Stunning Lake Titicaca

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Lake Titicaca (shared between Bolivia and Peru) is the world's highest navigable lake, at 3,812 metres above sea level. It is also South America's largest lake, with a water volume of 893 cubic kilometres. In other words, this is one of the highlights of any trip to South America and we had great fun exploring.

The Bolivian Side

"At the Copa, Copacabana....". This is one tune that refused to leave my head for our stay at the lovely town of Copacabana, on the Bolivian shore of Lake Titicaca. Whilst I can't imagine it lives up to its Brazilian counterpart, I was surprised at how enjoyable Copacabana was, especially as it is very much a tourist town and base for visits to the islands on Lake Titicaca (mainly Isla del Sol and less-so Isla de la Luna). The town had a great laid-back feel and a good mix of gringos and locals.

We went on some enjoyable treks around Copacabana, including hiking up one of the hills overlooking town which is very popular with pilgrims looking for favours from God/the gods. Cerro Calvario is basically a steep climb from the centre of Copacabana, made more challenging by the altitude here. We also hiked up to "Horca del Inca", an Incan astronomy complex. From there we continued hiking uphill to the summit of Cerro Nino Calvario at 4,014m altitude. These Incans certainly liked their heights!

The best part of our time in Copacabana was the visit to the Isla del Sol in Lake Titicaca. Inca legend places this as the location of the birth of the sun and so it has long had a priviliged place in local culture. We took an early morning boat to the island (taking over 2 hours to get there) and then proceeded to explore the island for the day before returning to Copacabana that evening. Our time on the island was spent exploring the Inca ruins and trekking (as well as bagging a few peaks in the process of course!). The Inca ruins included the very impressive Inca temple on the south of the island and the labyrinth at the north. Connecting the 2 ends of the island was a long path which was easy to follow and which was well-shaped to the contours of the island. As we approached the town at the south of the island we came across a lot of locals who were re-digging the path and laying new stones - it all seems to be a very well set up community.

The Peruvian Side

From Copacabana we made a painless crossing into Peru to the town of Puno, also on the shore of Lake Titicaca. Puno is not as nice a town as Copacabana, but it is still a fine place to rest for a day or two and to use as a base for exploring the surrounding sights. We took two main trips out of Puno. The first was to visit the pre-Inca site of Sillustani with its burial chambers. Sadly there were no mummies around but the architecture was fun to look at and it is all in a stunning location, overlooking a laguna offshoot of Lake Titicaca. On the way back to Puno we stopped off at a local "traditional" house to meet the owners and have a look around. I was worried it was going to be a horrible tourist-trap but actually it turned out to be great fun. The family were very friendly, talked about their daily lives and then treated us to lots of yummy food, including quinoa bread, cheese, potatoes dipped in clay (tasty!) and local mint tea. When hiking around Lake Titicaca we had noticed a strong smell of mint and now we understood what it was used for!

We also took a trip out into the lake to explore the "floating" reed islands of Uros. These islands are literally built on piles and piles of cut-down reeds, and the reeds have to continually be replaced to stop the islands from sinking. The tour was once again interesting and the locals were friendly. We got to have a taste of the reeds as they are also used as food (tasted a lot like cucumber to me) and also took a trip in a reed boat. Very touristy but surprisingly fun!

Lake Titicaca was a spectacular place to visit, with interesting sights, great people and lovely scenery. We also ate the best alpaca steak of the trip in Puno!!

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Comments

[barrygahan]

I look a bit red there....
...was your camere on some strange setting?