Machu Picchu

The ruins of Machu Picchu, rediscovered in 1911 by Yale archaeologist Hiram Bingham, are one of the most beautiful and enigmatic ancient sites in the world. Built by the Incas on an Andean mountain top 8,000 feet above sea level, this extraordinary city covers five square miles. Machu Picchu is a building masterpiece. Many of the blocks of stone weigh 50 tons or more and yet are precisely sculpted and joined together.

Two thousand feet above the Urubamba river, the cloud shrouded ruins have palaces, baths, temples, storage rooms and some 150 houses, all in a remarkable state of preservation. Invisible from below and completely self-contained due to the surrounding agricultural terraces, which provided sufficient food for the inhabitants, and watered by natural springs.

It is no wonder that Machu Picchu is considered as one of the New Wonders of the World.