YouTube travel-video transcript of Kara and Nate Buchanan documenting day four of their Peru trip. The video covers visiting the Incan-era village and ruins at Ollantaytambo, a train ride to Aguas Calientes (the gateway town for Machu Picchu), arrival at a rainforest lodge, and on-site leisure (nature walk, tea/coffee, hot tub). The tone is personal and observational, focused on local sights, history of stonework, accommodations, and travel logistics ahead of a planned visit to Machu Picchu the next day.
Chapters
Sam.
Today is day four with mountain lodges of Peru. Last night, we stayed in the most unique accommodations I think we've ever been. It's like all of these little cabins in the middle of this flower garden. It is so beautiful. The chef is excellent. We had a ton of pizza last night, which was great. After hiking all day long, we've, like.
Really enjoyed all the Peruvian food, but, like, the pizza and salad and soup was ridiculously good last night. So today we are heading to some ruins that are in the closest nearby town. And then after that, we get on the train that takes us to Aguas Caliente, which is the closest town to Machu Picchu, which means tomorrow we are visiting Machu Picchu.
We just got to this tiny village called Ollante Tombo. Our guide said it's so old, it's and well preserved. You're basically walking through a museum, but people actually live here. So we're walking through the town first, and then we're gonna go see the Incan ruins.
So this town has literally been built on top of Incan walls. You know that they're Incan because they're cut really perfectly and they don't need to use. So, like, this part's Incan, and then this is the part that they've added on. They even still have the water supply that to use that goes all the way through the city. It's like a big canal. And now they have pipes and stuff. But it's still cool that it's still here.
We just learned that these doors on this side of the town are the nicest. You can see, like, the really nice stones and the double doors behind me because they face the religious ruins that we'll be going to in a few minutes. But this is where the most affluent people in the community live because they got to stare at the religious ruins as soon as they walked out the door. That's where we're going.
So I bought a really cute hat in the market before we came into the ruins. I'm really excited. And we just learned about this rock. Our guide is a little camera shy, so we're gonna have to relay a lot of the information the next couple couple of days. But basically, this rock came from a quarry that's over the river pretty far away. And there's ones even bigger than this that the Incas somehow moved over here. They don't have anything recorded, so a lot of it is just what people have heard, but they think they pulled it on logs, like hundreds or thousands of people. We really don't know for sure, but it's pretty crazy.
Everything about these rocks is so incredible. First, just the sheer size and how much these things must weigh. And thinking that not only were they transported from the valley that was across the river, we've now walked hundreds of feet up this mountain. And somehow they got these rocks up here. And then in addition to the size, they were able to cut them perfectly with who knows what kind of tools that they had in the old days. They all fit together. They think that these things were to put the stick outs, that's the technical term, or to put logs underneath them to be able to push them up on top of the other rocks, and then they'd knock them off, and I guess they just forgot to knock that one off. Incredible.
So this is where they think they got the rocks to build this entire complex. And the reason they think that is because that's the only place you can find pink granite rocks. And there are pink granite rocks scattered all the way from there, all the way to the complex. And all the big rocks that you're seeing here are pink granite. It's incredible to think that somehow they were able to move these massive stones from all the way over there, all the way here up this mountain.
So this complex is so huge and impressive. And our guide, Del Miro, just told us that we're going to pass 10 more just like this on the train ride to Machu Picchu. But for some reason, Machu Picchu is the most touristy and well known, but it's not even the biggest or the most impressive, which is really interesting. I'm still really excited to go, but it's just interesting that nobody really knows about all the rest of them. It's time for us to go to the train station. This place was super cool, and it got me really excited about Machu Picchu tomorrow.
All right, see you later.
We're getting a ride in the local trail. This is the best.
We just got our box lunch on the train. It's super comfy. Staying with Christy and James, we're going to Machu Picchu.
The ride to Machu Picchu is about an hour and a half at this point. I wish it was longer because the views are amazing. We're just going straight through the mountain, Sam.
We made it to the town of Aguascalientes and it is raining. We're in the rainforest kind of.
Hola.
We just got to our lodge for the night. It is super nice. As usual. There's a jungle outside of our door. We have this little patio and there's some gifts on the bed. We got this little purse and sandals like the local people wear.
Don't think we have much more on the agenda besides relaxing this afternoon. We did an eight hour hike yesterday, so we're all a little tired today. But if it does stop raining, we'll show you around the property.
It finally stopped raining and this place is massive. There's a tea plantation, an orchid garden. So we're gonna go explore.
Wow. Look how close I am.
Sam.
So we found this beautiful walking trail behind our lodge. We came down from 9,000 to 7,000ft, and so it's way greener than we we've been seeing the last few days. We can't find a single tree or rock or power line or anything without something growing out of it. Everything is green.
Where we going?
Where are we going?
We're going to have tea time, which means coffee and brownies.
We've had the best afternoon going on our nature walk and having coffee and brownies. And now it's getting even better because we're in ropes and we're going to the hot tub.
There were a lot of people in here earlier. We've been in here for at least an hour waiting to get this shot burning up.
I think.
We just arrived in the town of Ollante.
Ollante. Ollante.
How far up?
See where the rocks are?
Oh, yeah, yeah. Okay, up, up, up to the left. Left, left, left, up.
Okay. So this is where they think they got the rocks to build. Where are we at?
Is this pulley?
This bait?
This temple?
I just got my box on this tree.
While Jim stays a safe distance, Kara and Christy go ahead.
I thought all hummingbirds did was eat. I did too. Apparently I could just sit, watch a pigeon eat. The lighting's really good.
