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You might want to cross post to the Anthropology group - they will like this, too! 
Saying the same thing
I can vouch for that the high res photos look like the magnificence I saw then with my young eyes.
Upstairs in a closet I have my slides. Probably rotting. You can possibly imagine how many I took.
Other than the obvious of getting to roam there and explore and breathe deeply and learn about the Incas and the phenomenal walls they built with no mortar there are two things I want to tell you.
There is the other mountain, the one that juts up in the photo that starts the little posted video.
http://www.tripadvisor.com/Travel-g294318-d548890/Machu-Picchu
eru:Huayna.Picchu.Wayna.Picchu.html
I tried to climb it!
I could not make it. The Urubamba river at the deep down bottom was beckoning for me to fall into it. Some of the turns at the side of the mountain were about 24" wide, you had to grasp the mountain to make it around the bend into the unknown on the other side. I could not do it. They did not have any ropes or anything to help you then. Many fell to their death.
The other thing is I came up in the bus on a switch back road. I called it the Hiram Bingham expressway. Hiram was the explorer who found Machu Picchu in I think 1916.
I was so effin' scared going up I simply cannot describe it. So, instead of going back down on the bus I walked down the entire mountain through the jungle, carrying my suitcase.
I wish I were young again, for just a little while, to do some more really idiotic things like that.
Machu Picchu was always on my bucket list. The stairway part reminds me of a photo I've seen of a cantilevered stairway stuck on the side of a vertical wall. 
This one?
I was looking it over and it is amazing, on the right side of the terraces near the top in particular. There are cliffs lower down too, with the river on the left instead.
This image is up atop Huaynu Picchu:
13° 9' 28.71" S 72° 32' 48.11" W
Can you find it in the image, Where's this Wall-do?
I like this trail, Inca Bridge:
13° 10' 23.60" S 72° 32' 42.77" W
In '88, we walked up in a rain at night, got into the ruins before first light, and photographed the mist rising before the tourists entered the images. In '70, we camped in the agricultural huts near the ruins, staying in for four days. It was a great place to just relax for a few days back then, with far fewer visitors daily.
To descend the mountain, both times I timed the trail run for the buses. You cross in front of them many times, and wave at them again and again as you run down and they slowly zig-zag.
how I went down the mountain perfectly, except I did not time my descent with a bus going down. Just down until I got to cross the road, down, and repeat, over and over.
It's been a real pleasure to have someone know this feeling I had.
I think when the Thanksgiving has quieted down I'll pull out my slides.
And have never had the huevos to climb Huaynu Picchu. I did climb Apu Machupicchu, which is the mountain on which the sanctuary is built. From the top Huaynu Picchu looks fairly small. A hard climb but not scary or dangerous. Quite amazing at the top.
This is on the trail up.
And close to or at the top
Last edited Tue Dec 4, 2012, 02:55 PM - Edit history (1)
Looking in the Gigapixel image, I'm impressed by the upper terracing, especially the masonry of the uppermost terrace, and i even see a set of the protruding steps, but not this particular configuration. This image may not be actual, rather a combined spoof. Panoramio may reveal the truth if the three terraces together are found elsewhere. There is some awesome stonework up on that peak!
On edit, I found another photo:
But I still don't confirm in the 16 gigapixel image.
I think you can see the rock protruding from the topmost of those three terraces in the 16 gigapixel version. Not the protruding rock:
The end walls not seen here, facing Machu Picchu, are seen from the camera below on their other side.
The lower terrace of the three has brush capping the end and the receding cliff below it.
Look about 9 terraces down from the topmost, all the way to the right. That's the wall-do we want.
On edit, back because I found more photos of same:
The following image has a high-res file here:
http://www.panoramio.com/photo/46170404?source=wapi&referrer=kh.google.com
Last edited Tue Dec 4, 2012, 01:24 PM - Edit history (1)
someone with an actual instrument capable of 2m accuracy to do readings of specific points in the ruins, specific huacas like the Intihuatani. The Intihuatani is roped off, so two or more readings equidistant on opposite sides of the position would be required for averaging (or talking nice to the guard in Spanish). Good accuracy requires patience as the instrument takes time to acquire sufficient data. Are you at all familiar with this tasking?
My current Google Earth based coordinate for the Torreon is:
Machu Picchu Torreon
-72.545576 -13.164634
These Google Earth files open a lot of the placemarks determined using Google Earth and some GPS work of undetermined accuracy:
http://jqjacobs.net/archaeo/sites/machu_picchu.kmz
http://jqjacobs.net/archaeo/sites/llactapata.kmz
In Google Earth, turn on the Panoramio layer for tons of images to examine what the positions reference. Google earth has limitations in such vertical terrain due to oblique camera viewing. That oblique angle is seen in this image:
http://jqjacobs.net/archaeo/sites/index.html#africa
"When viewing geometric monuments with significant elevation, the oblique view of the camera is readily apparent—see the Washington Monument.
In this GE screen capture of Khufu's and Khafre's pyramids, note the seam between two images (bright on the right and darker on the left) and note that each pyramid has a unique angle of oblique view.
This points to the degree of accuracy, or I should say "inaccuracy" of the monument representations in this format. Online, an updated image has since replaced this one."
More placemarks of diverse Andes monuments with Panoramio images embedded here:
http://jqjacobs.net/andes/kml/andes_archaeology.kml
