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We got to Puno tired, sick of tours and early mornings so the first day was spent just relaxing within a couple of blocks of our hotel. Our hotel was pretty ordinary, its only real good point was that it had the cleanest bathroom so far. The receptionist was a lovely old guy who turned out to be a few raisins short of a fruit cake. Though he did recommend us a Chinese restaurant for tea which was cheap, great service and served the best stuffed avocado we have had so far. Puno like our hotel was a pretty ordinary and uninspiring. I went in search of breakfast in the morning and found a yummy bakery, a dairy selling manjar, and a street avocado stall. We walked down the pedestrian street full of tour agencies and tourist restaurants than sat down in the main square which has macrocapas trimmed into circles and triangles. We were promptly attacked by a hard case shoe shine boy who sat down next to us and just wouldn't give up. He spoke some English and some Spanish and had an answer for everything. The boy pointed to Steven and said "good", to himself and said "good"
and to Steven's shoes and said "bad". Steven said he couldnt shine them because they were not leather so the boy got out some white polish made for running shoes, Steven said he liked them dirty so the boy got out the black polish and offered to make them dirtier and eventually ended up calling out to anyone that could hear, "crazy this man is crazy". He always had a smile and I give him credit for persistence but we were glad to get away.
While we were in Puno we went to a variation of great restaurants and not so good ones but are getting way to used to eating out. The best deal here is to get the set menu which is cheaper and is usually a soup or an entree, a main meal usually meat or chicken and rice and chips, (why they think we need rice AND chips i don't know), but sometimes has other options like pizza, or huge hamburgers, and then a small desert. Sometimes also tea and fresh fruit juice. This is usually around 10-15 soles ($5-7.50NZ) in decent restaurants, it is more in really fancy ones and sometimes much less in
basic ones though you risk getting sick there. We have started just getting one menu and sharing it because its quite a lot of food. We also spent a quality amount of time checking out the city's multitude of Internet cafes. No matter where you where you were standing in the city there always seemed to be at least one Internet cafe within sight.
The second day it was time to do Punos biggest tourist attraction, the floating islands of Uros on lake Titicaca. We wandered down to the port where we where immediately hassled to buy tickets out to the island Taquile. After a certain amount of interrogation we found out that this was the locally owned and run collectivo boat (as oppossed to corporate tour company) that also stopped at the floating islands, so we decided to support the local cause and jumped into this boat. Locals piled in along with heaps of luggage wrapped in colourful blankets. There was going to be three weddings on the island that day, so I guess that is why the boat was so crowded and why it took 4 and a half hours to get there instead of the three
they had said.
The local people on this island still dress traditionally, I'm not sure if that is partly because of the roaring tourist trade or not but i think they are proud to be keeping their culture and traditions alive. The men wear woolen hats that they knit themselves, tall night cap looking thing that are half white for single men or fully coloured for married. Dignitary's wear a different sort of hat again, more colourful with earflaps. Women wear big many layered skirts that stop around the knees similar to Cuzco, but they also wear loose black head scarfs with bright pompoms on them. Not far into the trip we arrived at the floating islands of Uros. The lake was not very deep here and reeds grow up everywhere leaving narrow channels for the boat to go through. The islands are made entirely of reeds which are replaced from the top as they rot from the bottom. There are also some bigger buildings including the primary school, which are floating on barges. We got off on one of the islands where the locals were ready for us with stalls of locally produced crafts. It was cool to
see all the reed houses on the island and the ground was spongy to walk on.
Fifteen minutes and every one piled back on the boat. The women would get on the boat with babies in blankest on their back then leave the baby in its parcel sitting next to the edge, we couldn't believe that more kids don't fall off. The boat was full of kids but they were so quiet you hardly noticed them. All the locals sat round eating the inside parts of the reeds about 30cm long by 2cm round, that the islands are made out of. The little girl opposite us must have eaten about 15 of these reeds as well as a bowl full of rice. It was also amazing to watch how self sufficient the kids were. Little kids tidying up the reeds and one girl maybe 3 at the most who must have taken off some of her bulky skirt layers on the trip, saw that we were almost there and deftly dressed her self in the complicated outfit. She tied each skirt up in a bow with a string at the side not even looking at her fingers and tucked
her woolen jersey in so that it all looked perfect and exactly as all the adults.
