Finding Machu Picchu

At the earliest moment of sunrise, James and I stepped around the bend of the mountain. Lacy pieces of mist drifted across the Inka Trail like aimless ghosts, too tired in the early morning to heed any particular direction. They merged and separated giving us alternating views of the trail. We had arisen at 3.30am in order to get through the final checkpoint on the Inka Trail leading to Machu Picchu.

“Please wait at the Sun Gate,” Smithy, our guide, had implored the night before. The Intipunku or Sun Gate sits on a spine of the mountain in a direct alignment with the sun rising during the Southern Hemisphere Summer Solistice (December 22).

James and I had rushed onward though because the heavy mist at the Sun Gate had blotted out any chance of seeing the sun at all.

We kept hiking at a brisk pace refusing to give voice to the impending sense of disappointment: After four days walking, it seemed that Machu Picchu would be a white cloud. Four days ago, our team of 8 trekkers, 13 porters and our guide, Cesar Smith Cuba Castillo (whom we all called Smithy) launched from Kilometer 82, the beginning point of the Inka Trail.

We had traversed over bog and rock, through mountain passes and cloud forests, and summited our highest peak – some 14, 500 feet – to reach this point. And it seemed that the mist would keep it shrouded.

“It happens, sometimes,” Smithy had warned many days before during our orientation. “It is one of the reasons the Inka picked this site, because of the veil of protection the clouds give it. Some days it just cannot be seen.”  The Peruvian government only allows access to the Inka Trail with a guide service.  Smithy explained that the porter jobs are good paying jobs.  It took some getting used to letting others carry the tents and food.

James stopped up ahead. And then I was beside him.

The trail had ended.

We didn’t speak for a long time. I cannot say how long now. We stood there at the end of the Inka Trail on an ancient stone step in the midst of the settling mist that magically revealed one piece of the ancient city then concealed it. The roiling, billowing mist moved together and apart as if there were a mad man operating stage curtains who couldn’t decide which set piece to show off first having correctly realized that the revealing the entire scene at once would have been melodramatic.

I was grateful for him, that mad man, because it would have been too much beauty to take in at once. As we stood, we first saw Machu Picchu in snippets, little pieces of memory in cloud, then as the sun rose in the sky and banished the mist, the verdant plateau in the whole.

Looking for Machu Picchu

“Holy $#%!” Sam’s words were a rather restrained cacophony of expletives unlike him but not without reason.  The soft, billowing clouds had given way to a fractured landscape of mountain tops our plane plummented in a nose-dive toward the high altitude landing strip that is fashionably called an international airport in Cuzco, Peru.

Billy did a Jackie-O over his sunglasses, letting them slide just a fraction down his nose, before he stopped them with a grimace and said, “Isn’t this where they filmed ‘Alive’ where the plane full of people crashed into the side of the Andes and the survivors had to resort to cannibalism?”

“That was Bolivia” I remarked.  ”This is Cusco.  Cusco, Peru.”  He shrugged and disappeared back behind his sunglasses.

The city of Cusco is a beautiful place layered with history.  During 13th century, the surrounding lords of the Andean valleys fell to the Incas Viracocha, Huascar, and Pachacutec consolidating power in the royal temples and palaces of Cusco.  The Spanish leveled the Inca palaces and remade the city into a colonial outpost of striking brutality and treasure looting.  Terrorism in the 1980s and 1990s, quieted the third largest city of Peru temporarily as its residents sought to avoid the power struggle between the Shining Path and the Fuijimori government.  And, now, with the fastest growing economy in South America, and an ascending tourist industry, we found the streets were filled with small women in tiny high heel shoes spider-stepping on the cobblestone toward  every tourist with the greeting of “Inka Massage” or back-lit white signs offering “Inka Cola” or “Inka Tours.”

We had come to Peru for a month to trek.  And trekking is what we did.  Our big group (Kristen, Frank, Maddie, Isabel, Sam, Bill, Jim, and me) was trekking the Inka Trail from Kilometer 82 to Machu Picchu later that week.  A four-day, three-night journey both backward and forward in time.  Later in the trip, a smaller group was set to tackle a 90-mile trek and ascent of the Cordillera Huayhuash.  But for now we were marveling in the gentle chaos of the city.

