Huayna Picchu
— — the mountain the ruins lean against.
Not only on a wall.
“The steep one. The peak that rises behind every postcard of Machu Picchu, on the far side of the citadel from the Sun Gate. Four hundred permits a day, two morning windows, and a stone staircase carved by the Inca that climbs more than three hundred metres in less than an hour of walking. At the top there is a small terraced shrine and the river bending eight hundred metres below. Most people come up for the view down. The view, when the cloud lifts, is of the ruins from the angle no postcard takes.
Huayna Picchu, on ceramic.
Each tile is finished by hand in our Knoxville studio. Artwork is slowly infused into the ceramic surface under high heat and pressure, and rests beneath a thin glossy finish. The colour lives in the surface, not on top of it.
Pick any four 4-inch tiles — National Parks you've been to, a Smokies set, the four seasons of one place. $ for a set of , cork-backed, ready to live on the table.
The place, in three passes.
Huayna Picchu is the sharp green peak that frames the north end of the Machu Picchu citadel, in the Cusco Region of southern Peru. Its summit stands at 2,693 metres, about 360 metres above the ruins themselves, and the Urubamba River loops around its base in the Sacred Valley below. The mountain sits inside the Machu Picchu Historical Sanctuary, inscribed by UNESCO in 1983 as a mixed cultural and natural World Heritage Site. The Inca built terraces and a small ceremonial structure, the Temple of the Moon, on its flanks. Access is by permitted timed entry from the citadel itself.
At nearly 2,700 metres the air is thin enough that most visitors feel the climb in the first ten minutes. Morning cloud commonly fills the Urubamba gorge below the citadel and lifts in slow sheets as the sun clears the ridge, which is why the early permit window opens at 7 a.m. The trail is a single-file staircase of Inca-cut granite, in places worn smooth, with cable handlines on the steepest section near the summit. Rain in the wet season — roughly November through March — makes the stone slick. The Peruvian Ministry of Culture caps daily entries to protect the route.
Entry to Huayna Picchu is by separate timed permit on top of the standard Machu Picchu ticket, capped at four hundred visitors per day across two morning groups. Permits sell out weeks ahead in the dry season, June through August. The round-trip from the control gate inside the citadel takes most people two to three hours. There is no water, no shelter, and no exit other than back the way you came. The Temple of the Moon, on the north face, is reached by a longer loop that adds about two hours. Children under twelve are not admitted.