Inka Trail: Shhhh… you are having too much fun

Hola Hola … Wakey Wakey

The morning greeting from our guide and official butt kicker, Elias.

His fun loving nature sparkled right from pick up in Cusco.  He did say we needed to be whipped into shape…. imagine 16 people with varying  attention levels… all in good fun

Elias always made sure we were in a positive frame of mind and not only made the group a unit, but also engaged us with the porters. (without porters we would not be enjoying simple pleasures like a hot meal or tents)

Shhhh you are having too much fun!

Laughing, joking, teasing before, during and after … How else are you going to get through the day?

One particular stop at an Inkan ruin on day 3, a  guide from another group asked us to be quiet…we were talking and laughing  too close to them  … ok, fair enough… we moved away … apparently,, that wasn’t enough we were still too noisy. Two guides spoke to Elis about his group being inappropriate … shake your chichis … oh right you don’t have any to shake!

Last Checkpoint 

3am … Hola Hola Wakey Wakey  … up we get and start the day… remember I told you about the stars… they were amazing at 3am.. we had a light meal and off we go to the checkpoint.

Meanwhile,  the porters were breaking down the camp packing up and heading home.

It’s now 4 am … stars are shinning, wide awake and  have until 5:30 am before we can move through the last checkpoint.  Singing and dancing are just what the doctor ordered ( pun intended)

One national anthem, quickly spreads to the rest of us … Jackie is shows us  Scottish dance  moves, follwed by Elisha’s Irish dancing… the doctors give us a Bollywood song and dance…I lead a small stretch session followed by which movies we’ve watched

Finally  daylight starts to peek over the mountains, the checkpoint opens and we are off…. probably much to everyone else’s relief… mind you someone did say” keep singing and dancing” as they passed by!