The inca trail with diabetes - Machu Picchu

I had booked the 4 day classic inca trail months in advance to make sure that I would be able to do it when I got to Cusco. I have heard so many amazing things about Machu Picchu and the inca trail and I just hoped it would be as good as everyone said. When people hype a movie, song, event etc. too much, I find that it sometimes ruins the experience a bit. This is not the case for the inca trail and Machu Picchu! This journey just can´t be described in words or pictures - it has to be done.

Day 1

We had to meet up at a plaza in Cusco at 4:30am to take a bus to Ollantaytambo where we would have our breakfast. We were a group of 15 travelers, 2 guides, 20 porters and a chef. The breakfast costed 15 soles for a buffet with coffee, tea, fruit salads, juices, bread, meat, cheese, cereal and pancakes. A great breakfast + some time to wake up and get to know people - perfect. Afterwards we were driven to the starting point where we had our first group picture and some time to arrange our bags with the sleeping bags and mattresses that we got. - Don´t rent this from your company! - First of all it is more expensive than just going to a shop and renting it - which I fortunately did with hiking shoes, walking stick etc. - and secondly the sleeping bag and mattress that we got was huge and heavy! We just had to figure a way to carry it and I managed to stuff the Mattress into my bag while I attached the sleeping bag onto the bag.
We started walking uphill. It didn´t take much to make me breathless since it was a bit steep and the altitude was high. I had taken just two units of NovoRapid to the breakfast which had plenty of sugar, but all the hiking made me drop low. Just before the hike begun we got a small bag with a banana and some soda crackers as a snack until lunch - this was enough.

The first day was filled with sun. It was very hot but the view was amazing! Walking first along the huge river and then getting deeper into the mountains. After an amazing lunch it was just uphill until we reached the campsite. We walked 14km that first day. At the campsite we were provided with a bit of hot water, soap and a small towel each and I took a french shower (without the perfume/deodorant). There were a lady selling beer who had walked up from her small house along the path. We were a few people from the group enjoying an expensive beer on our first campsite on the inca trail - surreal feeling. By my request, ten of us played a namegame and since that game I remembered all of their names :) We then had our first happy hour before dinner! Tea, coffee and hot chocolate (for most of us this meant mixing coffee and hot chocolate since we couldn´t make up our mind), plenty of popcorn and crackers. We then had our first amazing dinner with a lot of variety and I ended the night playing cards in Zen and Sara´s tent with them and a few guys from the group.

Day 2

Today we had to walk 16km. It is said to be the longest and hardest day. Most km, only up and down hill and reaching the highest altitude of the trip - 4200m.
For breakfast we had plenty of carbs to help us with some energy. Pancakes, fruitsalad, pourage, cake and some coffee/tea. I took one unit of NovoRapid which turned out to be too much. Usually when I work out (dancing) I push myself hard and get up the pulse. The result is that my blood sugar is flying up and I need more insulin. Doing the hike is not like dancing. This is exercise all day! I believe this is the reason why the one unit was too much and I only needed to take the Levemir for the rest of the trip. I had expected to take more insulin because of the altitude and cold evenings, but no.

Today we learned how to chew coca leaves for altitude sickness and other benefits. First time it was a bit weird and after keeping it in your mouth for 20-30 minutes you need to chew it - not a pleasure first time. I got used to it though and now I´ve started to like it. Today I walked together with half of the group most of the time. We talked a lot and supported each other when it got hard. Just before reaching the campsite, we saw a big inca ruin. It was so impressive! Unfortunately it was foggy and we had a bad view. Russ, Nat and I decided to stay while the others went to the campsite to relax. After 20 minutes of walking around and exploring the ruins, it suddenly cleared up and we had an amazing view of the jungle and the mountains!

Day 3

Today we had a lot of rain! We walked in the rain trying not to slip and fall and hoped it would soon clear up. It was worst in the morning though. Most of the time the rain actually wasn´t that strong and it was not too bad in my opinion. We are in Machu Picchu and the weather is a part of the experience - as long as it is not foggy all the way :) When we reached the huge inca terraces, the sun came out and we had a great view and a history from our guide. The day was short and the place where we ate lunch was also our campsite. I went for a long walk back to the ruins with Russ after lunch and visited some other ruins with the group later on. In the evening we had our last happy hour with a huge delicious cake! The porters and the chef are so impressive! He manages to make pizza and cake in a pot and have a big variety of great food every day! A bunch of vegetables and proteins every day - it was the healthiest I had been eating for a while. The porters are in all ages and they all carry huge bags a lot bigger than themselves. They don´t seem to complain, they run ahead of you to make your tent and food ready and their bag does not even have support like ours does.
The rest of the night was again cardgames and going to bed early.

