Blogs from Uros Island, Lake Titicaca , Puno, Peru, South America - page 7

okay, i haven´t written because i have been very sick. i think that i have had the flu, i am not sure. we are in puno, near lake titicaca. we accidently took the first class train ride here. it was fancy. we got lunch, afternoon tea, and a fashion show! it was quite funny. i have never seen a fashion parade on a train. we took some pics. i have been sleeping most of the time, but we did get up to go to the uros islands. they are these islands made out of reeds. the houses are also made of reeds. it was pretty cool, but touristy. we are headed to copacabana, bolivia today if i feel good enough. ... read more

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 - ... read more

Isn't "Floating Islands" some kind of meringue desert? The ride from Arequipa to Puno was really interesting. The high desert gradually got more and more filled with cactus and grass as we kept getting higher and higher. It has been pretty cloudy the past week, so there were no mountains visible, just very low clouds. And then suddenly you are on the antiplano with herds of llamas and alpacas. We even had to stop a couple of times to allow the alpacas to get off of the road. It's still pretty desert-like, but as we kept getting higher (Puno is at 12,500 feet) there was more water. Soon the countryside looked like Scotland or Ireland or Iceland (in summer)--impossibly green with treeless mountains and rushing streams, except there were llamas among the sheep and Inca agricultural ... read more

Puno - hoerte sich im Reisefuehrer ganz nett an, aber dieser Flecken ist nicht schoen, nichtmal sch..., es ist einfach nur ein Flecken. Viele Haeuser sind unverputzt, ueberall wird gebaut. Lediglich der Platz an der Kathedrale, die Fussgaengerstrasse LIMA und der auf der anderen Seite angrenzende Platz sind anschaulich. An der Kathedrale treffe ich die Reisegruppe wieder, die ich schon auf dem Weg nach Copacabana im Bus getroffen habe. Mit ein paar Leuten ging es dann erst zum Chinesen, dann heisse Schokolade trinken (hier ist es manchmal verdammt kalt, also denkt bloss nicht, ich waere im Sommerurlaub und das waere hier Zucker schlecken) und Kuchen (nur die Maedels) und etwas tanzen. Den Tag darauf war ich dann auf einer Privattour. Der Guide (eine alte Mutti) sprach schlechter englisch als ich spanisch. Trotzdem klappte es halbwegs mit ... read more

14/11-15/11/07 From Cuzco we headed down to Puno (3827m asl), a small town on the side of Lake Titicaca where we originally stopped there to arrange crossing the Bolivian border the next day but ended up heading out to one the most fascinating sights I´ve ever seen. The floating islands of Lake Titicaca. With only a morning to see them, we opted for a short 2-3 hour tour run by a local boat captain who took us out to Uros Islands where we visited a couple of different settlements. The islands are made up of water reeds, as are the houses, beds, boats.... pretty much everything. Stepping on to one for the first time is quite weird. Sort of like walking on a bed of straw in a horse stable. Very cool though. The locals rely ... read more