Ingapirca Inca Trail in Ecuador

While the Ingapirka Inca Trail in Ecuador is not as famous as its southern cousin in Peru, the Inca Trail to Machu Picchu, it was actually more important when it was constructed 1,000 years ago.

The Inca Trail in Ecuador once connected the Incan empire’s northern capital Quito with the city at its heart, Cuzco in Peru. It was used to move trade and messengers as well as large marching armies during the civil war that broke out between the two Incan princes, Huáscar in Quito and Atahualpa in Cuzco.

Later, the Spanish called it the Camino Real (Royal Road) during their conquest of the Incan empire in the years after the Incan civil war. Centuries later still, Commander Sucre, the Ecuadorian independence leader, led his troops over this Incan highway to fight the Spanish royalists, and the giant mounds of stones on the mountain pass marks the cemetery where hundreds of Commander Sucre’s troops were buried.

Today most of the Ecuadorian Inca Trail has been destroyed by the Spanish Conquistadors, but this three day trek that stretches through Sangay National Park towards the ruins of Ingapirka offers some of the best preserved ruins in the former north of the Incan empire.

The trek takes you through the pristine Ecuadorian paramo past its many beautiful lagoons and reaches a maximum elevation of 4,200 m (13,776 ft.) above sea level – making it one of the highest points of the Royal Road in the entire Incan Empire.

Along the route we break for lunch in the ancient Incan Tampus, stone buildings constructed by the Incas, where Chasquis or Incan messengers took refuge hundreds of years before.