A Breathless View from the Top - Puno and Lake Titicaca

---

Armed with plenty of coca leaves to chew to combat the effects of altitude, we departed Cusco on the “Wonder Peru” bus, a scenic bus service stopping at places of interest between Cusco and Puno.

Our first stop was the San Pedro Church in Andahuaylillas at 3112 metres above sea level. It was built in 1631 and is full of art work and carvings.

At 3480 metres above sea level we visited the remains of the Incan Wiracocha Temple in Raqchi. The 15^th century structure is 100 metres long and 20 metres wide and made of adobe built on top of volcanic stone foundations. It is surrounded by many other buildings which were used to house people, supplies and food and the area has the usual amazing water system characteristic of all Incan sites. The remains are an impressive sight.

We stopped for lunch at a buffet style restaurant serving Peruvian food in Sicuani, a small town at 3500 metres.

Reaching La Raya pass at 4335 metres was a special moment and very impressive. The bus stopped for 15 minutes so we could take photos and purchase souvenirs from the roadside vendors. The air was cool and thin which made walking a bit of a challenge but crossing the road s..l..o..w..l..y to see the view was worth the effort.

Our last stop before reaching Puno was the Pucara Museum at 3876 metres above sea level. It holds artefacts from the Pucara pre-Inca Culture which reached its peak between 250 B.C. and 380 A.D.

Lake Titicaca came into view before we reached Puno; a beautiful and enormous blue lake at 3827 metres above sea level, 74 metres higher than New Zealand’s highest mountain. It is the world's highest commercially navigable lake at 190 kms long and 80 kms wide and the border of Peru and Bolivia crosses the lake.

As our bus travelled into Puno we were surprised that the town was jam packed with parked buses, trucks, utility vehicles, vans and cars. Our guide explained that there is a government move to clamp down on illegal mining and so protesting miners had come from all over the district to attend a protest rally.

After checking in to Camino Real, we walked three blocks to the main square. As we approached the main square we could see it was completely full of striking miners listening and cheering to the speakers. Judging from the size of the protest, which included whole families, we concluded the illegal mining industry must be very substantial. Leigh cautioned against going any further so we retreated down the main street to have our dinner. Our fears about the miners appeared ill founded as they seemed to be very orderly after the rally with many going on to enjoy a night on the town. Even so, we did not linger after dinner but we headed back to our accommodation for an early night.

The Camino Real was comfortable, other than the lack of a heater and the unfortunate placement of the pillars in our room. This created an obstacle course for Leigh to negotiate in order for him to get to his preferred side of the bed. Despite these minor issues, we would recommend this accommodation to fellow travellers. With a cosy duvet in place, we both slept well after travelling for the whole day.

The next morning we boarded a boat and travelled for two hours to visit the floating reed islands of Uros where the Uro-Aymaras people live. These people use the reeds for shelter (using dried reeds as building material), for bedding (dried reeds), for seating (fresh reeds), for food (peeling the stringy outer coating and eating the white flesh which has a slightly sweet, very subtle flavour) and for transportation (bundling, shaping and binding very long dried reeds). We took the obligatory 10 minute tourist trip in the reed boat at a cost of 10 pesos each. Leigh was annoyed and said that this was a “rip-off” because the boat completed only a small circle in front of the dwelling while two girls repeated an earlier song holding their hands out for additional money. As soon as we were off the reed boat we were the targets of yet another souvenir sales pitch; a pattern which was typical in Peru. After the last coin was extracted from the tourists in our group who could not say "no thank you", were back in our boat heading off to our overnight stop.

We arrived at Amantani Island mid-afternoon where we assembled on the beach and were greeted by the heads of the villages. In an orderly fashion each trio, couple or single were called up and allocated a host family. Our hostess, Maria, is was about 1.5 metres tall and she was dressed in traditional clothing. When our names were called we greeted her in our best and Amantani greeting. A Korean couple, long resident in Canada, joined us and we discovered none of us spoke Spanish and Maria's family did not speak English which left us with a few challenges. Introductions over, Maria was off at a cracking pace with us following. As we started to climb the hill Maria's two young daughters joined us and we began to succumb to the effects of the altitude. Maria continued up the hill leaving us with the girls to pick some wild mint thyme to help us with our breathing and to guide us home.

Our home for the night was behind a corrugated iron gate in a wall. Behind the gate was a series of rooms surrounding a small rectangular open courtyard. From what we could see there was a combined kitchen and dining room in one building, children's room chickens and guinea pigs on another site, a wall opposite the kitchen building, master bedroom with two guestrooms above on the entry gate side, and in the toilet was in a separate building behind the kitchen through a gate and opposite a small garden. The wash area was an outdoor concrete sink just outside the kitchen building.

As Leigh climbed the stairs he banged his head on the roof gutter and the girls giggled. Once in the room, the ceiling was so low that he could not stand up straight so dressing was best done sitting down. The room had a little window, a simple table and chair, a straw mattress bed with two heavy felt blankets, a candle in a candle holder with two matches, and a potty for night time use. Perfectly adequate! We rested on our sloping straw mattress until we were called for a late lunch, quinoa soup – delicious!

At four o'clock we met our guide in the main square who gave us lots of information before we began our one-hour ascent to the second highest point on the island (at 4115 metres) to see the sunset. On the way up we passed many local people, including some very young children, bringing their animals down to shelter for the night.

Leigh arrived at the top ahead of me, eager not to miss the sunset. As I looked up at him waving enthusiastically, I could see there were just a few very steep steps to negotiate but I was now totally breathless from the climb in the thin air. I was done! With no energy or breath left, I indicated to Leigh I would not continue and he should enjoy the sunset. In a flash he was at my side helping me up the steep steps saying he wanted us to share the moment. Awwwww!

Once we saw the last rays of the spectacular sunset we began our 40 minute descent to Maria's house with the aid of a torch. We were greeted at the door by Maria's husband and we were ushered in to eat a delicious vegetarian meal. Before we knew it, we were outside in the dark courtyard with Maria dressing us in traditional clothing and then it was a gallop up the hill to the community hall.

The tourists and locals alike looked fabulous in their traditional finery. The dancing was fast paced and exhausting so it wasn't long before we were ready to head back to our straw mattress for the night.

We woke at dawn and Leigh decided to go for a walk. He walked down to the lake edge where he found stalls with a wide range of goods for sale; food, clothing, hardware supplies, in fact everything you would find in a small town main street but on a much smaller scale. At 7 am Maria served breakfast of sweet pancakes made from quinoa while the girls played and laughed behind us. We were disappointed that the family did not eat with us for any of our meals and we assumed this was because there was just not enough space for everyone. We said our goodbyes and then we left Amantani Island at 8:30 am.

As we arrived at Taquile Island for lunch, our guide explained the boat would drop us off on one side of the island and collect us from the other side after we descended 600 steep steps. I considered the state of my already aching knees and decided I would accept the offer to travel to the other side on board the boat. Unfortunately the guide did not explain there was nowhere to purchase food other than the town at the top of the island. Leigh took about one hour to make the journey to the top and he was rewarded with lunch, a cold drink, and a lovely view. Three and a half hours later we were reunited on the boat for the long journey back to Puno. The verdict – it was a great overnight trip!

---