We hiked Peru’s SALKANTAY TREK to Machu Picchu (without a guide!)

for the next 4 days we're hiking the stunning suai trk to Machu Picchu an almost 70 km route that will gain over 3,200 MERS in elevation as we Traverse through the Andes and we're doing it without a guide which means we're coordinating all of our own lodging packing some of our own meals and navigating the trail all on our own experiencing this Trek has been a bucket list item of ours for years along the way we'll see a wide variety of scenery and ecosystems including a vibrant glacial Blue Lake and the jungle it's going to be a trip with many highs quite literally we are currently standing at 15,190 FT plus an unexpected [Music] ending one downside of doing the cant track without a tour is that we have to get to the trail head by ourselves which is was 3 hours away originally we were going to take a combination of a collectivo and a taxi to get there but then our lodging for tonight offered us Transportation so even though it's a bit more expensive to do it this way it just seemed so much [Music] easier so how this Transportation worked was that we got a ride with a tour group going on a Day hike to uman Tha Lake we had a very windy ride through the mountains stopping for a quick breakfast and paying our insurance fee for the hike before being dropped off at the trail head it is 900 a.m. and we are finally after a really long bumpy ride at the start of the suen tide Trek and this is actually going to be our shortest day on the Trek by far we have about a 6.4 km hike to sorai Poma and then an additional 4.2 km round trip to humai Lake but we are at 12,000 ft right now and the first part of this Trail is so steep so even though today it's going to be an easier day I'm already breathing so heavy and my calves hurt [Music] woo we are only an hour into this hike and the scenery is already incredible almost the entire time we've had this view of this gigantic snowcapped mountain and we just rounded a corner and Bam there's another one we have just about made it to our home for the night while we do love camping we actually won't be camping at all in this track we're going to be staying at hosts and bmbs that are placed perfectly along the Route and tonight we're going to be staying at s pomp [Music] hostel cool nice and cozy so this spot does have a dorm room with bunk beds but we booked one of their wooden Sky cabins which are these private pods so let's give you the tour this is it so you have a bed for two people there's an outlet here it's not a regular outlet it's just two USB ports but it's very nice to have there's a little nightstand there's two chairs there's a coat back but the coolest part is the glass ceiling up here and there's a tarp over it right now I'm assuming to keep the heat out but once oh my gosh the heat is so bad though is I'm dripping right now it's hot even with this it's still pretty warm and so I guess when the Sun goes down a little bit they'll probably take that off and we can see all the clouds in the blue sky and then when it gets dark hopefully tons of stars but besides the glass ceiling we also have a pretty awesome view right out of our front door so the property also has an outdoor common area an indoor dining room and shared bathrooms and showers with hot water so they say We'll test it maybe [Music] later our plan for the rest of the day is to hike to umai Lake but before we go we're having some coca tea and some lunch we'll be eating our breakfast and our dinners at our lodging but we did bring some food items to have for lunch along the treack and yesterday we had a genius idea we got pizza and we ordered enough pizza so we had lover pizza for today I'm so excited it's been warming up in my backpack for the last two hours yum it's a little worse for wear yeah I kind of got smoos after bouncing down the trail a bit but it's still going to be Mega tasty nothing better than leftover pizza right especially out in the middle of nowhere oh my gosh the hike to uman Tha Lake isn't that long but it does gain over 365 M taking us to over 4200 M so this is going to be a tough workout this is one of those hikes where you just want to look around the whole time because the scenery is so epic but you can't you have to look down because there are landmines everywhere AKA tons of horse poop there's so many horses out here and although their poop is everywhere and you have to be really careful it totally adds to the vibe just see all these horses frolicking in the grass the mountains all around it's hard to breathe to you've been just talking for a few seconds you're out of breath okay let's go let's go these views literally take your breath away that is accurate they do oh my gosh oh my gosh look at that water the waterfall the water is crazy holy crap the [Music] glaciers this is probably the most iconic spot on the suen ti track and I've seen photos of this Lake for years and years and years and I was a little nervous it wasn't going to live up to the hype but