“What do you think is involved in an Inka Massage?” Sam asked before I pushed the card out of his hand and we moved on to the center of town.

Powder Fall

We exchanged words quickly and hotly.  James pushed his goggles above his visor, his finger tapping my chest.  ”I didn’t see the sign,” I said and shrugged, giving up.  I couldn’t say anything more because there wasn’t more to be said.  We were skiing along at Mt. Hood on a mostly sunny day on a weekend trip to Timberline Lodge.  After skinning up to the top of the Palmer Glacier, we blazed down untracked, fresh snow.  James made big, wide tele-turns whereas I slipped past him looking for a bit more speed.

The sign that I missed said “Danger: Cliffs” (as James informed me) and was placed along side a 30 foot drop into a canyon that snaked narrowly down the mountain.  As I lifted into the air and then began falling, I sensed what stuntmen must feel when they know that the play is going absolutely wrong — the dead air, the hang time, the falling — always the falling – and then the ineffable crunch on the ground.  In the expansion of time that happens in a great fall, I tried to recall the formula for acceleration but James’s angry and surprised shout cut my train of thought as he unknowingly followed me into the air.

We landed skis first in a cloud of powder, gathered balance and coursed through the canyon.  Damn, the first blow was going to destroy my knees, I thought.  There was little time to think at that point.  React, react, react.  We couldn’t really ski out of the canyon: the walls were too high.  And we had too much velocity at this point to find a stopping space on the narrow canyon floor.  So we went down, down, down.  Until, it opened in a flat plain high above the world below.

The Backwoods of Mt Hood

Houston

“There has to be something charming about Houston,” James remarked.  ”Really.  It is one of the largest cities in the United States.”

I was skeptical.  Houston. Texas.  Hmm.  I was in town for a day (literally) to give a presentation at a lawyer’s convention.  But, true enough, Houston has its charms.  And gems.  Among them the Rothko Chapel.

Skiing Down From Here

There is a backcountry route that leads from a mile above Timberline down nearly 4,000 feet to Government Camp.

“No,” Joyce said.  ”But we will gladly meet you down in Government Camp.”  We nodded agreement, pulled our helmets on and skied off to connect with Joyce and Ryan below.  It was a spectacular Presidents’ Day.

New Life

Jed busily scratched the words on the paper hanging from the walls.  There was “Jim’s List” and “Stephen’s List” color coordinated.

“The difficult part, now, is to shorten the list,” he said.  True, too true.  James & I were planning out the next several years of life and things to do and accomplish.  Where to start?  Where to begin?  We started in Hood River.  We began with friends.

Dishin’ the Books in the ‘Couv

It may be surprising, but certainly I am not the only one, to have spent twenty years in Portland and never once set foot in our neighborly city to the north, Vancouver, Washington.  Vancouver has always been to me the traffic congestion-point between Portland and Olympia but never anyplace that one actually went to.  But, here I was on a Sunday evening in January, making my very first journey deep into the heart of the ‘Couv.  Yesenia was hosting the inaugural book club party: Prodigal Summer by Barbara Kingsolver.

“I don’t know,” one of the members said.  ”I thought the sex scene in the woods was romantic and all but just not that realistic.”

“Why is that?” Yesenia prodded, carefully keeping an eye on the stove top.

“Well, I get the idea of wanting to be taken in the woods and laid out down in the tall green grass, or even up against the old growth log.”  She paused, considered, and then finished: “But what about the rock-burns and the ticks and the scrapes.  I’ve been there and let me just say that it isn’t all that romantic afterward.”

Huayhuash 2011: Planning

It is a compact, but spectacular mountain range in Peru.  The trek through the Valley of Huayhuash ranges from 14,000 ft to 18,000 ft.

Our team of intrepid trekkers is heading there in May 2011.

A 75th Celebration With Two Jacks

Seventy five years ago, Jack Milano was born.

The Milano sisters celebrated the evening with a handsome dinner, a traditional German Chocolate Cake, hide-and-seek with (baby) Jack, and pasta fagioli.

“How is that a German dessert became an Italian man’s favorite?” I asked.

In near unison, Christina and Andrea replied, “He married Betsy Milano.”