Day 4

We woke up at 3:00am, had a quick coffee, some bread and went directly for the check point. We wanted to be the first ones to enter when they opened at 5:30am. There was one group in front of us, but it was just 4 seniors who we got ahead of as soon as we were through the chekcpoint :)
We played cardgames for 2 hours before they opened the checkpoint and then we started walking towards Machu Picchu. There was one guy from the group ahead of me, who reached the sungate before me. When I arrived to the sungate he was already gone and it was only me and a guy who worked there. Almost alone on the sungate, the second person to get there and with the best view of Machu Picchu! This felt amazing. After 5 minutes a few more people from my group came and I started hiking shortly after. I then realized that I didn´t just want to hurry there if I was gonna do it alone. I started running back to meet my friends and then we hurried together :) We got to Machu Picchu quite early and had a great clear view of it. WOW! I have seen so many different pictures of Machu Picchu, but nothing can be compared to how it looks when you are there! I believe I enjoyed it even more after walking for 4 days to get there.

When all of the group arrived, we went down to place our bags, use a propper toilet (not a hole in the ground as for the rest of the trip) and then we entered the actual inca ruins. We walked around and got a great guidetour with plenty of information - very interesting! It is really impressive to hear about how they built it, what thoughts they had, why it looks like it looks and how they managed to transport such big rocks! After the guidetour, I stayed in Machu Picchu for another 3-4 hours with Russ and Nat. Walking around a bit and also just sitting, enjoying the view and enjoying being in Machu Picchu.

On the train back to Cusco we had a bunch of beers and rum. We celebrated the success of the trip and also that Cedric, who is around 30 years old, had his first train ride ever!
We played cards and got drunk and then went back to party all night in Cusco. The inca trail is an amazing experience which have given me a great memory for life and some amazing new friends. It is an expensive trip - but definetely worth every dollar!

Ps: On the trip I did a few dancing videos on different nice locations that I might edit to one short trailer from my trip to Machu Picchu. Hopefully I will find the time to edit the video and if I like the result, you will get to see the video. Anyway, how cool is it to say you have breakdanced on an inca ruin? ;)

Cusco & Insulin

On the way to Cusco my bus was two hours delayed. Fortunately I met Alex from France who I first met in Lima and then on Ballistas Islands - his bus was also delayed and we hung out for two hours talking and drinking beer.
It is amazing how you keep meeting the same people over and over again in different cities. In almost every city I´ve met someone that I´ve met before. I even met a danish couple and a week later I met the girl´s dad who was traveling with his wife.

Coming to Cusco was amazing and cold! After staying in Iquitos for 4 weeks and then going through the dessert, you are not used to the cold evenings they have in Cusco! Besides the cold and the changing weather, Cusco is a great city! It is really beautiful and has plenty of nice places to go. One of my first days I went on a free walking tour. The two guides took us around town for 3 hours showing us monuments, viewpoints, different cafe´s and restaurants where we f.ex. got to taste a piece of sushi, some chicha morada, choclos and chocolate tea for free. We were also shown to different museums and we got to see how they works with silver and alpaca wool. This is a must if you go to Cusco! 

My time in Cusco have been amazing so far! I get to relax a lot and hang out with different people on the hostel. I made new friends and went out for beers, dinners etc. This summer when I was hitchhiking in Europe, I met a girl from Spain. She is now working in Cusco for 4 months and we also met up for lunch which was great. I am taking my time here and trying to figure out what to do and where to go next.

