Lake Boobypoopoo aka Titicaca

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May 18th 2010

Published: June 11th 2010

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View of the Lake from the hostel rooftop

Got up early for the first time in a few days, showered, packed and paid up, finally managing to actually leave the hostel after Edwin, the hostal owner, banged on for a while about reviews we could write for him, bad reviews others had written about the hostel and what we should see in Puno. We said good bye to the pussies, grabbed a quick breakfast in the bakery and jumped in a cab to the terminal. Which turned into another nightmare - we got there at 12 as requested, at 12.15 went to try and get through the gates, where the security guy wouldn’t accept our tickets. He then ran around the gate, gave them to the police who wandered off upstairs with them, there was total confusion as one guy was saying that there was no bus to Puno with CIAL, while the bloke from CIAL was telling us to hurry and pay the terminal taxes. He then handed us 4 new tickets, which got us through the gate eventually only to find the bus wasn’t leaving till 1pm and that, in fact, CIAL was just the agent selling for another company, San Luis, who provided a smelly hot

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17th century cathedral

bus. South American logic strikes again! But we had seats at the front so great views all the way, although sometimes it felt like you were in the danger seats (and the sight of a delapitated and crushed bus in the river below didn't allay our fears!). We cruised along the endless road to Puno, with a few hundred stops along the way, rushing past majestic mountains, llamas, local folk, llamas travelling open air in the back of a truck, lots of road kill (of the poochie variety), farmers, farmland (always with only the women slaving away...), maize being grown and dried, all the way following, first, the river and then the train tracks. We travelled up, up, up, and it was slow going, so we got to Puno late, gone 8pm. Hopped in a cheap taxi with Lilian, a lady grabbing travellers off the buses and offering her services - hostels and tours - who took us to Dunque Hostal that Edwin had booked for us. We met the lovely, if slightly pongy, Ricardo, who was very chilled and hospitable. Walked down to town for the yummiest pizza yet and a few beers. Driving in on the bus, we

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The main street, Jiron Lima

thought Puno looked a little crappy but once we walked down to Plaza de Armas a whole new Puno opened up and it was quite pleasant. Seems par for the course in most of these South American cities - crappy suburbs and nice centres, the opposite of most Eurpoean cities. That night we slept (badly - awful, small hard bed, hot and agitated) at 3870metres.

Had breakfast courtesy of Ricardo the following morning which was very kind, and then headed down to town to find Lilian’s tour company. We wandered for a while, found somewhere for lunch, ended up watching "Taken" as it was the first telly any of us had seen for a while, eventually found the company after more searching and booked the tour. On our wander we saw a crazy job advertisement wall and lots of tuk tuks too and decided the city has a nice vibe and helpful folks. Hailed a tuk tuk to the Yuvari boat - a 19th century British built steam ship, which sailed from England to Peru via Cape Horn, was then dismantled into 2766 pieces and carried across the Andes by llama and mules to Lake Titicaca, which took 6

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Odd looking place of worship

years in total. Initially a Peruvian navy gunship, it was later used to deliver mail around the Lake and now is in need of serious investment to get it up and running again properly to give tours. We were given a free tour by Teo, who was difficult to understand but a sweet, and obviously proud, guy. The ship had an old school-style working phone and we watched a documentary clip of Michael Palin and Sky News visiting the ship. There was an odd British couple on our tour - she immediately told us she had a headache and had a moan while he was a little on the pervy side, old school Bennie Hill-esque. On the shore we saw a group of marmots before taking a collectivio bus back to town for super cheap, buying some fruit at the market for the tour and grabbing a cheap menu dinner. We were lazy bums though and took a taxi back to the hostal but the car couldn’t actually make it up the hill, showing you just how steep it is.

The bus picked us up at 7.45am from the hostel, and we then trundled round the town picking up

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the others on the tour, before going to the boat and meeting our guide Neo, who talked mainly Spanish the whole time meaning good practice for us. Our group included a fresh from military service Israeli couple, Chloe a sweet Korean girl, a newly married Spanish couple from Sevilla, 3 chatty Chilean ladies and a Dutch girl, Paolina. It was a good group.