it totally did glacial lakes and just glacial mountains are my is my favorite scenery in the entire world and when we walked up and saw this I almost cried like I I started to feel emotional and I'm kind of getting emotional now I'm just talking about it because it's just it's just breathtaking like my eyes are blown it's just breathtakingly beautiful wow I've actually like never cried about nature before and like I actually think I might cry right now so you can do this as a Day hike and it is very popular hundreds of people come out here every day and we chose to wait until they were all gone we started around 1:30 and when we first got here there were only about three or four people up here and then now all the other trekking groups are starting to get up here and there's a good amount of people up here but there's plenty of space to spread out and have your own little area also not only can you hike to the base of the lake but you can also hike up to that ridgel line right back there and even though we're pretty exhausted from the hike up here and we have three pretty big days of hiking ahead F go the wind is so crazy we're going to go do it anyway hopefully we won't fly off oh my gosh W so looking on the other side of the ridge here is this massive absolutely massive River Valley look at that light shining down through the clouds wow everything out here is just like bigger than life like these mountains just Tower over you I mean we've been to some big places you know like Alaska and all that stuff but like out here you like seriously feel so [Music] tiny before we continue with the Su and TI trk we want to give a huge thank you to of our favorite Brands element for sponsoring today's video as you can see we're at sea level now but for this trik our biggest concern was the altitude with parts of the trail reaching over 15,000 ft the last thing we wanted was to get altitude sickness and have to bail on the hike so one of our must bring items for this trik was element element is our go-to electrolyte drink mix that helps us stay hydrated on all of our adventures and staying hydrated at altitude is especially important as you sweat more due to less oxygen and higher metabolic demands and lose more Electro ites especially sodium element contains 1,000 mg of sodium 200 mg of potassium and 60 mg of magnesium plus no sugar or artificial ingredients on this Tri we drank element multiple times every day to ensure we replenish the electrolytes we were losing and on the TX cold nights we loved treating ourselves to one of their chocolate flavors which have completely replaced traditional hot chocolate for us we personally love to make these with water and a little bit of half and half plus marshmallows or whipped cream on top for an extra special treat and for our fellow chocolate lovers element recently brought back one of our favorite items their limited edition chocolate medley they make for the perfect stocking stuffers this holiday season if you want to try element for yourself element is offering our viewers a free sample pack with any order which includes eight different flavors to get yours head to drink LM n.com a+k or click the QR code on the screen we made it back from the lake and we just had dinner and dinner here is served at a specific time and you eat with everyone else that's staying here and tonight we had fried rice and it was delicious but man what an exhausting but amazing first day out here yeah we realized earlier today that this is our first International backpacking trip and we've wanted to do this one for over four years now so it is so awesome to finally be out here but uh it's only like 6:50 p.m. and I I think we're going to call it a night I'm not even sure we have enough energy to try to look for stars through our glass ceiling how you sleep not that great really like a five out of 10 I think I should have showered oh no I did wake up a couple times and look up at the ceiling and I could see so many stars [Music] we are hitting the trail just after 6:00 a.m. this morning because today is going to be the hardest day of the trick we'll be hiking from sorai PPA to chiai which is about 19.3 km but what is going to make it extra tough is we have to climb up to santai pass which is the highest point on the [Music] route we spent the next 6 kilm huffing and puffing as we hike towards Sentai the namesake of the track this absolute Beast of a mountain stands at 6,271 M making it the tallest mountain we have ever seen and it holds special meaning to the locals salant Tha is known as Savage mountain in the ketua language and is one of the 12 apus in the Cusco region Apu is a ketua word that means Lord and this designation was given to mountains of great importance and are protective spirits that watch over the people in their territory their livestock and their crops [Music] we made it yes so proud of you proud of [Music] you we are currently standing at 15,190 FT which is the highest we have ever been until next week that is oh