Salkantay Trek - Day 1

We woke up early on our 1st wedding anniversary to start our 5 day trek to Machu Picchu. We left Cusco early, and arrived near Soray to start the Salkantay Trek. Our first day was an easy 6km to Lake Humantay, which was a 'practice' hike for us to get used to hiking at 4000m+ above sea level. Even after being in Cusco for a week, the altitude and thin air was quite tough to hike in. When we arrived at a Lake Humantay, we were pelted by rain but were lucky enough to witness a small avalanche on the far side of the lake. We returned to our camp, and set up our mountain huts for the night. We had our meals at a cliff top building which had the most beautiful views of the surrounding area, but required a tough 10 minute uphill walk to get to from the huts. It was a really cold night sleeping at an altitude of 4000m (we had all of our layers on), and it even snowed while we slept. It was the first time in 4 years that they'd had snow on the Salkantay Pass and we were lucky we packed enough warm clothes!Read more