So Lake Titicaca (or as Ian renamed it, Lake Boobypoopoo), actually means Puma’s Rock because of the shape of the lake, and is the world’s largest high altitude lake, 284 metres deep and 15 times the size of Lake Geneva. There's heaps of wildlife on the 70 islands, 3 of which we visited. The Uros Islands, which we went to first, are made from totora reeds, man made centuries ago by the Uros to protect themselves from the invading Incas. They're quite impressive constructions and feel spongy to walk on, almost bouncy. The ladies who live there have long hair extensions attached to their braids, with the colours signifying different things. Black means she's married and therefore off limits, while colourful ones mean go for your life. There are cats and kids all over the place

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A record of some of the altitudes we'd been at

(hope they can swim) and it's quite a surreal place. We were given a demonstration of how the islands are constructed - they aren't anchored in anyway so could theoretically float all the way to to Bolivia - and how the Uros go about their lives, before being serenaded off the island by a crazy singing women's quartet, 3 of which were in tune and time with each other, with one old dear totally oblivious to what the others were doing. Hilarious! The boat ride to the main island in a traditional boat was pleasant enough and we got our passports stamped with the official Uros Islands logo. Cool!

Amantani was the next port of call. The town, set at 4015 metres has tourism as its main industry now, with people coming to stay with local families. Other than that, the people farm for self sufficiency and make artesenia to sell. It's all very humble and a back to basics place. We met our hosts, Francisca y Ricardo, and hiked up to their house, with a prime location right on the main square - location, location, location darlings! They had 2 rooms upstairs, which used to be their kids,

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Cool courtyard

which had great views over the lake and we could watch the moody sunsetting and rising. Francisca is tiny and very mild mannered, who we thought might actually be high as she was quite vacant and unaware a lot of the time! She made for us a lunch of yummy soup, eggs, uncooked potatoes and ocas, a weird purple penis-like looking vegetable that tasted like uncooked sweet potato. Not too good. We also had muna tea (similar to coca) before walking up to the sacred temple, which was high, high, high, (4500 metres). The views at the top were amazing and worth the trek, with stormy skies breaking over the Lake, the mountains of Bolivia in the distance and the traditional agricultural steps cut into the fairly stark landscape. Again, these bionic women were lugging their wares up and down everyday to seel to visitors, their calves of steel bulging under the weight of the artesenia they carry on their backs. We walked round the temple 3 times anticlockwise, a tradition/superstition apparently. The Spanish lady was suffering from altitude quite badly but she did make it the top, trooper. We got back to the house for a dinner of soup

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Tuk tuks and train tracks

and omelette and muna, and then got dressed up in traditional clothes ready for the town party. Now this was truly hilarious - the boys got off pretty lucky with only a beanie and poncho, while Carissa and I had the full works with massive hip-enlarging skirt, shirt, belt and cape. Much laughing was had by all and all the others were dressed up too so we didn't feel too ridiculous. Had some beers outside before the band started up and we entered a small room attached to the beer shop where lots of dancing, swirling and twirling began, to the looooongest songs ever heard. It was fun and we danced with our hosts before the music suddenly cut out at 9.30pm and we were told the party was over. It has to be the shortest party we've ever been to. Not to fear though, we had rum and cards back at the house before bed. Sleep was slightly disturbed that night by nature getting angry and letting rip with some crazy rains, hail, lightning and thunder. As for our hosts and the party poopers from the night before, they were all up at 4am in the church next to

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Lisa getting some tuk tuk action

the square ready for another celebration...obviously a more important one than us being there!

Up for breakfast the next morning at 6.30am - bread and tea - and we said our goodbyes and thanks to our hosts. It looked like rain and so once on the boat, we slept for a bit, only waking to hear the boat spluttering to death, but then coming alive again luckily. We arrived at Taquile, a more beautiful island than Amantani, with more flowers and colour. It's now a UNESCO site, but used to be a prison island. Here the men rule - it's all very macho macho - with the women walking behind them 5-10m. The men wear hats to signify if they are free and single or not - red for the married ones and white for the single guys. The women also have the same tradition but with their skirts - black or red equals married, any other colour is up for the taking. We had a tasty lunch looking out over the Lake, which included a cup of explosivo (muna and coca together - crazy!) for Lisa, before we walked down many steep steps to the boat and set

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Koen overtaking us

off for Puno, a 3 hour trip, during which we broke down of course. We got back to the hostel, had some unsatisfying cold showers and went for more delicious pizza at our now favourite restaurant in town. Then back to bed, ready to leave this country and head for pastures new...

Bye bye Peru and hola Bolivia!!

Big hugs to you all,

Lis and Ian xxxxxxxxxxxxxx

PERU...

Too good - Amazing scenery from deserts to mountains, beaches to ruins and friendly folk
Too bad - Taxi drivers ripping you off at every opportunity and gringo tax

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