Finally we reached the island of Taquile, and climbed the steep steps up to the village. We were both tired and Steven needed something to eat pretty soon so we wandered in search of a restaurant. Actually there were heaps of restaurants but most were closed, maybe because of the weddings. We saw a hushed procession coming down the path and stood by to let them go. Beautifully dressed men and women escorting the bride and groom. The bride wore a short skirt with so many layers it stuck out a bit like a tutu and they both had money pinned to their colorful outfits as gifts to start their new lifes together. The procession was silent and later we saw part of the ceremony, also very solemn where they were drinking out of a cup in silence.
The island offered beautiful views of the lake and of its agricultural fields although most of Taquile´s income is from tourism. We found the main square and sat down to eat, but the waiter had his hands full and wouldn't listen long enough to
get our order so we decided to find another quieter place. The next restaurant told us they had no food left. Eventually we found a nice restaurant up stairs with a tour group in it already. This was good because we got to eavesdrop and learnt a bit about the island. The meal was nice, quinua soup and I had trout which tasted great but was full of bones. We had a quick look at the stalls selling woollen hats and jewlery then got back on the boat. This time it was less crowded and only took 3 hours to get back to Puno.
We spent most of the next day looking for the local bus station after our guide book had lead us in the wrong direction. We also got to the local woolens market and to a huge line of stalls set up for the Alacitas festival. The stalls all sold miniature things which you are supposed to buy and tie onto a little statue with a cigarette and it supposedly brings you luck in the real form of your miniature items. There was everything you could ever want. Miniature sacks of rice or boxes of cornflakes,
tiny suitcases full of money, little shops complete with goods and a shop assistant, little wheelbarrows with spades and tiny bricks, and miniature degrees from all sort of universities including oxford, plus much more.
We caught the local bus to Desaguadero the border town to Bolivia on the side of the lake. There were typical little villages on the lake edge with beautiful churches. Inland away from the lake the treeless landscape was dotted with little mud brick houses evenly seperated by small fields of crops and some tussockland where there would be a child watching a mob of sheep.
Desaguadero was not a beautiful town. We had a look at a few hotels until we found one with hot showers and a room with a window, then we went out for tea. We met a friendly bus driver who recommended a restaurant for us. It was very very cheap and there were lots of locals there but my soup had chicken feet in it. We then ran through a sudden rain shower to find the Internet cafe. The next morning we were woken ridiculously early to tooting and whistling and shouting on loud speakers. When we ventured
out, the streets were unrecognisable from last night. Every street was a market with a constant traffic jam of three wheeled bike taxis. We walked down street after street looking for a restaurant or somewhere with no market but it must have gone on for the whole town. The fruit and veges street, the blankets street, the orange juice, cornflakes and jam street, the hole punchers and sellotape street, and my favorite the spices street with so many huge bags of chillies and sacks almost as big as me full of oregano and the biggest Cinnamon sticks Ive ever seen.
We found the migration office and got our passports stamped then walked across the border to Bolivia along with bustling crowds taking goods backwards and forwards.We found the immigration office and were told that our exit stamp was no good. The Peruvian officials had stamped our passports as the 5th of April instead of May so we had to walk back across the border and repeat the process. Officials on both sides were helpful and there was no sign of anyone trying to go through our money to check for supposed fake notes to line their pockets like we
had been warned of. We must have been lucky I guess.
We are in Bolivia! Although you wouldnt know because this side of the town looked just like the Peruvian side.
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Kate
non-member comment
Wow guys! You are doing such an amazing job with this - awesome to read and wonderful photos :) Those reed boats and floating islands are so fascinating! The boats look like something out of a historic film...lol! Hmmmm...hole punchers and sellotape street?? What is that about?! Nothing huge is happening back here - we bought a new washing machine as the old one finally gave up and Dave and I have managed to get our flights and stuff paid for for the end of the year :) Jeanie has gone back to Canada - I'm sure she will be in touch, she's very keen to come back sometime. Anyway, enjoy your travels through Bolivia! Hugs, Kate