I was travelling on my own which was fine by me; these types of Solo holidays are the ideal way to meet great groups of like minded people. The Inca trail itself is 45 km, a small section of the awesome 14,000 mile Inca road; we would start from the sacred valley of the Urubamba River and end up in the stunning ruins of Machu Picchu village. This has to be the classic 4 day hike which includes a day to explore the ruins in Machu Picchu. I have never participated on a trek like this before or been at a higher altitude than 3,000m, although I have enjoyed a few walking holidays. Therefore I was slightly apprehensive but knew that it was worth booking with a reputable company who would prepare us for acclimatisation. Of course a good level of fitness is required as the altitude exceeds 4,000m in places and this can be hard on the unprepared traveller. The trek would take us through dense subtropical forests and over a combination of high altitude mountain ranges in the Andes.

So the trek started in Cusco at 3,350m where I spent a two days relaxing, getting used to the altitude and meeting some of the guys in my group. I also luckily had time to explore some of the great sites in the area; I visited Ollantaytambo, a stunning old Inca fortress which gave me an idea of what was to come when we reached the top. Also a trip to the old market town of Pisac was fun, where we spent a couple lazy hours watching the locals haggling over their treasures in the old market place.

We set off the next morning after meeting our guide, Pat, and the porters. I must say our group was so impressed with the standard of service we received from our guides and porters. From the horsemen to the chefs I can say that we were catered for to an extremely high standard and made to feel very welcome in Peru; this made the trek very special. I also felt that Pat's knowledge was excellent and enabled us to find out so much about the country in a short space of time. We started off fairly steadily on the first day but by the second day our strengths were tested as we managed two climbs; an ascent of 1000m into Deadwomen's Pass at 4,125m, followed by a descent of 900m, then culminating in a further climb of 700m across a second pass. We had walked for 8 hours and ended up camping above the Phuyupatamarca ruins at 3650m. I was absolutely shattered that evening and slept well in my tent after a delicious meal.

At this stage I am very relieved to say that I was well prepared for this hike; I had brought an all-weather sleeping bag plus many layers of clothing which were certainly needed; the nights were extremely chilly. I also brought a few changes of good quality walking socks and proper comfortable walking shoes which had been well worn in; a couple guys on the trip had recently bought their boots and they suffered with bad blisters. We only needed to carry the essentials in our day packs as thankfully the porters managed to carry the heavy loads; they were such hard workers and I was struck by their dedication in the challenging conditions.

I really loved the charged atmosphere on the day of the final ascent. We were impressed by the amazing 2,000 Incan steps we had to descend to reach the Winay Wayna site where we had lunch. This site was elevated up on a perch overlooking the Urubamba River, and was incredible, resembling a massive amphitheatre which fitted into the curve of the huge Mountain. We then set out to reach the fabulous Sun Gate where we had our first glimpses of Machu Picchu village below. Through the clouds I could see the stunning ruins below, it was breath taking and I was not disappointed.