The original post: /r/travel by /u/danblk04 on 2024-04-29 21:42:05.
Hello fellow travellers,
my girlfriend and I are travelling for some time and slowly reaching Peru Cusco/Machu Picchu after Bolovia and Argentina.
Since we are travelling without preebooked flights and want to stay flexible we didn’t book any permits for Machu Picchu. What a mistake. We want to do the Salkantray Trek and contacted a couple of tour operators in Cusco. Since it is high season sadly most of them said they are booked out or to be specific, there are no permits for Machu Picchu available for mai. They could take us with them on the Salkantray trek, but can’t get us any tickets for the last day to Machu Picchu.
So currently we are wondering what to do and have three options in mind:
- Go with a tour operator without the Machu Picchu permit. The Salkantray Trek ends in Aguas Calientes. We would have to try to get tickets to Machu Picchu there and stay one more night since the tickets are always for the following day. In this case we probably could not go back to Cusco with the tour operator cause we have to stay the +1 night in Aguas Calientes. But we could do the trek without the hassle of booking accommodations. And it’s probably more fun in a group.
- Try to do the Salkantray Trek on our own and save the money for the tour. We are beginner hikers and travel with hand luggage. So we would have to rent at least some stuff like a sleeping bag and book the accommodations on the trek in advance. We did Huayna Potosí a week ago and are in good shape but have no experience in organizing multi day hikes on our own.
- Do the Salkantray Trek in June. This would be our last options and would mess up our plans a bit.
Any help or more options appreciated. Does anyone habe experience in getting the Machu Picchu tickets at Aguas Calientes? The tour operators didn’t recommend getting the tickets there since they give out only a small number of tickets daily.
Thanks and pardon my english