Lake Titicaca: Incan History with a Shameful Lack of Human Sacrifices!

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December 8th 2012

Published: December 8th 2012

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DavidJGrinter

Cascadas of Coroico

Some cool waterfalls near Coroico

After departing Sucre on a shocking bus (don't book with Copacabana 1 Mem, go with Copacabana) overnight we ended up in La Paz again! We were warned by an American couple that they had nearly been robbed, "60 seconds" before we got off the bus. I found this hard to believe as he had his expensive camera dangling from his neck and she had a day pack limply hanging from her hand. They were either idiots or lying, we didn't stick around to inquire further. We headed inside to grab a surprisingly good coffee, papaya/banana milkshake and cake breakfast in the terminal before catching a taxi across town to the collectivio station and promptly juming in a Minivan destined for Coroico. This town is at the bottom of the death road, but thankfully the driver took the sensible new road, especially as snow had fallen on the highest points over night. Coroico is the capital of the Yungas, an admisterative region of Bolivia, and home to awful, locally produced coffee. It's pretty small, and surrounded by coco farms, deep ravines, waterfalls and numerous satellite villages. If you don't like nature or walking this is not the place for you. We'd come

Coca Fields

Vertical Farming at i's Best!

specifically for the walking so it was a perfect fit. We were beyond tired after the 12 hour bus trip and a further 3 hours crammed in to a minivan and collapsed into our beds at Hostal Kory. The climate here is always humid and hot, very hot. Standing up leaves the skin gleaming and even the daily thunderstorms fail to alleviate the oppression. We'd arrived during a bizarre time in the Bolivian calendar, Census day. On our second day here, everything would be closed from midnight until 6pm. Locals aren't allowed to leave their homes during these hours while government bods take their particulars. Tourists are free to do what they want, except there's nothing to do unless it involves the natural world. We spoke to the tourist information guy, who was equal parts helpful and unhelpful. He gave us a hand drawn map, for a fee, but really pushed for us to take a guide, which naturally made us stubbornly refuse!

The map was woefully inadequate, not a surprise considering it was a work of fiction pretty much. Locals who had ventured out (police and army not enforcing curfew here it would seem) seemed to

Northern Isla del Sol

The north side of the Island

be complicit in the conspiracy of misdirection and fantasy. I heard Bolivian's don't like to disappoint and will lie sooner than give bad news! A group of older gentlemen told us that the Rio Negra was "down this road, past Saint Geronimo, (seriously a real place) just keep going straight, don't turn off, you'll know the pools." The map suggested it was a fairly straight forward road, but it twisted and turned for mile, upon mile and then vanished over the edge of cliff, zigzagging 700m to the bottom of the ravine! We knew the pools alright, there was nothing else there, the road just stopped, dead. They were great for swimming and cooling off, but we then had to negotiate the return journey in the middle of the afternoon. There was no shade and we fried under the sun. A mixed success day. I stayed up late playing card games with a group of German backpackers. One of the girls was in charge of drinks and would take it as a personal slight if you didn't accept a drink every round, suffice to say the combo of harsh Bolivian rum and Sprite had me rather drunk after 5 hours

Labrynth

This "pile of old stones" was a lot of fun to explore. So many nooks and crannies to poke about in!

of playing. I didn't know any of their games, Arsehole was a new one on me, I was "The Arsehole" for many rounds, and figured it was a jape, but then I won and someone else was "The Arsehole." I need to remember the games as they were good for drinking in pubs. Luckily I escaped a hangover the next day and we headed to our next destination.

Our introduction to Lake Titicaca was horribly underwhelming. We'd caught a bus out of La Paz in the early afternoon, unfortunately it was a tourist bus as all the local buses were full. There was no leg room and it was uncomfortably hot and no A/C! After a couple of hours we stopped next to a body of water. I could see the otherside, but assumed it wasn't the lake as it was supposed to be the highest navigable lake in the world (thanks, wikipedia), turns out it was the lake...well, part of it, and we needed to cross it to get to Copacabana. It was all a bit of a let down, but then what was I expecting? Well, I was expecting something a bit more grand than that, is

Inca's Road

Linking north with South

all I'll say. Luckily, the lake proper, not that imposter, was pretty cool, we climbed up from our hotel to a Christian Shrine complex on top of a hill to watch the sunset. Our hotel was pretty cool, nothing exceptional, but by local standards it was comforable, clean and did superb breakfasts (if you're ever here stay in Utama). Copacabana is a bit of a nothing town, it caters for tourists who go to and from the Isla Del Sol and thats it. The food at the little waterfront shacks (20 seperate units, each selling the exact same menu and the same prices...a truly Bolivian institution) was very good, Trucha a la diabla (grilled trout, hot sauce and chips/rice) was a favourite.

