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Published: December 3rd 2007
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Hey, sorry about yesterday, I'll finish this post now. Sometimes I get on crappy computers and it such a pain to have to write extensively on them.
Well anyway, yesterday I arrived in Puno, which is on Lake Titicaca. Today I took a tour of the lake and some cultures that make a living there. Before I even came this way, I had a good couple of days in arequipa. So far, I am really enjoying peru!
After the Peru boarder, the world starts to take on more shape, and becomes actually hills and valleys and canyons instead of just dunes. Small plants that look like little fuzzes about a foot or two across litter the entire landscape (have you ever seen that original star trek episode when they have all of those fuzzy things all over the place. These plants look like that). It was still pretty surreal though. When I was in Arica, and I was looking at the landscape of the big dunes falling into the ocean, all I could think was that it looked like something out of a sci fi novel. Well, on the other side of the boarder, it pretty much looks exactly
what I think Tattooine should look like. (sorry Im being so geeky here, there were things I really thought).
Eventually, things start to green up. There are plenty of farms and irrigation. It was a good ride into Arequipa. I guess is it Perus second largest city, so its big more or less. I was only going to stay a night, but as soon as I arrived I decided to stay another day. The architechture was SO beautiful, and Im not even one for buildings, really. Also, the city is surrounded by three large, looming volcanos (none currently active, all snow topped), which adds to the appeal. But the real cool thing about the volcanos: a great deal of the buildings in the city are made out of this amazing pure white volcanic rock. Its not smooth like marble, but more pitted like pumice. Its also easy to carve in, so that the entrance ways are quite ornate. And the ornamentation is quite unique as well. Im not sure, but I think it would be best described as local, pre-colombian sort of style (very busy, scrolly, and complicated scenes) with christian iconagraphy. Many of the buildings in downtown are
like this, not just a few. The streets are all clean and made of cobblestone. I guess, the whole place feels a little like a pre-colombian nunnery. Or something. I dont know, I try with the descriptions.
The food here is really good as well. Or at least I can appreciate it because I can afford to eat out here. The first night in Arequipa, I had a really good crepe. Variety, I know! And I ordered a good glass of wine to go with it. I was so happy. The next day I also got to eat out breakfast and I had falafal for lunch. Again, yay! Peru gets high marks for food. Since then, I have also tried alpaca, here in town in Puno (another thumbs up. Its like light beef), and I had fresh fish today on one of the islands in lake titicaca. It was trout. They introduced the fish some years ago, because the largest edible fish in the lake only grew to 12 cm. Small. So, now they have trout and kingfish. I know it is silly to get so excited about food, but after eating spagetti since, forever now, it is such
a welcome, relaxing, and fun change to eat out.
Well, anyway, I left arequipa for puno just yesterday. The trip was .... interesting. First of all, I do have to say it was very beautiful. Its all flat planes with sparse shrubbery and mountains the whole way. There are sheep and llamas grazing in the fields everywhere. I also went by a few small lakes and say flamingos! I was so excited! You just always think of them as a zoo animal, you know... and there they were, hanging out all natural in peru. Yay! Well, that was nice. The trip got interesting when I really had to pee and they wouldnt let me use the bathroom or stop to let me go. This made for a bad three hours of pain. It got more interesting when we stopped, in the absolute middle of nowhere to pee. Just get off the bus and go... anywhere you like. But, please remember per my description... that there is LITTLE plant life, and the place is entirely flat. SO I had to pee in front of everyone. And I had to see everyone pee in front of me. Ick. This is not
a problem for the local women. They were large, poofyout, full length skirts. SO they just wiggle there underwear around and squat. I had to pull down my pants. Nice. Lovely. Hello, I am a westerner.
Well. I got to go. And I made it to Puno. Puno is a cute little city stuck on steep hills leading up to the lake. They seem to like topiaries a lot here.
The next day, I went on the tour of Lake Titicaca. Near Puno, the lake is dark and full of algea, but outside the port, it is very clear, and a distinct teal blue. It is also very very cold. We did two things on the tour: we visited the Uros people, who living on self made islands of reeds, and we visited people that live on Isle Taquil, and saw what their life is like. Up front I{ll say that the tours are a little weird. Its a bit uncomfortable watching people essentially sell themselves for money. I know they have to choose to do this though. At the Uros islands, only a handful of islands are visitable by tourists, and the rest are hands off! But
still. You take pictures of the people and IT IS like taking their soul a little. I guess it all comes down to the relation of the tour to the people. Unfortunatly, I don{t have much information on what that is.
Well, it was pretty amazing though. The floating islands are neat. The Uros people started living this way thousands of years ago to avoid waring people on the mainland. They took reeds, that are very plentiful all over the lake, and they make mounds of them. The mounds float, and they just live on top. They make their houses out of reeds, and boats out of reeds, and even eat the reeds. They do however, incorporate other modern materials as well. The islands only last for about a 100 years before the touch bottom. Then they start a new island. They take the rotting reeds from the old island, cut the massinto squares, and put the squares on the new island and plant plants on them. So they have little square gardens everywhere. Other things I liked about the floating islands, were the floating mini islands for guinea pigs (food), and the mini huts for the cats. Most
people earn a little bit of money,and so a lot of the huts have solar panels, electicity, and TV and radio. Pretty neat. Kids that live on the islands have to row to the mainland for school in the morning. He.
Taquil was pretty neat to. It is all terraced for farming and sheep raising. From the top of the island, you can see the mountains in Boliva.
Well, tomorrow, I leave for Cuzco. I{m really really tired, so Im going to sign off for now, and add a few picture before I go!
later gator!
Kelly
It take 6 hours, and they didn{t let us off to go to the bathroom for the LONGEST time. And then when they let
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