Tuesday it was ladies night at the hostel. This meant that all ladies or anyone dressed as one, would get a free shot every hour from 9pm-01am. Tobias (a danish guy I met on the hostel) and I decided to dress up as girls and save some money on alcohol. We borrowed some clothes from Josse and Pernille (two other danish girls we met on the hostel) and got some attention and free shots in the bar ;) Later on we went with a bunch of people from the hostel to a club and danced all night, though in our normal clothes :)

I found out that January is a great month to travel in South America. I met a lot of peruvian, chilenian, brazilian and colombian travelers. Even more argentinians though! All of them have vacation now and are traveling. This is both great for me to practice my spanish and also a great opportunity to get some advice from locals and maybe even have a friend or two in one of my destinations :)



My diabetes have been acting a bit weird since end of december. Around christmas I suddenly went from taking no NovoRapid to taking 5-8 units for every meal! This lasted for a week and then went down to just 1-3 units pr. meal. Going from Iquitos to Lima, Lunahuana, Huacachina and Nazca have not really shown any pattern in the change of insulin. Some days I just need more than others, without having much to do with the food I eat. F.ex. I was on the flight from Iquitos to Lima and chocolate bars, vanilla crackers and soda crackers which was the food we got - I didn´t have to take any insulin! In Cusco which is a lot higher altitude, my use of insulin have been very low and is now down to none again, only the Levemir. It can´t seem to figure out why it changes all the time, but since I don´t see a pattern in the temperature change or altitude change, it might just be how relaxed I am. At the moment I am just really relaxing. I don´t worry about anything and take my time here in Cusco which is great for me and probably also my diabetes!

One more thing. I placed my hand luggage in the luggage room of the bus. Apparently this was a bad idea. Several heavy bags was thrown on top of mine, which resulted in most of my teststripboxes opened. I didn´t notice this until around 1,5 day later. I thought they would all be ruined. I tried measuring my bloodsugar with strips from 3 of the packs that were opened and one that was still closed - they all showed the same! I hope it will continue like this. I don´t know how it was possible since they are not allowed to get much air, but I am just very lucky and glad that they seem to still work fine.

New years eve in Lima, Lunahuana, Huacachina, Nazca

In Pilpintuwasi I met a group of friends from Oregon who I gave a tour in Pilpintuwasi and we talked for a bit. The same group of friends I met on the hostel I went to in Lima and I spent new years eve with them. There was a great party in the hostel. I helped with the grocery shopping to make it cheap and it ended up with food and a lot of alcohol for everyone for 20 soles each. I started early drinking red wine, whisky, rum and pisco and the food didn´t get ready until much later. Just before midnight I was smashed and as soon as I saw the fireworks, I went to bed. It was a great evening though and I met a lot of nice people. The following morning I was up before everyone else and went for along walk along the beach - amazingly quiet and beautifull in the morning sun!

I agreed with two girls from the hostel - Erin and Shea - that we should go to Lunahuana and Ica together and so we did.

Lunahuana is a very small village sorrounded by dessert mountains and with a big river next to it. When we got there, we went for a walk along the river and found a small treehouse just next to the river where we spent some time just relaxing. Extremely beautiful. The noize from the strong and wide river, the grapeplants around us and the big empty mountains. The following day we went for river rafting which was great fun and cheap!

In the afternoon we took a bus to Huacachina where we found a cheap hostel. As soon as we enter I spot the group from Oregon. Spencer, Ben, Jordan and Whitney. They had been out sandboarding and where going to Cusco later that evening.
In the evening I spent some time talking to Ben about couchsurfing, woofing etc. untill Spencer invited me to the bar and made me a great and strong rum and coke. We partied until he had to catch the bus to Cusco.

In Huacachina, Shea, Erin and I went sandboarding, dune buggy and went on a trip to the Ballistas Islands. I can only recommend people to do all of it! Great fun and incredible nature! Watching sea lions climbing from the water up on the rocks and some of them were fighting. Watching penguins and a bunch of birds outside a zoo. It was great!

Erin and I continued to Nazca. The owner of our hostel tried to sell us a flight going over the nazca lines for 430 soles each. I thought it was way to much and wanted to go ask tour agencies the following day. He kept offering me a lower price and I ended up paying 220 soles for a night in the hostel including open bar in the evening and breakfast in the morning + the flight over the nazca lines!

A few people that I met:

Lucas from Argentina. He hates the police and authorities. He had a visa to Peru for 60 days, but stayed 75. When he crossed the border they asked him to pay a fine which he refused. He thought it was stupid and he didn´t really have the money. He ended up going to jail for two days trying to convince they police that he did nothing wrong and shouldn´t be in jail. They told him that he could pay the fine and reenter Peru when he wanted to or he could spend more time in jail and never be allowed into enter Peru again. After the two days he asked for 5 hours to go sell some of his stuff to earn money in order to pay the fine, and so he did. Now he was with less than 50 soles trying to get from Lima to Bogota where he could get a job.

