The barest suggestion of stone buildings could stop us. Yet it was the first sight of the sickly green Trekkers’ Hostel that made me tear up, and not because the eyesore of modern architecture was long overdue for a date with a bulldozer. I wasn’t the only one grateful for this last official campsite before Machu Picchu. “Thank you, Lord!” cried Grace, so ecstatic I was a little worried she was going to kiss the building. But she only leaned her forehead against the concrete walls. “Thank you!” The backpackers inside squeezed tighter to accommodate us. If they hadn’t, we would have been stranded out in the rain, huddling and shivering through the night. Everyone insisted that Stesha and Grace take two of the beds. Dad muttered a single halfhearted warning about bedbugs, too worn out to do much more. (And yes, for the record, bedbugs can thrive at high altitude.) I couldn’t sleep. Every little sound made me think that we were being hit with another mudslide. Sick of feeling this claustrophobic panic, I crept around my sleeping parents to head outside, which made no sense at all.
