Peruvian Andes trekking holiday to Machu Picchu

Planet

Our 14-day journey in the Peruvian Andes takes in Machu Picchu after first trekking to it’s lesser-known sister city Choquequirao, giving you the ultimate Inca experience. Choquequirao is twice the size of Machu Picchu and because of its remoteness receives a small fraction of the trekkers that visit Machu Picchu. It takes two full days of trekking to reach Choquequirao, where we usually enjoy the site to ourselves and get to camp on the ancient terraces, waking up to a breathtaking sunrise over this historical site. 

We enforce a strict Leave no Trace policy on all expeditions. We educate all our clients in how to minimise their negative impact in the environments in which they travel and offer leave no trace training on every expedition. We encourage them to take ownership of their interactions with the environment and consciously make every effort to leave it as found. Whatever is brought with us on expedition from equipment to food, must be taken away again. Tracks and trails are followed as much as possible to avoid any additional disturbance to local ecosystems. All clients are encouraged to give any animals they encounter a wide berth, to avoid unnecessary trauma to the animal and potential danger to themselves.

We provide all water on the expedition trails, which is first filtered with a katadyn filter, boiled or treated with purification tablets. We encourage all clients to bring their own water-bladders and water bottles to be filled each day in an effort to eliminate or minimise the need for the purchase of single use plastic water bottles. We minimise the amount of canned and packaged goods on our expeditions, reducing our non-biodegradable waste. All biodegradable waste is buried deep in the ground, far from water sources, breaking down over a short period of time. All other waste is carried off the expedition and disposed of in a responsible manner.

Each year we plant three native trees on behalf of each of our clients to improve the biodiversity of our local environment. We invite all our clients to join us on a tree planting day every December. We plant native woodland that will grow for many years and provide a valuable resource for both man and beast long into the future.

People

On all our trips we want to put money directly back into the local communities we visit. We stay in small, locally run hotels, avoiding big international chains. We encourage clients to visit the local markets and to pay market price, where fair and reasonable. All food supplied on the trail is sourced fresh from local markets. We place a strong emphasis on the importance of sourcing locally wherever possible and illustrate the value of this for the local communities to our clients.

Local teams of guides, cooks and porters are employed to lead and assist our expeditions on the ground in tandem with the international guide and doctor who travel with each trip. Our local guides are highly experienced and very familiar with the expedition route, local history, cultures and customs of the region.

We have clear and transparent payment policies across all our destinations. We pay industry-standard wages or above to our guides, porters and cooks throughout the world. We offer advice on tipping to all our clients. We ensure the money is divided fairly between the local guides, cooks, porters and drivers. We offer specific tipping advice for each of our destinations in keeping with the local guidelines on best practice.

We participate in cultural and social events such as traditional dance and song, visit local NGOs and co-ops and frequent local festivals and celebrations. We encourage our clients to partake in local traditions whenever possible.
Near Machu Picchu we take time to visit a local coffee farm; picking the coffee cherries, roasting the coffee over an open fire, grinding the beans and brewing the freshest cup of coffee! We learn about traditional coffee growing traditions and experience what it takes to produce from tree to cup.

We spend an evening at natural hot spring soaking our tired legs under the stars.

Before we return to Cusco we visit a woman’s co-op which produces traditional textiles and art. During the visit our clients get to see first-hand how these traditional crafts are produced.