my gosh I can't believe it this is absolutely unreal we are just sitting right underneath this mountain and we got to S got to see part of the glacier cab off and we could hear it like rumbling down that was so cool we haven't seen that in a long time I'm just so speechless right now [Music] uhoh well we brought backpacking meals to make for lunch and we were super excited about them but we're having a bit of an issue our stove isn't working for some reason we didn't bring a lighter with us because we didn't think we could bring one on the plane and we just didn't think to buy one while we were out here and I asked around and no one really has one so it looks like we're going to be eating Bobo bars and Snickers for lunch not too bad right Snickers with a view this is probably the best view we've ever had a Snickers in [Music] all right we have about 8 miles to go today and the good thing is it is all downhill the majority of the photos I've seen from this track are from umai Lake and suen Tha pass so the rest of the track is kind of a bit of a mystery to us we do know we're going to be going down a lot in altitude and the vegetation will be changing but we really don't know what to expect which makes it extra [Music] [Music] exciting Dingle wiggle yes now we can eat lunch yeah the real lunch yeah all right moment of truth here one two 3 go we are also making some coffee because we need a little bit of afternoon pikme up and we bought these steeped coffees for this trip which we had never tried before until yesterday and what's cool about them is their little tea bags and it was actually pretty delicious [Music] [Music] [Music] what a long day we were hiking for 10 hours today and the climb up the pass was definitely the hardest physically but I almost think the downhill part was harder mentally because it just went on and on and on and it was a lot of a loose Rock and dirt and super Dusty and I think we de we went down 6500 ft in elevation we've never done that much in a day like up and down like I don't think we've ever done that much we went up I think it's like 27 over 3,000 ft wow and then we went down 65 oh my go we're completely wiped but tonight we're staying at at the suen Tha hostel and this place is super cool this might be the coolest like hostile hotel room we've ever stayed in we have our own private room and maybe the coolest feature of this room are these 3D like carvings on the wall the one behind us is of Machu Picchu where we're going yeah we're going there soon we got a corn carving over here we have an amazing view out of our Windows here and we also have a private toilet and a private shower which we will definitely be using yeah we're not going to be lazy today we are for sure going to shower oh it's amazing never felt better [Music] [Music] today we are hiking from chiai to lukma Bamba which should be about 18 1 12 kilm it's mostly all downhill and not nearly as much elevation loss as yesterday we read that it's the easiest day on the trk which we are very much looking forward to after [Music] yesterday I had heard that today was the least Scenic day but so far it is incredibly Scenic we are walking through this Valley with these giant mountains around us and this super Crystal Clear River just rushing through and then we just rounded a corner and there's this Gorge right behind us this is crazy [Music] [Music] [Music] that is a huge waterfall so far today has been just filled with unexpected gems [Music] we are making a pit stop at this big open field that has a couple different stands that sell fruit and snacks and juices we got a Paya and then we got some avocado sandwiches and some chips and then Adam just went to the other stand to get us some juice sweet lady in there serving up fresh juices oh this is the best got orange and passion fruit that is so good and fresh tasting today has had quite a bit bit more uphill than we thought so this is exactly what we needed I've been loving these breads here in Peru every like hotel and hostel and things all have the same kind they're just ah get out of my face they are so [Music] good this is awesome [Music] [Music] so you may be wondering why we chose this Trail over the more famous and historical and more popular Inca Trail and one is that one requires a guide and we didn't want to do a guide on this Trail because we're going on an even higher Trek next week that it'd be nice to have a guide for that one and we wanted to save our money for that and two we read that this Trail the scenery was much more diverse the first day and a half was high altitude massive snowcapped glacial mountains and then now we've come down into this River Valley that's super Lush and green and there's birds chirping it's just been spectacular and what's blowing my mind a bit is that we did all of this different scenery we've gone through all these ecosystems with our own two legs it feels like we've G on like seven different hikes just because of how much the scenery has changed [Music] fresh pineapple