Chapter 21: The Apu of Picchu and other observations

Although I did wax poetic about it a couple chapters ago, I have an admission to make: Machu Picchu wasn’t the thrill I had anticipated. I mean, the Incas had it down well. Great stone masons! Effective administrators! Wonderful architects! Gotta love those guys. But hundreds of years before Macchu Picchu the Mayans had constructed Chichen Itza, which I had the good fortune to visit  in 2010. Those Mayans were amazing. Have you ever noticed how light streaming through the gaps in venetian blinds bends and casts shadows with jagged patterns on a wall?  For example this photo from my college days:  (I hope the photos come through. Theoretically, they're attached, but the Internet can be funny at times.)

The blinds work like a lens that bends the light. The Mayans created the same effect with a the levels of a square pyramid which they situated to catch the sun’s rays on the solstices so that light undulated down the side of a staircase creating a snake-like movement to signal that it was time to plant or harvest, or whatever.

Machu Picchu is wonderful, but the Mayans help keep these things in perspective. They could have taught the Incas a thing or two. But people still  go oooh and aaahhhh at Machu Picchu—my colleagues, for example:

Some visitors hold their hands close to this sacred rock to feel its “energy”:

Others meditate:

Some of us just hike up that long trail you can see on the hillside below to visit the sun gate, where we get spectacular views of the site. (This was a 1,000-foot ascent and took almost an hour.

When I got to the top I was able to look right across at Huayna Picchu, that tall mount that serves as a backdrop for the ancient city. For a video on what it’s like up there, please go to: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CF8kXFQrNpY From those perspectives, it’s not hard to see why the Incas thought the mountains were spirits, or Apus. The cliffs are amazingly sheer in places, leaving the mountains standing like sentries to guard the passes to the Inca strongholds. Anything coming off those slopes does so with a lot of spirit.

By the way, here’s what the Inca trail looks like near the sun gate. Try running up that hill in sandles, or whatever they wore. The podiatrists must have been well paid.

The llamas take it all this pretty stoically. They’ve been watching outsiders show up for hundreds of years, and they can appear pretty blasé—these two for example.

Here’s another pair watching me take their photo after getting off the bus:

And yet…There are some interesting things to discover at Machu Picchu. For example, here’s the Inca’s own personal privy. Bet you didn’t know he had his own, did you?

And you remember those magazines you used to read as a kid that had photos with images hidden in them that you had to discover? Check out this rock arrangement – I don’t know if this is supposed to be the Easter Bunny or the Playboy Bunny, but either way he/she  looks a little grumpy to me.)

You may notice that these rock walls for the buildings in this photo aren’t as fancy schmancy as the fine stone work in this wall behind Jill Wakefield, the chancellor at Seattle Central Community College.

Apparently the quality of the stone work had a lot to do with how important the particular stone formation was. There was a lot of quality that went into the one below, for example, because it was designed to catch the sun’s rays coming up the valley on the solstice.

Oh, here’s probably my favorite shot: I wonder – is that a golf course?

Wish I could share more about this place

Love,

Robert