Machu Picchu

Not many places or pictures take my breath away, but I was drawn to machu picchu because it did just this. I recall seeing a picture in the paper in the travel section and saw a city in ruins that was located in the peaks of the Andes mountains. It was not the ruins that drew my attention but the location of this magnificent place. I wondered what it would be like to stand there in person if the picture alone made me gasp. It was that day that i decided someday somehow I would visit machu Picchu in Peru. What I never imagined was the transcurrence of events that led my husband and I to this special place on such a special time, the 100th year anniversary of the discovery of the ruins! It all began last summer when I called the airline and asked what dates were availble with "points" for our two free tickets to Lima, Peru. After i told them I was looking for a a 6-8 day vacation and was open all of June and July to travel, they let me know that there was a departing flight on the 1st of July and returnng flight on the 11th. So I went ahead and booked the flilght to Lima and let the adventure begin! I them proceeded to purchase online plane tickets from Lima, Peru to Cusco, Peru where we would need to take a train to Machu Picchu. There are alternate ways to arrive to Machu Picchu but I chose to depart from Cusco, Peru by train. Lastly before I looked for hotels, there is one hotel inside the park of Macchu Picchu called Macchu Pichu sanctuary Lodge and I was determined to save and stay there the day I made it to Machu Picchu. Since it is a small 30 room hotel, it is recommended to book 6 months in advance, so when I tried booking a few weeks in advance, naturaually the hotel was sold out with the exception of the night of the 7th of July, so I went ahead and purchased the night and then revolved the itinerary around that night to be spent at the ruins. Afterall, we were going to Peru to visit the ruins and that was the HIGHLIGHT so why not schedule the entire trip around that one night? Once I had that reservation, the roundtrip airline tickets from Lima to Cusco, and the train tickets from Cusco to Machu picchu I did not purchase tickets to the entrance to the park because the hotel charged a comission and I figured it was easiset to just purchase them in person once there. So let the journey begin....in Lima, peru