Boats, birds, big holes in the ground and bus blues...

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When was the last time that you got caught up in a political demonstration, visited an island made from reeds, had lunch with an Inca family, bathed in hot springs, watched condors flying and got woken up by an earthquake - all in the space of 6 days?

As you can tell, we've had an action packed week, which began with the bus trip from Cuzco to Puno (closest town to Lake Titicaca) last Friday. The bus was due to take 6 hours, and we boarded on Friday morning expecting to be in Puno late afternoon in time to book a trip to Lake Titicaca for the next day.

Unsurprisingly, we hadn't factored in 7 unscheduled stops for political demonstrations along the way. About an hour after leaving we came across a load of logs and rocks in the road, as well as a group of about 30-40 locals blocking the entrance to a bridge. We got off to have a look, and ended up spending about 45 mins waiting until they cleared out of the way. We found out that the road block was a protest against taxes for farming, and were warned that there were more ahead and the whole thing would be going on until Sunday.

Undeterred, we also got off to have a look at the next roadblock, a few miles further down the road. At this one we tried to help to clear the road, until Jamie got threatened by some ancient Peruvian woman with half a bush in her hand. It was one of the funniest things I've ever seen, a stand off between a 6ft English guy and a 4ft Peruvian midget who must have been about 90!

The amusement soon subsided when we got caught up in another road block, and another, and another, until we finally arrived in Puno 6 and a half hours late. We barely had the energy to find the hotel and hit our beds.

As suspected, Saturday was something of a write off, as all the trips to the lake leave at the crack of dawn. Still we did manage to fill some time with a trip to visit some Inca tombs at a place called Sillustani. According to the boys (Andy was feeling rough so stayed at the hostel) we'd booked ourselves onto a trip full of Saga representatives, and they spent a delightful afternoon in the company of some of the world's oldest travellers! More bus blues, as the bus chartered by the tour company broke down 4 times throughout the afternoon. They finally got to the tombs, and Jamie got a close up view (you'll understand when we manage to post the next load of photos).

We were up at the crack of dawn on Sunday, for an all day trip to a couple of the islands on Lake Titicaca. Our first stop was the islands of Uros, a group of over 40 islands made out of reeds and inhabited by a few thousand people. It was pretty amazing, all these people living a very simple existence, though you couldn't help but think they were there as some sort of tourist attraction more than anything else. We bought a few local handicrafts and took a ride on a boat made from reeds, before we moved onto our next destination - the island of Taquile.

After a little walk around the island we were treated to a tour of one of the houses, followed by a demonstration of some of the handicrafts and living techniques adopted by the locals. Steve got to help make flour, whilst we all learnt how to weave rope from grass. All the people on the island live in big family groups, and the family we met were so friendly. They were all smiling and eager to greet us, and even performed a local dance for us which involved the blokes skipping about in a circle for a bit (pretty amusing). After this we had lunch cooked for us, which consisted of a local soup followed by fish from the lake. It was really delicious.

Taquile was truly beautiful, and all the people seemed to have a perfectly simple existence. They grew all sorts of crops and made some really beautiful handicrafts, which they took to the mainland to barter for other things they needed. We had a walk around the island after lunch, then got back on the boat for the trip back to Puno.

I haven't really mentioned Lake Titicaca and am not really sure what there is to say about the world's highest navigable lake and one of the biggest. It's high and it's big!

We'd barely arrived back at the port before we had to dash to the bus station to catch a coach to our next destination, Arequipa. Arequipa is the starting point for trips to Colca Canyon, the second biggest canyon in the world (bigger than the Grand Canyon). Our enjoyable bus experiences in Peru continued, as we spent about 6 hours on a bus with virtually no suspension on some of the worst roads in the world. We also made an unexpected stop for about an hour and a half in this truly awful place called Juliaca, as the driver and conductor were trying to fill up the bus and didn't seem bothered about going anywhere until they'd pretty much done so. The experience was topped off once we arrived in Arequipa and got to the hostel, which was incredibly unfriendly and offered box rooms with questionable hygiene. We were too tired to moan, so made the best of it and were up again early doors for our two day trip to the Canyon.

Still reading? Sorry, but I told you we'd been busy. Just think if we'd done this much for the past 3 months, this travelblog would be pretty much the length of War & Peace by now!

