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Published: March 31st 2011
After the 10 hour bus ride to Puno, and the accompanying change in altitude to 3,800 meters, we were startging to second guess the two day excursion on Lake Titicaca, but we sucked it up, repacked bags to travel as light as possible, and set the alarm for 6:30 Tuesday morning to catch a boat tour of Uros, Amantani, and Taquile.
Uros
I´ll forgive you if reading my description of Uros, you might think that I have drank a bit much coca tea. A long time ago, a group of people decided that they needed some space from the mainland cultures, including the incas, who were in a bit of a conquesting mood. So they came up with a unique solution by building huge floating islands out of a peat like material found at the bottom of the lake (It´s the root material for the long tapered reeds that grow around the lake, and once cut from the bottom, is buoyant for a long time). They cut blocks about two feet square and three feet deep, tie enough of the them together with rope, cover with a thick mat of reeds, and presto! your own island. There
are still hundreds of these anchored about a mile out from Puno. They have straw houses on them, a school, and a little restaurant. The folks on Uros seem pretty committed to the lifestyle, but I get the feeling that there wouldn´t be so many people living on the islands if it wasn´t for the large volume of tourist traffic to the islands to see this phenomenon. The visit by the tour boat is very well choreographed, from a lineup of locals to greet the boat, a little display of how the islands are built, followed by tours of homes, a chance to buy handicrafts made by the residents, and a boat ride in a reed boat. It was a lovely and informative visit, but paled in comparison to the rest of the day.
Amantani and Taquile
As our boat approached the island of Amantani (real island)after a three hour tour, I was wondering what natural phenomenon had created the stratified look of the towering island. It looked like it had a hundered layers or more, like vina tarta. Surely, I thought, this couldn´t have been man made. Wrongo. The island has a population of 4,000
who are living in utter simplicity with few modern conveniences. Their main occupation is farming the steep slopes of the island right up to the top at 4,150 meters (about 13,500 feet)above sea level . Over the generations, the residents have literally moved millions of rocks off of fields and onto fences and retaining walls, giving it the layered look. Like Uros, the visit to Amantani has a script that is followed by the residents, and choreographed by the tour guide. Unlike Uros however, I had absolutely no doubt in my mind that this is an entirely authentic way of life. The tourism was clearly a sideline to the main business of producing food to eat and sell.
The tour package includes an overnight homestay with Amantani locals, and upon arrival we were introduced to Guillermo and Juanita (yes, really) Borda and their seven year old daughter Yoselin. Staying with the Bordas was probably the deepest cultural experience, and possibly the best single day, of our trip. Living a life of utter simplicity, they tend a huge garden, some fields high on the island, a cow, chickens and some sheep. The only modern conveniences included piped cold water from
a cistern beside the house, and enough power (I think from solar panels) for lights and a radio (they listen to news every morning, and Guillermo was extremely saddened by the devastation in Japan).
We had a bit of time to kick around the house after a lunch of Quinoa soup, and Abbey got a chance to play with Yoselin. Even a language barrier cannot stop two little girls from play. A hike to the top of the island was scheduled for 4pm so Juanita led us along the many gravel paths to the main plaza (no roads or cars on Amantani) to join the hike. At that altitude, it´s a bit of a slog to walk up another 350 meters, and it looked like Abbey wasn´t going to make it to the top. Pauline sent me ahead to the top, and after a couple of photos I was headed down to find them and walk back to the village, and there they were. Pauline and Abbey had counted steps and rested often, and at every rest, Abbey insisted on continuing trying to get to the top. The guide had shown us an herb that grows on the island
(munia) that you collect and hold to your nose to breath in it´s scent. It helps to breathe in the the high altitudes. We all agreed that it helped on the climb. The amazing thing about the climb was that as we were breathlessly struggling up the hill, we saw many islanders (mostly women, some appearing to be very old) working the small fields with hand tools, or carrying huge bundles of produce down from the hill.
Guillermo advised that the higher fields do the best, as they get better sunlight and air. From our stunted conversation in Spanish, we gathered that they have a nine month growing season, the best being December to February when it is warm but also rains every day. The strength of the sunlight is such that even on a cloudy day, plants get all the light they need. They will harvest their last crops by the end of May, and wait through June, July and August when it is cold and dry.
After the hike back down and the 20 minute walk back to the house for supper, we were pretty tired. There was a traditional fiesta planned for our group, which
we were thinking of skipping. But once again, our trigger man was Abbey, who pushed to go. She desperately wanted to get all fancied up and as you can see by the pictures, she was so cute. So Juanita pulled out traditional clothes for all of us, and led us again through the maze of trails to a small concrete hall with one bare lightbulb powered by two car batteries. Some local musicians played in the shadows at one end, while the locals started all the gringos dancing.
The Borda´s kitchen is a small building separate from the main house, connected by a roof over part of the small courtyard. The kitchen has a fireplace with a ceramic ´stove´ inside it that pots sit on. There is also a small two-burner gas stove. Being the only room with a source of heat, I imagine that the Bordas spend a fair bit of time in the kitchen. They took great pride in explaining that most of the food we were being served was produced locally. (It made Pauline think that this must have been how her grandparents must have lived a hundred years ago in rural New Brunswick - without
the electricity.)
Our bedroom was on the second floor, entered from an outdoor balcony. No heat, but enough wool blankets to make you wonder if you could crawl out from under them. We slept well, but not late enough. After breakfast, we gathered back at the boat for the morning trip to a smaller island (Taquile) for another hike to the top, followed by an explanation of the history and unique customs of that island. At one time, this had been a type of prison for political prisoners. One prisoner, when he had left exile there, went on to become president of Peru. We ate a delicious meal of trout (trucha) before descending 500 big rocky steps to the harbour to board the boat for the return to Puno.
The group we shared the two days with was excellent. Folks from Austraila, the US, Argentinia, Germany, and two other Canadians. Abbey latched on to the two women from the US (Katie and Sandra), and a Andrew from LaRonge. Everybody took an interest in her and she was in her glory. On the way back to Puno, she convened a game of ´31´ on the top deck of the
Yay!
It was a tough climb in the thin air, but we made it to the top of Amantani to see this pre-inca temple. Incas didn't like round churches (hard to fit furniture).boat.
Having locals host travellers appears to be a good model for the community to benefit from tourism, using the existing infrastructure (their homes). The only thing that left us a bit uneasy about the homestay arrangement on Amantani is the rumour that some of the tour operators don´t pay the host families very well, and that the third party arrangement doesn´t treat them very well. The guides indicated that it is customary to bring a gift of food to the family (which we did- rice, sugar, coca leaves), but we still weren´t sure that we were somewhat exploiting these very nice folks. We were going to ask the tour guide about this, but were not sure if this might blackball our host family, so we looked for a reason to leave some more money behind. After purchasing three handcrafted toques and a leaving a good tip, we at least felt that we had dealt with them fairly.
Today
We have today free, so will get a chance to explore the city a bit, but will keep it low key. Abbey is doing a math test which Mme. Mervat emailed to us earlier, and I´m going to visit a very old ship that was brought here from England in the 1800´s and is now a museum. Pauline will update her journal, read and enjoy a free day. Tomorrow we head back to Lima and from there, Quito, Ecuador. We anticipate breathing that oxygen rich air.
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Maria
non-member comment
Trip of a lifetime
Great entry. Love the photo of all of you in traditional dress! I remember seeing a documentary about Jacques Cousteau and Lake Titicaca. They were in search of Inca treasure buried under the lake, but all they came up with was pottery and some other cultural artifacts. Looking forward to the next installment. Take care, Maria