Lake Titicaca

Big, Blue, Beautiful....and Burnt to a Crisp!

At 4:30 this morning, eight of us fumbled back into the volunteer house and flopped into bed after a long, but fantastic journey to Lake Titicaca. The adventure started at 6:30 on Thursday morning, when we were picked up from the house and taken to the "First Class" bus terminal. For the next ten hours, we were students to ourb friendly, yet annoying tour guide. In transit to Puno, we stopped several times to visit various, extremely touristy, sights. Our first stop was a Cathedral which had a mish-mash of Inca and Spanish decor. Next, we visited the tallest Inca temple, surrounded by what used to be an Incan community. At that sight there were over one hundred and sixty store houses, and the Incans would trek to this sight to bring food and supplies back to Cusco and other regions of the Incan empire. The entire sight was surrounded by a rock wall high above on the hills. We had a two quick stops where we could do some shopping for Andean gear (I got hooked up with some alpaca socks, gloves, a toque and a sweater). For lunch, we pulled into this cute little town, and enjoyed a buffet while some Andean musicians played traditional music. We finally arrived at our "tres chic" hotel around 6pm and rejoiced at the luxury of a nice hot shower.

Early Friday morning we were picked up and taken to the port, where we waited out a rain and hailstorm before venturing out into the gigantic lake in our good ol' trusty boat, "Roy Adventur". Our group was full of travelers from all over the world: Denmark, Holland, Spain, France, Japan, Italy, Australia, Califronia and my fellow Canadian from Quebec! We first visited the floating islands, which was definitely a highlight for me. How cool would that be to live on something that is floating!!! From the reed island we took a short trip on a reed boat accross to another reed island. This second island was much more touristy, equiped with a cafe, a restaurant, a bar, and little huts for visitors to stay in. As we left the floating Islands, I decided that it would be nice to take the long part of our boat journey on the roof of "Roy A.".....forgetting that we were 4000 meters closer to the sun, on a lake which reflects the sun, and not knowing that good ol' Roy was the slowest of the boats - my face got very badly burrrrnt . I woke up the next morning with my eyes swollen shut, and the day after, although my condition had improved, it still looked as though someone had punched me in the right eye...and it wouldn't stop watering! Needless to say, I opted to ride inside the boat for the rest of the tour, and I am happy to report that my face, although aged by several years from all the sun imposed wrinkles, is doing much better today.

Arriving at Amantani Island lobster red and hungry, I went with four of my other Peru's Challenge team memebers to meet our host family for the evening. The house was so cute...I was very impressed. Our host family made us a fabulous lunch consisting of Quinoa soup followed by an omlette and two types of potatoes. After lunch we met with the rest of the tour to hike up to a temple at the top of the island. From there, Christine and I stuck around to watch the sunset, then treked our way back down to enjoy another great meal. It was really awesome to get to experience how these Quechuan farmers live and what they eat. After dinner, we got to further our experience by dressing up in their traditional clothes and going up to the community centre to dance. It was pretty great seeing everyone from the tour dressed in outlandish attire. Although the dance was good times, everyone was very exhausted from the long day of travel, so the party was packed in pretty early. We were guided back to our host house under one of the biggest, brightest moons I have every seen.

The next morning was another early start. We had a hearty breakfast of fried dough and the same moonia tea we had at every meal, and then returned to the port where we were reunited with our good friend "Roy". Soon we were off to our last stop, Taquile Island. The islands are so beautiful and serene...no traffic, no excess noise, amazing views from everywhere - it was certainly a very relaxing atmosphere. On these islands there is no police force and no hospital. Traditionally, the wome would have between 10 and 22 children, and the husband would be the only one allowed to help deliver the babies. They use all different kinds of plants as medicines and have traditional ways of practicing medicine. For example, their from of radiography is to go to bed with a guinea pig on the spot that is an issue, then early in the morning, as the sun is rising, sacrifice the guinea pig and open it up and inside will be the same problem that the patient has. Alrighty then..... Anyway, we had a fabulous fish lunch, and then traipsed down five hundred steps to meet for our final time with Roy A.

Back in Puno I got some dinner with Christine, Sam, and some new friends I had made on the tour. We all ended up being on the same overnight bus back to Cusco, and in town today I have already bumped into the girls from Holland and the guys from Denmark! On Friday, some of the Peru's Challenge team members are off to do the Inca Trail trek, and after struggling up those humble hills, I say good luck to them!

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