Visiting Machu Picchu? Book it yourself! Cheaper, better times, better options on what to visit!
If you're visiting Peru, you'll no doubt be adding a stop at Machu Picchu to your itinerary. You've probably heard of the Inca Trail, the multi-day trek that brings you to Machu Picchu, but most visitors to Machu Picchu arrive on a day or 2-day trip that goes through the town of Aguas Calientes. My goal with this post is to tell you how you can book this trip yourself, without a tour operator, which will give you a much wider variety of visit options for a much smaller price.
There are generally three ways to get to and inside of Machu Picchu. You will be using Cuzco as a starting and end point:
- The Inca Trail: takes between 1 and 4 days depending on where you start from, but this MUST be booked in advance - the general guidance is to book at least 6 months in advance for high season (June and July). You are required to have a guide, so you have to book through a tour operator. In general, when you book the Inca Trail the tour operator will sort out entry into Machu Picchu for you too.
- The Salkantay Trail: a beautiful trek which goes through the Salkantay Pass - many climbers report this as being more breathtaking in surroundings than the Inca Trail. It doesn't book out in advance - you can book this when you get to Cuzco. Your tour operator will usually sort out entry into Machu Picchu for you.
- Direct to Machu Picchu: the hiking-free option! You can book this via a tour operator, or you can do it yourself. This involves:
- booking transport via railway to Aguas Calientes, the town at the base of Machu Picchu
- booking overnight accommodation in Aguas Calientes
- getting up to the top of Machu Picchu, via bus or on foot
- entering the ruins
- optionally arranging a tour guide while there
- then getting transport back to Aguas Calientes, before returning to Cuzco
Do It Yourself!
If you want to save money on your trip to Machu Picchu while also getting the best variety of options, read on. What do I mean by "best variety of options"? Most tours are either day tours (meaning you get only a couple of hours to see Machu Picchu, at the busiest possible times) or 2-day tours with set schedules. On these tours you likely won't get to see Huayna Picchu mountain, as this books out a month or more in advance. Therefore, to avail of these options (and pay less) your best bet is to book it yourself.
This will involve five steps. They may seem a little intimidating and complex at first, but once you get your head around the different steps it will make sense. It's not always imperative, but I highly recommend booking these in advance if you can (this is the only way you will see Huayna Picchu mountain):
- Return train ticket to Aguas Calientes - $110
- Overnight hostel in Aguas Calientes - $15
- Bus trip up to Machu Picchu from Aguas Calientes (you can also walk this) - $10
- Entry fee into Machu Picchu - approx $50, depending on ticket type
- (Optional) tour guide - $25 / $50 on your own
This gives a total bill of: without tour guide $185, with tour guide $210 / $235 on your own
1. Return train ticket to Aguas Calientes
Aguas Calientes is a small town at the base of Machu Picchu, and where visitors to Machu Picchu generally eat, drink and stay overnight. It is only accessible via railway, so this is an unavoidable and rather expensive part of the journey. The journey there however is quite beautiful, passing by Incan ruins in the Sacred Valley, while the trains themselves are extremely comfortable, with many boasting skylight windows.
The best way to minimise the cost is by booking it yourself, and this also means you have more options in terms of cabin type and journey time, plus you'll be skimming the tour operator's cut off the price too.
Two different rail companies operate this journey:
Inca Rail tends to be a little more affordable than Peru Rail, but you should make a point of comparing both sites. What times should you be booking for? My advice is to book something that arrives in Aguas Calientes in the afternoon or evening, and a return trip that leaves Aguas Calientes the following evening. You can check prices now but don't book until you've booked and paid for your Machu Picchu ticket (step 4 below).
This step is made a little more confusing owing to the fact that the trains to Aguas Calientes depart from different towns. I suggest the following as your two options:
- Fancy / lazy / more expensive option: Peru Rail runs a train from Cuzco, which is probably the most straightforward way to get to Aguas Calientes. However, tickets on this line are more expensive (at least $135 round trip), and you won't get to see the town of Ollantaytambo. Also, the train doesn't even depart from Cuzco - it leaves from Poroy, a smaller town which is a 20-minute cab ride away. So slap on another $10 for your cab ride both ways.
