Le village flottant du Lac Titicaca - The floating village of Lake Titicaca

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On est alles voir une ile du village flottant (il y a environ 40 iles). Le village flottant remonte au temps ou le peuple Puqueña fuyait les guerres entre Incas et Aymaras et deciderent de s´installer sur des roseaux. Ils y habitent encore aujourd´hui meme s´ils vont faire leur marche a Puno et les jeunes partent faire leurs etudes. Ils vivent de peche principalement. Les gens sont maintenant Aymara et ne parlent plus puqueña.
Les iles sont faites de roseaux amasses sur plusieurs couches et sont amarrees pour ne pas deriver! Il faut changer et "refaire" les iles tous les 18 a 20 ans car elles finissent par couler du aux tonnes de roseaux que les habitants mettent dessus.
Certaines iles ne sont pas ouvertes aux touristes. L´ile que nous avons visite est res touristique - malheureusement. Cela n´empeche que ca a ete une experience tres interessante.

We went to visit an island of the floating village (there are around 40 islands according to our guide). It all comes back to the time when Aymara and Incas were fighting, so the Puqueña people decided to get away from it all and to settle themselves on reed idslands. They still live there today even though they are now Aymara people and things have obviously changed a lot in the last centuries. People go to Puno for the market and the youngsters leave to study.
The islands are made out of several layers of reed and are anchored so that they don´t wake up in a different place every morning! The people have to "re-do" their islands every 18 to 20 years as they sink due to the amount of reed they put on them.
Some islands are not opened to tourists. The island that we visited is obviously - and unfortunately - very touristic. It doesn´t take away the charm of the islands though and it remains a very onteresting experience.

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Photos

Roseaux - Reed
Le parc national couvre 14000 hectares de roseaux!
The national park covers an area of 14000 hectars of reeds!

Explications 2
Et voila comment on fait un village flottant!
And this is how you make a floating village!

Crunch!
Et le roseau est bon a manger!
And reed is good to be eaten too!

Sur un bateau en roseau - On a reed boat
Les habitants utilisent maintenant des bouteilles en plastique pour faire leur bateau. Il en faut 2000 pour faire flotter ce bateau! Il y a du bon recyclage!
The people use nowadays plastic bottles to make their boats. They need 2000 for a boat like this one! Isn´t it good recycling?!