Carlos from Argentina and his two sons of 20 and 17 years. They are travelling around South America, trying to find the cheapest ways around and earning money for their journey by playing music on the streets. They are very talented musicians and gave a small concert on new years eve in the hostel. It resulted in a bunch of people, including myself, screaming out the lyrics of Yesterday by the Beatles :)

Spencer from Oregon. One of the guys from the group. He lives from fighting in UFC. Now he is on vacation and parties all the time. He has a lot of crazy stories to tell and he showed me pictures from UFC and of the bus that he bought - just to have a bus. What is most incredible is that he makes so many friends without knowing more than 5 words of spanish which is words like naked and drunk. In Huacachina we partied. he had just been there on night and already everyone in Huacachina knew him.

Christmas eve and more

I started the 24th of by buying a paneton to share for breakfast with the staff and the two other people at the hostel. Everybody was really happy when waking up to paneton :) I went to call my brother and wish him a happy birthday and we talked for 10-15 minutes which was nice. Liz and I went for a walk until she needed to take her flight back to Lima and Toni came and picked me up. First we went to his house - a very interesting and nice house. He showed me the great view from his terrasse and we talked while he played guitar. After a few hours we went to his sisters house. At first the family seemed very quiet. The sister has three kids - two boys around 13 and 19 and one girl around 16. They all spoke well english since their dad was from the states, but they didn´t say much. After around half an hour, the conversation really got going, they all became talkative and we had great conversations for hours. The two brothers showed me a computergame that one of them were programming, quiet impressive.
For dinner we had pizza with coca cola and champagne. Then I had brought a cake as a gift to the family for inviting me. When they pulled out the cake from the fridge, they all began to sing a birthday song for me - I was so overwhelmed with joy! Toni said that they couldn´t just skip a birthday in the family, they needed to sing for me :)
The evening was not a christmas with christmas songs or a tree, but it was with a family filled with love which was even better.

Around midnight, Toni and I walked to my hostel. We talked about "the alchymist" and about dreams. People having dreams but who don´t do anything to pursue their dreams. We also talked about beginners luck as described in the alcymist. During this conversation, I tried to figure out what I wanted in life, what was my dream. At first I couldn´t find an answer and I thought it was bad. I didn´t have a dream and therefore nothing to pursue or fight for. Then I realized I was fooling myself. I don´t know what I want to do for the rest of my live yet and what I want to be or where in the world, but I know what I want right now. My dream for many years was to go to South America, finally I was able to pursue it! This is the first step towards my future - one day at a time. I enjoy where I am instead of worrying to much about the future, and even though I try not to think to much about it, I know that I am getting closer to the answer every day :)
New years resolutions is somehow a sad thing. Why wait until new year to pursue our dreams or try to improve ourselves. If you know what you want, go get it now!


I had my last day in Pilpintuwasi last friday and went to town in the evening. On the boat it was quiet and there was a fullmoon, the most beautiful fullmoon over the river! I went to a new hostel where I met many other travellers in all ages. Some of them I knew from when they visited Pilpintuwasi. I stayed in a room with a man from Spain and two travellers from Argentina. I got to practice my spanish a lot and I heard some crazy stories and got a lot of traveling advice.
I have met so many amazing and interesting people the past week and it would take forever to write about it.
I liked being the only volunteer, I met more people on the tours and I talked more to the other workers and practiced my spanish. When I went to Iquitos, by coincidence I met people I showed around in Pilpintuwasi and it resulted in a beer with them, a walk or a change of contact information.

I decided to go change my flight ticket to Lima and go earlier (from the 5th of January to the 30th of December). I am ready to travel and I have to be in Cusco on the 8th of January. I figured that if I went to Lima earlier, maybe I would have time to visit Ica on the way to Cusco.

So far I have stayed 3,5 week in Quito and around 4 weeks in Padre Cocha. I really enjoyed it and feel that I have learned more about the cities and the culture. It is a very different experience to stay in a place for longer than just 4-5 days and get to know people. I have lived with locals both places which have also been an advantage. I hope to find another city later on where I can spend a few weeks trying to meet locals, find some dancers and also practice my spanish - but now I am ready to be on the run for a bit :)