- Cheaper option: the Inca Rail train running from Ollantaytambo is your best bet (but check Peru Rail too, in case they are cheaper on the day you're travelling). Pricing varies quite a bit, but tickets start from around $100 round trip. To get to Ollantaytambo from Cuzco, you make your way to the colectivo station shown below. Then you can hop in a colectivo van for 10 soles (around $3) to Ollantaytambo. The journey to Ollantaytambo will take between 90 and 120 minutes, and vans leave every 30 minutes, so leave plenty of time so that you arrive in Ollantaytambo for your train.
2. Overnight hostel in Aguas Calientes
Aguas Calientes is an entirely tourist town, and thus is full of hostels and hotels for all budgets. The town is quite compact, so it won't particularly matter where exactly you stay - you won't be more than a ten-minute walk from the bus stop or train station. If you arrive early enough in Aguas Calientes you can visit the thermal baths just at the edge of the town (open until 8pm).
3. Bus trip up to Machu Picchu from Aguas Calientes
You can buy this when you arrive in Aguas Calientes or you can buy it on the morning that you travel. The ticket booth is in the centre of Aguas Calientes, near Essalud.
Visitor numbers to Machu Picchu peak between 10am to 2pm, which is when all the day-trippers from Cuzco show up. Thus, I suggest getting the earliest bus that you can (5.30am). If you're doing one of the Huayna Picchu or Machu Picchu mountain tours you'll have to get an early bus anyway, as these tours start at 7am and the bus to the top takes about 20 minutes. There will be a long line to get the bus but it moves very fast as the buses are constantly departing.
If you're feeling active you can skip the bus and walk up to Machu Picchu - this will take you 70-100 minutes, involving an ascent of around 400 metres. But you'll also want to save some energy for actually walking around Machu Picchu, as well as the Huayna Picchu and Machu Picchu mountains if you're doing them. My advice? Get the bus up and walk down.
4. Entry fee into Machu Picchu
This is the most important step, and you should absolutely definitely 100% do this in advance. Visitor numbers to Machu Picchu have been limited to 2,500 per day for a few years now, while only 400 people per day are permitted on Huayna Picchu mountain (in 2 groups of 200, one at 7am and one at 10am). It's not unheard of for the visitor cap to Machu Picchu to be met during high season (June and July), and Huayna Picchu mountain is always booked out in advance owing to the extremely limited number of visitors that are allowed on it, so to avoid disappointment I suggest checking out some potential dates now.
To make the most of your trip, consider booking a ticket that includes either Huayna Picchu mountain or Machu Picchu mountain. Both of these climbs take a couple of hours and are quite challenging but the views from both are spectacular. Sadly, most visitors to Machu Picchu don't seem to know they exist until they get there - thus missing out on the chance to climb them. The climbs start from 7am so if you're doing the early climb you'll have to catch an early bus from Aguas Calientes to Machu Picchu to be there on time.
There are several sites that sell entry into Machu Picchu, but for simplicity's sake I recommend that you buy your tickets from the official ticket site: http://www.machupicchu.gob.pe/. The site is kind of hard to use, including a weird step that involves getting a confirmation number before you actually pay for the tickets, and then having to go into a separate part of the site to pay. TripAdvisor has a great article on how to navigate it. The handy thing is that you can do some preliminary research - just select a date and ticket type and you'll be able to see right now how many tickets are available for specific dates ("disponibilidad" is availability). Get the Huayna Picchu tickets if you can!
5. (Optional) tour guide
Machu Picchu is still a considerable mystery to historians, so unfortunately it's not unheard of for some tour guides to make up some dubious facts while showing tourists around. I opted not to go for a tour guide, and instead downloaded some Machu Picchu guide apps to my phone (Machu Picchu Visitor Guide being the most useful) and did the tour myself.
If you do want to hire a guide for yourself or your group, they can behired on the spot when you get to the entrance to Machu Picchu. A tour lasting two and a half hours will cost $50 total for 1-2 people, or $25 per person for 3 or more people.
Getting home
After you've walked around Machu Picchu, taking in the sights and getting plenty of photographs, you can either walk down to Aguas Calientes or you can get the bus down. The walk down takes about 30-45 minutes depending on your pace. From Aguas Calientes you can then catch your return train back to Ollantaytambo or Cuzco.
If you're going back via Ollantaytambo, colectivo drivers will generally be waiting around outside the train station for passengers. You may opt instead to stay overnight in Ollantaytambo, and check out the town and its Inca ruins the next day.
Regardless of how you get there, visiting Machu Picchu is an incredible experience. Hopefully this guide has made things a little bit clearer in terms of how to get there as efficiently as possible!
Very Nice!