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Ep. 29: Day 3 on the Inca Trail
46 Plays2 years ago
Join Stephy Steph and Bobby on day 3 on the Inca Trail. Is the hardest part behind them or is this just the start? Are they both enjoying the journey?
If Machu Picchu is on your bucket list then give a listen to see if this is the adventure you would like to take!
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Transcript
Start of Day 3: Uphill Trek and Inca Site Plans
00:00:00
Speaker
We are day three, this is Bobby, Inca Trail track. We've broken camp. It is 7 a.m. We've been hiking for about 40 minutes from the camp. Right now we're having an elevation gain and it's basically just straight up with steps.
00:00:25
Speaker
The plan is to get to a Inca archaeological site and most of today is downhill.
00:00:37
Speaker
If you heard prior day two track, the downhill is cardiovascularly not demanding, but it's rather challenging cognitively. Quite frankly, it's a lot more risky, which makes it challenging. Steffie stuff is ahead.
00:01:01
Speaker
We are now at the rest spot right here. She's doing a video recording. How's he doing? Oh, I feel lovely. Do you feel like doing good today? I feel like doing jumping jacks. Is that inappropriate with that? I think you should do jumping jacks. I'll take my pack off first.
Reaching Inca Site: Adventure Reflections
00:01:20
Speaker
We made it first, Inca site. So pretty excited.
00:01:28
Speaker
Okay great. So we're at this site. As I said we've only hiked for about 40 minutes and it's been quite the adventure so far.
00:01:52
Speaker
We're going through an Inca site right now. It's pretty neat seeing structures on the mountains. The view is just absolutely gorgeous. Absolutely beautiful. The sun is kind of coming through the clouds. Absolutely gorgeous. Oh boy. Steffi Steff did a little better job, I think, with the ascent. How do you go the west?
00:02:22
Speaker
Good. One of our groups is kind of splitting up everything we have here. So what an amazing, amazing spot. Just trying to catch my breath a little bit here. Steffi, Steff, can you turn and just give it a look? Look, see there.
Philosophy of Life: Living and Inspiring
00:02:52
Speaker
all right all right all right we're just hiking along we're just a hop skipping a bounce up this hill ain't nothing but a thing as long as you're going the appropriate pace day three Inca trail we uh i'm stuffy stuff and this is this is bobby just breathing a little bit heavier than
00:03:14
Speaker
You know, we're just kind of enjoying the ride. That's what we do here at Between Two Teeth. We're out to live, laugh, love, and to connect, discover. I'm not laughing today. And inspire. We're doing steps straight up. What most people don't know is Bob got his live, laugh, love from Eat, Pray, Love. You're so terrible. You know, one thing that we just stepped away from was an Inca restoration site.
00:03:44
Speaker
Yeah, that site's important because it shows you a little bit about the temperature that was seasonal based on the window size. But it also kind of shows you the size of the homes, which means gives you clues as to how many people lived in a dwelling.
00:04:12
Speaker
Yeah Rest me gives you a lot of people Ran up these steps believe it or not. I Wanted to know if there were any female runners, but I already knew the answer that question It's pretty tough, you know It's pretty tough because When you grow up in certain places in the world, you don't get to choose
00:04:37
Speaker
You don't really get to choose what you do. The archaeological site was for runners. They had relay runners between sites. That was their way for communication, probably to transport certain food items.
00:05:00
Speaker
Steph doesn't understand pacing. I like doing interviews like this. Bobby can't talk for too long. Steph is more
Historical Insights: Communication and Choices
00:05:10
Speaker
cardiovascular. So one of the things I want to just take a minute to talk about because we're here at Pace is just talking about some of the blessings we have living in kind of today's world is you get to choose what you do.
00:05:25
Speaker
Some people might argue that a little bit, but you get more of a choice than you used to. And that is really especially nice. Oh, what is it? Supaiki aiki? Supaiki aiki. We've got a porter coming up, so I'm going to let them go. Supaiki aiki, Senor Buena.
00:05:51
Speaker
They're carrying all of our stuff and we got one more porter. We have a bunch of young 20 year old Aussies behind us who are raring to get past us. Bob, what do you want people to know?
Group Dynamics: Pacing and Leadership
00:06:15
Speaker
What I'd like people to know is there's various leadership styles. You got this. You don't want to leave your wingman. Sometimes you say wingmans keep up. Sometimes. Oh there she goes again. Do you need a rest? So what I learned yesterday on the day two track is that slow
00:06:44
Speaker
baby steps does wonderful things. And if you're with a group, there's times you go at your own pace. If you're trying to be next to someone, you have to be very mindful of the pace they're going. You need to look at them, see how they're doing. And that's a challenge. Let's let this porter go by.
00:07:10
Speaker
So I think this is a great opportunity for you to kind of take the lead on this one. So for me, this is a struggle. I didn't train enough as much as I wanted to. I've talked about that on prior.