Anyway, we left Arequipa at about 8am on Monday, and found that for the 2 day tour we were the only people. We had a driver and an English speaking tour guide all to ourselves.

The road to Colca Canyon was barely sufficient to be called a road, but the scenery was amazing as we skirted volcanoes and drove along perilous mountain roads. We also reached the highest point we've got to, and are likely to get to, when we stopped at a lookout point at 4,900 metres, the same height as the top of Mont Blanc. We arrived at our hotel at about 2pm, and had a nice lunch there before taking a walk around the village.

The main village in the area is called Chivay (which in Inca means "the place where we make love", after the Incas invaded the valley but didn't need to use any arms - I assume they slept their way to victory!?!), but we were staying at a lovely hotel in the next village along, a place called Coporaque. During our tour of the village our tour guide, Roberto, helpfully informed us that the name of the town meant "swollen vagina" in Inca, a fact which reduced us into the most childish fit of the giggles.

After our informative walk we travelled a short distance to some natural hot springs in Chivay, which had come about due to the high levels of volcanic activity in the area. The water came down the mountain at about 90 degrees celsius, before being cooled and channeled into pools at different temperatures. We spent about 2 hours bathing in water at about 37 degrees, which was hugely relaxing after a hectic few days.

We then went to a local restaurant for some traditional Peruvian food, where we tried Alpaca meat (an Alpaca is similar to a llama, we photographed a very ugly one at Buenos Aires zoo if you remember) but still avoided trying guinea pig, which is a popular local dish. After dinner, a Peruvian band played some strange music and there were a couple of dancers who performed some traditional dances. We'd been warned that they pulled people out of the audience on some of the dances, and Jamie was one of the unfortunate victims. He did a good job of representing a victim of yellow fever and ended up under the skirts of the pretty female dancer (it's a long story). We enjoyed more drinks and soon all the restaurant was joining in some sort of strange Peruvian conga, which was very amusing. A table of middle aged French travellers next to us were getting very into it, a combination of the wine and altitude I think, and pulling off some of the most amusing dance moves I think we've ever seen. Andy fulfilled an ambition (a rather drunken one rather than a long planned one) and joined the band on one of the songs, playing this weird string of shells like a tambourine, and Joff and Jamie got dragged up to dance again. To top off the amusement of the evening Roberto, who I think we got quite drunk, tried to pull some girl using moves straight out of school and got really embarassed when we caught him putting his hand on her knee.

The next day we were up at 5:30am and off to a spot in the canyon where it's possible to see Condors. Condors are a rare and very important bird to South Americans - it is one of the 3 sacred animals of the Incas. We arrived at Cruz del Condor at about 8am and were lucky enough to see condors leaving their nesting spots and trying to catch thermals in order to fly (condors rarely flap their wings as the effort would be too much - they are flipping big!!). After a little trek and more interesting information from Roberto (we visited a spot where a priest and his married mistress were thrown off the cliff for their sins - in 1997!!!!) we got back on the bus for the trip back to Arequipa, where we were due to stay in the same horrible hostel.

As luck would have it, they'd messed up our booking, so we stayed at a really nice 3 star hotel around the corner for about a tenner each. We'd been told that Arequipa and the surrounding areas are susceptible to earth tremors, and we were woken up in the early hours of the morning by a quake which lasted for about 10 seconds. It was really weird, the whole bed was shaking like there was someone bouncing on it.

Yesterday was a total write off, as we took a 12 hour bus journey from Arequipa back to Cuzco, which arrived late to top off our woeful experience of buses in Peru. Still, it's the last bus trip we're taking in South America, and I don't doubt possibly the last ever after some of the horrible buses we've had.

Back in Cuzco today, and spending a quiet day before we go on the Inca Trail tomorrow. 4 days of trekking, 3 nights of camping (urgh!!), some of the most spectacular scenery in the world, and a little Peruvian man to carry your bag. Should be fun....

Thanks for reading, we'll try and include some Inca Trail info and photos for the last few weeks once we have a chance.

AC

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Comments

[anonymous]

Michelle, the only south american andy is beginning to resemble is maradona! and i'm not referring to his fooball skills! We want an update AC, your public is getting restless!