juice it's fre it's cold tonight we're staying at Leah BNB which is the spot I have been most excited to stay at on this track we have a private room a private bathroom with a shower but the reason I am most excited is because it is a coffee farm and we get to go on a [Music] tour this is Freddy the owner of Leah BNB and our hilarious ious tour guide and on his farm they grow three main items with the first being bananas Pepito de [Laughter] Gringo they also grow avocados but these aren't just any avocados they are some of the largest we have ever seen and we even got to pick a couple yes wow wow and then of course coffee Peru is the world's top producer of organic and fair trade arabica coffee on the tour we got to learn about the entire coffee production process starting with picking the coffee cherries and then processing the beans which includes a process called pulping where the red skin is removed we then had the chance to roast beans over the fire sounds like you're playing an instrument like in a band and grind the beans by hand before getting to enjoy the coffee ourselves [Music] Cheers [Music] Cheers oh yeah W that's strong and good W that was such a fun evening the coffee tour was amazing Freddy is absolutely hilarious and then we spent the rest of the night hanging out with the other hikers who we've all been staying at the same hosts every night so it was really fun to get to know them better and then Freddy's niece was hanging out with us and asking us a ton of questions in Spanish and we were playing games with her tonight was by far one of my favorite experiences from this entire track [Music] [Music] so we have a slight change of plans a few days ago I got some bug bites on my legs which is pretty common on this track but I think what happened is I scratched a bug bite and I got infected and my ankle has gotten extremely swollen very red and very very painful yesterday I tried to just power through the pain but by the second half of the hike I was limping because it just hurt so so bad to walk and today is supposed to be the longest day of the trk at almost 22 km to AA Calientes and I just don't think my ankle is capable of doing it so last night we were chatting with our host and they booked us a taxi to go to hedro electrica which is the furthest place that you can drive to to get to AA Calientes from there you have to either take a train or get to the town by foot unfortunately the train schedule did not work out so we're going to attempt to walk the final 10 km to town which is supposedly flat and easy and then once we get to town I'm going to go see a doctor I am super super bummed out about this I really wanted to complete the entire hike so it's really disappointing to have to miss out on some of it but I'm just very concerned that if I let this go any longer or push myself too much more I'm going to have longer term issues that are going to impact the rest of our [Music] trip all right you ready do this I hope so I just want to say even though she is not feeling well physically and mentally she is pretty bummed about not being able to finish this Trek as intended she always maintains a positive attitude this was not an easy decision to make especially after putting in all this time and effort of planning this trik but I'm just so proud of her and she is just so tough [Music] we are 99% confident that that is Machu Picchu up there crazy [Music] [Music] we have made it to AAS Calientes finally gentle high five cuz now my hand is super swollen too I'm a hot [Music] mess I am still alive the doctor says I have cellulitis which is what I thought I had just based on my obsessive Googling and what that means is basically when I scratch my bug bite bacteria got in and I got a bacterial infection so I got one round of antibiotics and an IV and you might notice I have a bulge right here that's the IV still in me which is not very comfortable especially being my dominant hand because I have to go back tomorrow and get another round of antibiotics and an IV they also give me a bunch of pills but I will be okay just going to take a little bit of time this is one tough cookie right here oh my gosh The Ivy my hands are swollen so when they put the IV in it was oh I started sobbing uncontrollably it was took it like painful you're a champ even though the trik didn't end exactly how we had planned we ended up missing about 12 km of it it was still an amazing experience and if you want even more information on how to do this hike without a guide which is totally doable we have a blog post that shares a breakdown of the cost our route where we stayed what we packed and what we wish we had packed like for me I wish I would have packed even longer pants high socks benad dril and antibiotic cream a lot of things I learned a lot of lessons on this trip but we have a hotel room here in AOS Calientes tonight we're going to rest up because tomorrow we are finally visiting Machu Picchu the doctor said I can go so we're going we're going [Music]