00:07:24
Speaker
comments this is hard Steph is more cardiovascularly fit obviously the heavy breathing is not coming from her but this is a challenge and challenge accepted yeah but slow
00:07:42
Speaker
Steady does
Cultural Perspectives: Travel and Opportunities
00:07:44
Speaker
a lot of things. I really want to get back to the gratitude of being able to kind of choose your own path in life. That has really stuck out to me and struck home. The more we travel and gain a perspective, the more I've realized the limited opportunity for people growing up in certain cultures.
00:08:06
Speaker
and Steph maybe talk about the small community that we were in where we saw the yeah yeah yeah yeah stuff being made yeah I'm gonna show you pace this there Bobby um one of the things that really like I said has been sticking out is just the the limited opportunity and when you are in America you get opportunity to
00:08:32
Speaker
get an education through school loans. That doesn't exist in several parts of the world. And another point on that is that you also may not be given the opportunity to go to school.
00:08:46
Speaker
You heard the story of someone who's 13 and wants to be a doctor, but does not have the means to make that happen. Yeah. Yeah. And so it's tough. And we were in a, buenos dias, we were in a traditional community where the work was quite segregated by sex. Yeah. The women were making textiles. Yeah, I know. Let me talk about that as you keep hiking there.
00:09:16
Speaker
Yeah, you know, the females, they had one outfit, which was a skirt and a hat and a shawl. And they were expected to wrap a child, carry that child, go get food for their family way up in the highlands. And then they were also expected
00:09:44
Speaker
to yarn or knit while they did it. And if you're somebody who enjoys those things, there's nothing wrong with those things, but it would be like me dictating everybody has to run, you know, 50 miles a week and you get no option or no choice in the matter. It's not, it's not right, you know. I think as we develop
00:10:06
Speaker
We realize the power of choice and especially the power of freedom of choice and what that does for human beings. And that's the blessing of traveling and seeing different cultures. Yeah, it's all perspective and I start to gain a really deep appreciation and understanding. You know, you're a surgeon back in the States. You likely, that'd be a very difficult path for you to do here.
00:10:33
Speaker
Oh yeah, almost impossible. So, and the other thing is, if you're a dude growing up in this culture, if your dad's a farmer, you also may not get a choice. You're probably destined to be a farmer. And that's not, you know, that's not living life to the fullest. If you want to be a farmer, that's great. And that's super fortunate. There's nothing wrong with farming. It's just, if you didn't want to be a farmer,
00:10:58
Speaker
you don't get that opportunity to choose your path. So the reason I bring that up is just the freedom of choice and the blessing of choice and the opportunities that come with that. Sometimes too many options, as we're also finding out in the States, is not a blessing.
Environmental Challenges: Inca Trail Landscape
00:11:18
Speaker
You know, when you start to get a menu like the Cheesecake Factory, you start to get decision paralysis. As I pause here for a moment, you know, we're still on the straight incline. This is early day two on the Inca Trail track. Looking around.
00:11:33
Speaker
Fog and clouds surround us. It's impossible to see the valley down yonder. Heavy vegetation everywhere. The rainy season is getting ready to start, so there's not a whole lot of blooms of color. But just an amazing spot. Yeah, not very much so.
00:11:55
Speaker
All right, guys, Bob's giving us the cut signal, so that means we're done talking, whether we like it or not. Oh, thank you. Yeah.
00:12:05
Speaker
So not necessarily just what I've learned today, but just in general, this trip has just really kind of given me perspective and I feel bad. I feel bad even asking, hey, if I see somebody like, oh, what do you want to, if I see a child, I'm like, you know, I feel bad asking, hey, what do you want to do when you grow up? It's kind of a tough question.
Gratitude and Cultural Awareness
00:12:31
Speaker
And so this one is just really,
00:12:33
Speaker
brought me a lot of sense of gratitude for where I live and a little bit more cultural awareness for sure and also just seeing like you got plenty of porters which are human beings that have to carry a lot of the load our load and I really don't know how I feel about that I know they carry my own weight but admittedly
00:13:04
Speaker
If I had a huge pack on, that would be very difficult.
00:13:11
Speaker
And I could see where the Inca Trail, which is accessible to so many, would quickly become unaccessible.
Physical Challenges: Adapting to Inca Trail
00:13:24
Speaker
But also, we have not adapted to this environment. The altitude, we're probably about 3,800 meters. See? Hola. Hola. Buenos dias. Buenos dias. See? We haven't adapted to that. Yes. We haven't adapted to the stairs. Yeah.
00:13:42
Speaker
It's tough on the porters They do this all the time Most of them are actual farmers. Yeah But you know, so stay tuned guys, you know, there's gonna be more to come we're going up the last few steps here and you know, hopefully we can really gain a great appreciation for kind of weaving through the struggle and
00:14:07
Speaker
and getting through it. Life's a struggle sometimes, but that's part of it. We're about to summit here, so more to come. Okay. Here you go.