19-20 September 2006
(This part by Leigh)
We arrived in Puno on the 18th - the town is alright, but the main attraction is its proximity to Lake Titicaca...yes, the butt of all our childhood jokes. If we were still in middle school it would keep us laughing for weeks. . . as it is we just chuckle quietly every few hours. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lake_Titicaca At 12,500 feet above sea level, we´re still breathless after every staircase and hill. We checked into our hostal and had to climb up to the 4th floor. Ouch - just cruel at this altitude. Our plan was to check out a few of the towns and islands nearby. So we booked ourselves on a 2-day tour of the lake. We had been given a tip that really paid off, we contacted Lilian at Kollasuyo tours who arranged a great hostal for 40 soles and a 2 day trip for only 50 soles each. In case anyone is interested in coming down, she can be reached at 9641284 on her cell or kollasuyos@terra.com the tour agency is located on Jiron Theodoro Valcarcel No. 155
We visited the floating islands of Uros and then stayed overnight with a host family on the island of Amantani. The second day, we took the boat to another island called Taquile. Of the three locales, Uros and Taquile were overrun with tourists which was a little dissappointing. BUT, our day on Amantani was just terrific (they even made us dress up as native Amantani-ans for a dance - see above).
(this part by Andrew)
Each of the three spots were interesting in their own ways. The floating islands of the Uros were fascinating, although in the process of a steady slide towards only being a tourist theme park. Nonetheless, we were able to glimpse a bit of what life must have been like. In addition the people had turned an egret into a pet, and we were able to watch it stalking around the island amongst the tourists occasionally snapping at some fish in a small pail.
Amantani, the leat touristy afforded us the opportunity to climb to the top of the island where we could view a 360 panorama of the lake below us. It was particularly beautiful as a series of thunderstorms rolled in. They chased us off the summit and back towards town as the rain started drilling down. Then the lightning began repeated strikes on the slightly smaller peak less than a mile away (it was 5-6 seconds between lightning and us hearing the thunder) Just as we reached the center of town the hail began. . . As we staggered up the path towards the home of he family wth whom we were staying, the hail intensified until it was relentlessly hammering on us. After scurrying along we eventually found the house and staggered inside. In all nearly 2 inches of large-marble-sized hail fell. When we later talked with some knowledgeable Peruvians they said that rain and hail almost never fall before November and that weird weather like this is generally a sign of an imminent "el niño" event.
At Taquile we were dropped on one side of the island and walked along a beautiful path around to the other side where we (and the other 200-300 tourists visiting the island that day) were greeted to the raucous sounds of a 15 piece brass band in the central plaza. It readily became evident why they were so raucous (and why they kept playing "Happy Birthday" every other song) as we observed them liberally mixing some sort of home brewed liquor with cola between every other song. I suppose if I played the same songs every day for tourists, I would want to get good and hammered, too.
Ah well, we made it back to shore safe and sound ready for more adventures. . .
LN-AF
