Day 16

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A hairy ride on one of the tut-tuts (a bicycle taxi) took us to the boat port of Lake Titicaca. Dad decided to give the young Peruvian rider a break and instead he sat next to me to enjoy the ride while dad cycled. This was the first time dad had been on a bike in weeks and he was pretty excited as I'm sure he is missing his 'Prince' (his beloved racing bike). We had to boat jump to get into our boat which had an inside area and was very cosy. .After a very slow one hour drive we arrived at the floating islands. Families actually live their whole lives on these islands in the middle of the lake. They build the islands themselves from reeds and restore them every three months. They have been existent for over 2,500 years. It felt like walking on air as a family showed us around their small island and explained how they make everything, even the small huts, from the reeds in the lake. They even eat these reeds. There were a few young children around playing and taking the boats out to go fishing... Making their own fun as they don't know any different. The slow boat then took us to a peninsula on the mainland called Lachon where we were happily greeted by the locals, placing necklaces on us made from their national pink flower. Next dad and I were introduced to our new mama Amelia who we would stay with for one night to gain an insight into their daily lives. Amelia showed us back to her quite large mud brick house, built buy her husband. It was very quaint, cottage like and you could tell she had made an effort to make it look appealing with pretty flowers growing over the gate. We were introduced to her three children and ate lunch together. She had made her own cheese, and served with it potato and rice. Neither of these three foods I eat, although I knew I would have to make an exception for the homestay so I didn't mind. For the next three hours dad and I helped her in the farm beginning with peeling the corn. Next we were given heavy sticks which we used to bash a huge pile of broad beans still in their shells. After 10 minutes of hitting the pile, which was kinda fun, most of the beans had come out of their shells and we spent the next hour sorting them. While doing this we were able to try and interact with her, as she spoke only Quechua and little Spanish. We referred to our phrase book frequently but she loved that we made the effort and were also able to tell her about ourselves. At 4.30pm we joined the other mama's and members of our group for a lakeside game of volleyball which is the second most popular sport in Peru to soccer. It seemed surreal playing volleyball in the sand with the most incredible view of the lake. It is hard to fathom how large it is,but to put it into perspective Peru and Bolivia share the lake and the perimetre is hundreds of miles. The first game was the visitors (us) against the mama's and Ollie... We certainly underestimated the mama's! Boy did they have a strong serve and spike on them... Even with four tall men on our team the mama's won by miles. At 4.30 everyday they do this, usually just versing each other though. Next Amelia took me back to the house and dressed me in the traditional clothing, the same as her and her daughters, and dressed dad in a male poncho and funny hat. I was in a huge puffy blue skirt, a white patterend top and a floppy hat which signified that I am single. The women in relationships wear a different hat. We met the rest of our group and all the mama's in one of their houses to prepare dinner together. There were plenty of laughs when we kept realising how ridiculous we all looked! After peeling a tonne of potatoes we played cards and drank muna tea waiting for dinner to be served. It was minus ten degrees that night, and we were grateful for the three layers of heavy alpaca bed spreads to keep the heat in. This homestay experience again reinforced how lucky we are in Australia. The families in Lachon seem 100 years behind us, living technology free and using old methods of farming simply to feed their families. It was very grounding even spending one night there.

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