I am going to try to compress as much of Machu Picchu as possible into one post but really there is so much to say it is impossible. What I do know is that it was truly awesome.  We (my friend Andrea and I) woke up (in our hostel in a town called Aguas Calientes 20 minutes from Machu Picchu) at 4:30 to get ready, at 5:00 we had breakfast of some bread and mate de coca (a tea to help altitude sickness).  Then we made it to the bus station and there was already a HUGE LINE.  There were people from all over: people speaking german, english, spanish, french, japanese!  All of them had come to see machu picchu just like us: about 2500 visitors over the course of the day.  We got a bus around 5:45 to the base of Machu Picchu (a 20 minute bus ride, winding up the mountain).  Then we finally entered, saw the dawn over the site, found ourselves a tour guide and went on a 3 hour tour of the site.  MORE IN NEXT POST