Good morning Vagabuddies. It is about 8 a.m.
We're outside of Cusco in the town of Poroy,
and we're on our way to Machu Picchu.
There are only two ways to get to Machu Picchu:
hiking or taking a train, and we are taking one of the top ten trains in the world here in Bingham.
This is going to be an experience. Marko is so excited.
He's always been obsessed with trains even when he was a little baby.
He was like...trains.
This train is a luxury train.
We're going to have cocktail service,
champagne, live music, food, white linen service,
and it's going to be incredible, not to mention the scenery that we'll be going through....
some of the most beautiful in South America.
Are you ready? Oh yeah.
It's a three hour 15 minute long train ride,
and the champagne is being poured.
I believe we've got a train to catch my friend. Ah touche!
All right.. well we are boarded and we're boozed.
They've already served us champagne.
They have that stuff called Maca.
I don't know "whatta I like-a" about Maca, but um yeah.
It's going to be about the potato soup.
It's going to be a fun trip.
It's like in three and a half hours.
No wifi, just beautiful views.
Are you excited, Mark?
I love trains, and this is one of the top 10 train rides in the world.
So, I'm definitely excited.
The name of the train is Hiram Bingham.
And Hiram Bingham was the American Explorer who found Machu Picchu in 1911.
He went on to become a senator and philanthropist, but back in 1911
he was the first kind of foreigner to rediscover Machu Picchu.
He had a lot of interesting ideas about the significance of Machu Picchu;
a lot of those have been kind of proven wrong
throughout the subsequent decades,
and archaeological digs have kind of shed light on what Machu Picchu, at least what we think it actually was.
When he found it, it was completely overgrown,
and it was kind of an exciting time.
It was the turn of the 20th century.
Big things were happening.
It was right before First World War.
Okay, so now we're making our way downhill
because Machu Picchu is lower than Cusco.
Cusco was about 3,500 meters,
and Machu Picchu is about 7,500 feet
Not sure what that is and meters, but it's downhill.
This area right here we're going down about 400 meters in just five kilometers to get into this gorge,
and the views are just becoming increasingly stunning.
We've kind of moved away from the agricultural communities, and now we're in the more
steep, narrow valleys of the sacred valley.
It must be hard to keep this railway open.
Just looking out the window right here
there're construction crews working on the road that kind of mirrors the train tracks.
There are landslides galore, and
very, very large boulders to the point where now we are actually backing up.
The train is going uphill
Actually, we need to descend 40 meters.
Yes, that's why we need to use a switchback system.
This is called the Spanish zigzag.
Exactly, we are changing tracks , yes, you see?
Oh, I see.
Now we're going to change to another track
because it's coming in the wrong way.
It's very high. Yeah.
Awesome.
Love me two times, girl
because I'm going away.
Love me two times, baby.
One for tomorrow; one just for today.
Love me two times.
I'm going away.
Well this is awesome.
Totally see why this is a top ten train ride in the world.
The views are stunning.
The party is going, and the Pisco Sours are flowing.
It's insane.
Beautiful scenery, really good vibes, good drinks.
Yeah, I mean there's nothing quite like hanging off the back of a train with a cocktail in hand.
Right now we've started entering the Valle Sagrada, the sacred valley.
Right here you see Urubamba River
This is the sacred river.
This is awesome.
I got one more Pisco Sour for the road.
It's time for lunch.
They're serving lunch.
I've got to walk back through the train,
which could be kind of challenging because I've had a few of these things.
We shall see.
Now it's lunch time.
We have a beautiful little plate here.
I arrived late, so I have no idea what I'm about to eat.
Marko, please enlighten me.
Trucha Ahumada, smoked trout with salmon and also a spread of avocado.
Enjoy. Bon Appetit.
For the main course we have lomo saltado,
but kind of like a filet mignon
with some cute little vegetables tied up with vegetables.
I don't know how they did that, but they did that.
Corn husk is how they did that.
Sometimes, it's better not to know.
All right ladies and gentlemen.. well we have descended from the high Andes,
and now we are on the eastern slope of the Andes Mountain Range
heading down towards the Amazon Basin.
It's pretty incredible.
The mountains have changed from this dry..
kind of high alpine
into lowland jungle with lots of vegetation.
Beautiful flowing river next to us,
but we're getting closer to Machu Picchu.
Ladies and gentlemen we have arrived to the base of Machu Picchu.
This was probably the coolest train ride I've ever been on,
and I think that we are in for a very awesome adventure in the next vlog.
We're about to go up to Machu Picchu.
We're going to film a VR video
and the behind- the -scenes video.
So make sure you stay tuned for both of those.
Big thanks to Peru Rail for inviting us on this trip.
This was honestly one of the best experiences of all my travels.
So thank you to Peru Rail,
and thank you guys for watching.
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This train is about to depart.
We're about to hike up to Machu Picchu.
So stay curious, keep exploring,
and we will see you on the Inca Road.