11th September - Inca Trail

2:30am I awake with a feeling that all is not well in my stomach and that I am much too hot. After sitting up for a while, I managed to find a position that seemed comfortable and, having retrieved one of my collection of sick bags, dozed fitfully through the night.

5:30am Aldo came around the tents waking each of us up. He gave us some tea and I explained that I wasn't feeling too good. I tried and failed to drink my tea and decided to get dressed and get outside. I got the underwear sorted, the trousers and the T-shirt. Only the boots remained, but, just as I moved them outside the tent to put them on, my stomach gave a lurch and I knew that dinner was about to make a surprise return. I just managed to grab my sickbag in time and promptly set about filling it, much to Chris's delight, trapped behind me inside the tent.

Once my stomach was empty, I got my boots on and got outside. I still felt lousy, but I got some water and got myself cleaned up a bit. I eventually located Augusto and explained that I had been unwell. James and James were also in the same boat - with tall James having vomited during the night and our (aka little) James feeling very poorly. They suggested that I take an anti-vomiting pill (despite the fact that I thought that this was a bad idea) and so I took it with a couple of mouthfuls of water.

It took quite some effort to pack my bag, especially as I didn't appear to have enough strength to squeeze my sleeping bag into my rucksack. I got there eventually however and, at a much reduced speed to the previous day, headed up the hill towards the second pass.

We stopped for a quick tour of the Runkuraqay ruins, but I couldn't tell you anything about them as I spent more of my time feeling poorly than paying attention. We then continued up the hill. I stopped to throw up my anti-vomit pill - not sure how that one worked. Once all of that was gone, I continued slowly up the hill to the second pass. Our James divested the contents of his stomach and, by the time we did reach the top of the second pass, the 3 invalids were looking quite fantastic shades of green.

We're not entirely sure what Augusto was up to - he was either taking advantage of the ill or performing some queer Inca faith healing ceremony, but he lit a cigarette and promptly started blowing the smoke around our heads and down our T-shirts. With Aldo providing the oil, he then encouraged us to breathe in some sinus opening smells 3 times (the third time deeply) and then rubbed our upper bodies and heads with the oils. I'm not sure if it made any real difference, but the psychological effects were beneficial. We also made up a couple of the Boots blackcurrant oral rehydration sachets. How these could be termed 'blackcurrant' is anyone's guess. They tasted absolutely rank and James and I spent the next hour trying to avoid Miss Clifford and her big bottle of bad tasting water. To compensate, Mr Newte made up some lemon flavoured water which, if you could get it without having to take the terrible rehydration stuff, was great.

The stomach problems hit James and I in waves throughout the day. We tended to be a few hours out of phase and, while I went through a period of feeling healthy, he would be going through a period of severe stomach cramp and vice versa. We focused on getting finished and while we appreciated seeing the Inca tunnel and the ruins at Sayaqmarka, we were too exhausted to pay any particular attention to them. Members of our group did indeed offer to carry our stupidly heavy rucksacks for us, but we were determined that a little altitude sickness wouldn't prevent us lugging our loads. Just after the second pass, Els, one of the Dutch girls, approached James. "We have an offer for you," she said. It is always exciting when good looking Dutch girls approach you with these words! They also offered to carry our rucksacks for us and while we really appreciated their offer, we were determined to maintain a British stiff upper lip and so while I think each of us secretly longed to give our rucksacks to Els and Esmerelda, we maintained that they would be too heavy for them and that we were still fit enough to carry them ourselves.

At lunch time, the 3 invalids laid down on the canvas to sleep. I managed a quiet 15 minutes before being woken and offered some soup for lunch. Tall James joined me shortly afterwards leaving our little James sound asleep on the canvas. Some rain began to move in and so the porters promptly buried our James under a few blankets, the odd rucksack and another canvas sheet. So we sat huddled in the dining room tent watching the rain fall on a huge pile of rucksacks and a pair of protruding feet.

The rain eased off enough that we made it to the third campsite at Intipata without too much bother. The others availed of the hot showers and washing facilities but I, feeling lousy and not having washed my teeth for 3 days already by that point, decided that another day wouldn't do me any harm and instead went to sleep in my tent. I managed a whole 13 hours, only interrupted briefly when the girls arrived back from dinner and drinks with some potatoes and rice for me. I was sorry that I didn't have either the stamina or motivation to go and see the near-by terraces, but it just wasn't to be.

Too busy chundering to take photos