5-Day Machu Picchu Tour Package

Your journey begins the moment you step off the plane. A Planet Odysseys team member will be waiting at Alejandro Velasco Astete International Airport to welcome you with a private transfer directly to your hotel — no shared shuttles, no waiting around.

Cusco sits at 3,400 metres above sea level, and your body will need time to adjust to the altitude before anything else. The morning is deliberately kept open for this reason. Rest, drink coca tea, and allow yourself to arrive slowly. When you are ready, your guided city tour begins.

Your local guide will take you to Qorikancha — the original Inca Temple of the Sun, where 700 sheets of solid gold once lined the walls before the Spanish dismantled them to build a colonial church over the same sacred site. Walking through both structures together tells the story of two civilizations in a single afternoon. The tour continues through the historic center, arriving at the Plaza de Armas — Cusco's magnificent main square and the cultural heart of the city for centuries. It is a wonderful place to begin feeling connected to this extraordinary part of the world.

This is the day most people say they didn't expect to love as much as Machu Picchu itself.

The Sacred Valley of the Incas stretches for around 60 kilometres along the Urubamba River — fertile, dramatic, and still deeply alive with the culture and traditions of the communities who have called it home for generations. This is where the heart of the Inca Empire once beat, and where some of Peru's most quietly extraordinary sites are found.

Your first stop is Maras, where more than 3,000 individually owned salt ponds cascade down a hillside, fed by a natural saltwater spring that has been flowing for longer than recorded history. Each pond belongs to a local family, harvested using the same methods passed down through the centuries. It is one of those places that quietly takes your breath away.

From Maras, you continue to Moray — a series of concentric circular terraces carved into a natural bowl in the earth. The temperature difference between the outermost and innermost rings can reach as much as 15 degrees Celsius, which is why archaeologists believe the Incas used Moray as an agricultural testing site, simulating different growing climates within a single structure. The engineering alone is remarkable. The setting makes it even more so.

A sit-down lunch is included in Urubamba before your guide transfers you to the train station for the scenic journey to Aguas Calientes. The train ride itself is beautiful — narrow mountain passes, cloud forest, and the Urubamba River running alongside. You arrive in Aguas Calientes as evening settles in. Your accommodation is ready. Tomorrow is the highlight of your Machu Picchu tour package.

There is a reason travelers come from every part of the world to stand in this place.

Because you stayed overnight in Aguas Calientes, your group boards the first bus up to the Machu Picchu gate ahead of the day-trip crowds from Cusco. That early entry changes the experience significantly — quieter terraces, cleaner light on the mountains, and the space to actually absorb where you are standing.

Machu Picchu was constructed in the 1400s as a royal estate for Inca emperor Pachacuti. It was abandoned less than a century later, and the Spanish never found it. The site remained unknown outside the region until historian Hiram Bingham arrived in 1911. Today it is a UNESCO World Heritage Site and one of the New Seven Wonders of the World. None of that quite prepares you for the moment you walk through the entrance and see it for the first time.

Your Planet Odysseys guide will lead you through the Intihuatana stone, the Temple of the Sun, the Room of the Three Windows, and the vast agricultural terraces that fan out across the mountainside. They will tell you not just what you are looking at, but why it matters — the astronomical alignments, the engineering solutions, the cultural significance of every stone placed deliberately in every wall. After the guided tour, you will have free time to wander at your own pace before making your way back down to Aguas Calientes. From there, the train and road transfer returns you to Cusco for the night.

This is why Machu Picchu vacation packages remain one of the most sought-after travel experiences in South America.

By Day 4, you have experienced the history and heritage of the Inca world. Today belongs to the Andes themselves — the wide, raw, quietly sacred mountain landscape that forms the backdrop to everything you have seen.

Planet Odysseys gives you the freedom to choose the experience that feels right for you.

Rainbow Mountain (Vinicunca)

Altitude: 5,200 m · 17,060 ft

Vinicunca — or Montaña de Siete Colores — is one of the most remarkable natural landscapes in South America. Its slopes are striped in vivid reds, yellows, greens, and purples, formed over millions of years by the oxidation of different minerals in the soil. For most of history, the colors were buried under glacial ice. As the glacier retreated around 2015, the mountain was slowly revealed to the world. The hike is moderate to challenging and takes around two to three hours at high altitude. The panoramic views from the ridge — across the Andes, over the Ausangate glacier, down into valleys that seem to go on forever — are unlike anything else on this itinerary. Best suited for travelers who feel comfortable at high altitude and are looking for a full, physical Andean experience.

Humantay Lake

Altitude: 4,200 m · 13,780 ft

Tucked beneath the Humantay glacier, this glacial lake sits in almost perfect stillness, its water a deep turquoise that reflects the surrounding snowcapped peaks. The hike is shorter and less strenuous than Rainbow Mountain — around one and a half to two hours — and the atmosphere at the lake is peaceful in a way that is difficult to put into words. Fewer visitors, more silence, and a quality of light over the water that has a way of making people stop talking altogether. Best suited for travelers who want a meaningful Andean experience without the most demanding altitude.

Both options include round-trip transport from Cusco and an expert local guide throughout the day.

After five unforgettable days, your Machu Picchu trip package comes to an end. Your final morning in Cusco belongs to you. Take a slow walk through the San Blas neighborhood — the cobblestone streets, the artisan workshops, the rooftops overlooking the city — or settle in at a café in the Plaza de Armas and watch the morning unfold around you. Cusco has a way of feeling different on the last day. You notice things you missed at the beginning.

When the time comes, your Planet Odysseys driver will collect you from your hotel and transfer you privately to Alejandro Velasco Astete International Airport, giving you plenty of time before your flight. From here, you carry five days of Peru with you — the light on the citadel, the salt ponds at Maras, the colors of Vinicunca or the stillness of Humantay Lake. Real journeys. Real connections with the Andes.