At the end of the day, everyone heads back down the mountain to Agua Caliente, most to catch their respective train back home. Here are the workers in the back of the dump truck ahead of us. Our train was a "local" train, rather than the "tourist" train, so we were heading back with many of these workers. The tourist trains run from $80 to $120 round trip. They run on time and take less than three hours each way. The local train only costs $8 round trip, but it takes four and a half hours when it is on time.
It was only two hours late this day, virtually on time from what I hear. No one seemed to mind though. Agua Caliente is a great place to hang out. The lower picture is everyone eating at the cafes along the track, standing around drinking whatever, shopping, playing frisbee and doing whatever to pass the time.
We were trying to buy our tickets second hand from a friendly police officer, since you can't just show up and buy tickets for a local train. It is a very strange system, but it seems to work. I wouldn't exactly use the word "graft" but I am not sure the money we gave the officer for our tickets really ever made its way back to the Rail Road office. But he was the officer guarding the train, so it worked, and it cost us the same as if we would have actually bought tickets. I guess I am learning enough Spanish to get by.