there to Ayapata 1.3 hrs.

Day 2: Ayapata (10,829’) to Dead Woman’s Pass (13,779’) and then down to Pacaymayo (11,700’) for lunch—8.5km, 7 hrs; Pacaymayo over 2^nd pass (13,123’) to Chaquicocha camp (11,800’)—7.5 km, 4 hrs.

Day 3: Chaquicocha (11,800’) to 3^rd pass (12,073’)—2 hrs, and then another 3 hrs down to Wiñay Huayna at 8,792’, a total distance of 10km.

Day 4: Wiñay Huayna to the Sun Gate (8,956’) and Machu Picchu (7,873’), a total distance of 5km.

Not all guides are equal.  My guide for the trek into the Colca Canyon, Omar, was far superior to Romero in terms of interests.  We had really interesting discussions about birds, geology, culture, history, religion, etc.  While Romero knew his history, he clearly had his prepared spiel and had trouble with interuptions and interjections.  On the other hand, he had lots of experience in dealing with clients of all levels of trekking ability and experience.  He was an excellent coach.

Not all porters are equal.  Ours appeared to be a happy bunch.  They joked and laughed among themselves and were quick to smile.  Since we were a small group, they set up the kitchen in half of the dining tent with just a partial cloth wall partition.  That meant we could watch them cook and talk to them while they were preparing meals if we stood up.  Unfortunately, only one of the porters, a student, spoke English very well; some of the others understood at least some English.  While my companions spoke Spanish, some of the porters only spoke Quechua.

Every other year the guides and porters can participate in a race along the 27-mile Inca Trail.  Just a few years ago someone broke the 1997 record of 3 hrs 45 min with a spectacular run of 3 hr 24 min.  The typical tourist trekker takes 3 1/2 days!

As I mentioned in my last post, Nina Fogelman of Ancient Summit works with a group of weavers in the Sacred Valley.  By taking her clients to meet them and learn about how they ply their craft, she reinforces the importance of their weaving in the ancient manner while providing them a means for earning money without turning their village and themselves into a spectacle or just another stop on the tourist circuit.  Clients are encouraged to make their visit a learning stop, not a shopping stop.  No tips are allowed.  If one wants to help the village, bring school supplies.  At my hotel, I met another of Nina’s clients; he was spending the week as a volunteer in the school.

When I arrived just after lunch, about a half dozen women were working and chatting in the open plaza in front of the village church.

Village Church in the Sacred Valley

Weavers in the Village Plaza

One of the women took me, with my translator guide, for a stroll into the countryside where she pointed out various plants, explaining their medicinal and other practical uses such as in dyeing wool.  Along the way, we met a woman moving sheep, although I had a hard time figuring out who was leading whom.

Sheep were introduced by the Spanish and are the primary source of wool in the Sacred Valley, not llamas or alpacas.  This little one didn’t want to move along.

Back in the village, another woman demonstrated how they clean the wool using the root of the plant Sacha paraqay.  Sheep’s wool is very greasy and needs to be washed several times to get it clean.

As in most of Peru, these women use a drop spindle for spinning.  According to Nilda Alvarez (see my last post), children begin to spin when six or seven years old, and, by the age of ten, are expected to produce usable yarn.

Using a Drop Spindle

This child was “helping” to dye a skein of yarn.

Traditional Andean weavers use a backstrap loom that produces a warp-faced weaving.

Using a backstrap loom

Warp-faced weaving

Weaving on a Backstrap Loom

As I noted in my post about the reed-weaving Uros, working outdoors as these women were is typical throughout Peru.

The Spanish also introducing knitting to Peru.

Note the details of the hats

The book being examined by the woman above appeared to be a notebook of patterns.  Documenting patterns and their meaning is a recent phenomenon.  As more and more people leave their rural communities of birth for consumer-focused city life, weaving traditions are being lost.  These women are doing their part to insure their traditions are not lost to the future.

“Peru has the longest continuous textile record in world history. “ 

The earliest fragments of Peruvian textiles date from about 8600 BC; that’s 10,000 years ago.   Peruvian pottery can only be traced back to between 1500 and 1000 BC.

It would be impossible to visit Peru today without recognizing that weaving and textiles more generally play important roles in the tourist trade.  In Cusco, the tourists’ mecca, the streets are lined with shops selling all types of woven items, everything from chullos (those knit hats with ear flaps and tassels) to exquisite alpaca sweaters.

Just one of many types of woven hats for sale in Cusco

In the Sacred Valley, most tour operators make sure you visit at least one site or shop related to weaving.  In a previous post, I mentioned my visit to Awana Kancha, a weaving collective.  In addition to viewing the raw ingredients on the hoof, the visit included an introduction to how the hair was transformed into yarn and then woven.

Examples of Naturally-dyed Yarn

My tour company, Ancient Summit, also takes clients to a village where one gets a chance to learn about textile production one-on-one in a non-commercial setting, but I’ll talk about that visit in a later post.

Weaving was also highlighted during my visit to Taquile.

What I want to discuss in this post is what wasn’t discussed by any of my tour guides–the historical role of Andean textiles.  Two excellent books on this subject are: 

Woven Stories: Andean Textiles and Rituals, by Andrea Heckman, a trekking guide who earned a Ph.D. in Latin American Studies based on her anthropological-art history research, (2003), and

Weaving in the Peruvian Highlands, Dreaming Patterns, Weaving Memories, by Nilda Alvarez (2007).  Nilda, a weaver from Chinchero, established the Center for Traditional Textiles of Cusco.

During the 100-year reign of the Incas, most adults had to pay a tax in labor, the mit’a.  Men typically served in the military or worked on public construction projects.  Women wove, and a percentage of their output became the property of the Inca.  The finest pieces became his personal property, but most of the cloth was stockpiled in storehouses and used to reward government service and clothe the army.  In an economy without money, cloth was a highly-valued commodity.

In a society without the written word, textiles played a vital role in communication.  “Weavings were a metaphorical presentation of the world” in which they lived. (Heckman, p. 8)  Each village had its own cloth patterns and clothing styles.  Even today it is possible for the knowledgeable to pinpoint someone’s hometown if he or she is wearing something made of homemade cloth.

Most of the weavings were arrangements of various geometric designs.  Both the pattern and arrangement had meaning, making it possible to convey complex ideas.  Unfortunately, as women migrate to urban areas in order to move beyond subsistence living, the traditional stories and meanings that were passed orally from one generation to the next along with the craft of weaving are being lost.  Efforts to stem the loss of craft and knowledge vary from the skill-based efforts of the Center for Traditional Textiles of Cusco to the knowledge-based efforts of  AI researchers at the London Knowledge Lab.

Typical Weaving Patterns

The inclusion of animals and birds in chullos and sweaters for tourists is a modern adaptation in response to market demands.  The weavers on Taquile have gone further than just adding non-geometric units to their weaving; they invented a cloth object just for the tourist trade–the calendar belt.  For a discussion of the history of weaving on Taquile and the effects of tourism, see anthropologist Elayne Zorn’s Weaving a Future: Tourism, Cloth and Culture on an Andean Island (2004).

A Taquile Weaving in Progress

Taquile Design Details

Having studied the effects of tourism (via Fred Harvey) on the arts and crafts of the Navajo and Hopi, I found Zorn’s work particularly interesting.  Unfortunately, I’ve not been able to find a scholarly study that addresses the issue of  how tourism and commercialization of crafts effect native cultures.

Some additional resources:

“The Cultural Significance of Andean Cloth and Implications of Its Decline”

Taquile and Its Textile Art