Like everyone else visiting Copacabana we just wanted to go to Isla Del Sol. We hopped on an overcrowded boat (no lifejackets, but I'm sure I could have swam to the shore at any point, but the Bolivians don't do health and safety, I've told you that before) and made the 2 hour journey to the north of the island. We followed a local tourguide, to practice our Spanish and bumped in to Luis, our

Stairs on Isla del Sol

We walked down which was infinitely more sensible than walking up at 3800m!

guide on the Volcano in Chile, on holiday with his girlfriend. They helped us with the translations as we looked about ruins and monuments from the Incan empire. Apparently the Incan creation myths centre on the Island and there was a load of nonsense about rocks with energy (they'e just bloody rocks really) and looking like pumas (nope, they looked like rocks). There was a sacrificial altar, which looked a bit like the table that Aslan is slayed upon in "The Lion the Witch and the Wardrobe." Said altar was surrounded by blocks of rock, making it look like an ancient picnic area. It clearly had a more grusome past, animals and perhaps humans met their end here, but that was an honour in the Incan religion. Ah, those crazy Incas. Also, Inca means king, they never called themselves Incas apparently, I can't recall what they called themselves...you're at a computer now, google it, don't be lazy, I've given you everything else on a plate. There were some pretty cool ruins of a palace or something, and they're called the labrynth (no David Bowie in sight anywhere sadly). We spent some time wandering around here before getting a bit bored

Uros

Floating Islands

and hungry.

After lunch all the day trippers had departed to the mainland again so we had the northern part of the island and the Inca Path to ourselves. You have to pay "taxes" on the island to see the ruins, which is fine, but on the south of the island you pay 15 Bolivianos to see the attractions, and then you get hit by a further 5Bs tax to enter the town, which is the only bloody attraction. Sneaky islanders...it was 11.2Bs to the pound so it's not like we were drastically out of pocket, but still, a quid for nothing seems a bit steep. We ate trucha a la diabla and watched the sunset with Max, an Aussie I'd met on the Saltflats, his girlfriend and a German guy who'd spent 30Bs trying to make a phone call to book a bus (could have done it on the mainland last minute, but like a stereotype he had to be organised). The next day we caught a cramped boat, no maximum capacity it would seem, honestly it was like a game of sardines, with petrol fumes and a dangerously listing boat thrown in for extra fun.

Uros part 2

Floating Islands man! Like regular islands (well not really) but you can move if you don't like your neighbours!

Half the boat had packed enough stuff to last them a year (two stupid girls had three huge bags each, for one night on the island, they made the list) which added to the extremely low position our boat took in the water. We survived the fumes, Posidon's games, Bolivian health and safety and moronic tourists to successfully land ashore in time to watch Wales get thrashed by the All Blacks....crap! And thus concluded our final full day in Bolivia. We had one day left on our 30 day visa and so needed to get the hell out of the country or pay the price...3Bs per day apparently...that's 25 of the Queen's good pence...not a bad price, but we really want to see Peru and we'd kind of run out of things to do in Bolivia, unless we headed back to La Paz, which was simply not an option, I'm never going back there again. So to Peru...

...One last Boliva fact...apparently the bus station in La Paz was designed by the guy who designed the Effiel Tower...the bus station is a bit rubbish though...he definitely peaked in Paris.

We didn't stray too far from from

Ellie at Amatani

At sunset.

the shores of lake Titicaca when in Peru, we ended up in the nothing town of Puno. It's rubbish, nothing worth seeing, although there are some really good restaurants (Internacional - good chili and passion fruit hot sauce, Estancia - huge portions, Pizza & Pasta - uh, good pizza). The only reason to be here really is to get out to yet more islands, luckily some of these islands are quite novel...they float. The Uros, as the islands are better known, are made of reeds and a tribe of people fled the Incas back in the day (1500 and something) and now their descendants live here. I'd presumed the Incas didn't know how to build boats otherwise this was a rubbish plan. The Incas did have boat building skills, they just seem to have deemed the extermination of this tribe to be pretty low on their list of priorites, after conquering land peoples, killing, human sacrifice and losing at war to the Spanish. But the Uros were pretty cool, they do float (they last about 30 years) and it was similar to standing on giant haybails. The people apparently aspire to live on the mainland and so it's pretty touristy

Traditional Dancing.

I avoided putting the photo of us in traditional dress up here!

(their only way of making money). But it was cool to see a very different way of life.

We visited regular, non-floating islands too. On Amantani we stayed with a local family who made us dress up and attend a traditional dance. It was all very cheesey, but kind of fun, even I could master the dance moves. Again, the people here make most of their money from tourism and they seemed to enjoy our presence there. We normally avoid these kinds of tours, but boats are not that easy to come by to visit the islands, it can be done, but it's hard, then you have the issue of finding somewhere to stay...no hotels! On Taquile the men do all the knitting. If they can't nit they can't get married or something. Apparently the things they knitt are the best in the world and UNESCO, again, have branded it a heritage site. The islands were, in their own way rather pretty, but Ellie commented that their dry stone wall technique would not be up to UK farmers' standards; "too many holes you see?" All in all the trip was interesting, and not particularly expensive and it was good

Ellie with Mathilde and her Grandaughter

On the docks leaving for Taquile.

to know the money was going to the locals not the operator. Not sure we'll be doing too many more trips like that in the future as it's time pressured and not a good fit for us. To get back into the "real" travelling experience we're headed to the world's second deepest canyon, Colca, next. Two days of walking, essentially doing a mountain climb in reverse! Great, will let you know how we get on!

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