I woke up in a reclined armchair as we rolled down the pre-morning streets of Puno. We had driven through the night, finally coming down the hill to Lake Titicaca. Our hostel owner didn't have our room ready, but he offered us a spot to crash on the couch, a rather good breakfast, and a place on a tour that left at 8am. We piled on all the warm cloths we had and sleepily walked down the quay to the waiting lines of boats. Pulling out of the marina, we cut slowly into the bay.
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| Our first glimpse of the floating islands |
The first stop was at one of the
Uros floating islands. The islanders have lived for thousands of years on these structures made of blocks of reed root covered in reed bundles and topped by reed houses. Most of the men and boys were out fishing and harvesting reeds with long, scythe-like poles. The elected "mayor" of the island greeted us with the women and girls, who showed off their embroidery and method of island building.
After a ride on a long, low reed boat we re-boarded our motorboat and went to the long rocky island of
Taquile. Here, the men wear black pants with billowing white shirts and black vests in the Spanish colonial style. These are belted with colourful woven sashes and "Inca" hats with patterns that indicate status. A bag of cocoa leaves is tucked into the sash. The leaves are traded with friends as a form of greeting when they meet on the paths. The women wear tasseled shawls, colourful for the girls and black with bright tasseled for the married women.
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Hiking up the island.
It was so cold, I wore a touque I had bought as a gift! |
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| Both the men and women of Taquile weave and knit. A market in the main square sells their wares. |
We broke for lunch at a house on the south end of the island. Our view extended over the huge lake, south towards the high mountains of Bolivia. We were served a delicious quinoa soup and a trout or tortilla (omlette) on rice.
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Bolivia's Cordierra Real mountains on the horizon.
They are over 20,000 ft tall |
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| Our companions came from Slovakia, Germany, South Africa, and Catalunia |
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| Quinoa soup |
We finally re-boarded our boat and bucked a rough headwind on a zig-zagging course back to Puno. Several of us sat on the deck, trading travel stories and discussing Basque/Catalunian/Spanish politics. Those of us who were staying at the same hostel resolved to meet for dinner, where we enjoyed another few hours of conversation (with the obligatory questions about why Americans love guns) and delicious Alpaca and Cuy.
