Puno-Lake Titicaca-Uros Islands

Day 21 Friday 26th December 2008 Cucco to Puno

A 400 km bus trip from Cusco to Puno in the very south of Peru on the shores of Lake Titicaca, the highest lake in the world. We were on a tourist bus, so there were a number of stops along the way to break up the journey, including at Raqchi to see the remains of the largest known Inca sun temple in Peru ... another amazing piece of engineering and design of the temple plus all the living houses built along a lane aligned exactly to the summer solstice so the people knew when the season had turned and it was time to plant the harvest.

We also visited the Sistine Chapel of Peru, another church full of spectacular art but this one especially because all the inside surfaces were painted with murals by the Jesuits when the church was first built - hence the "Sistine" tag ... unfortunately no photography is permitted inside any of these chuches, even without flash, so we can´t provide any pics. Also has some spectucular scenery of the Peruvian high plains along the journey, including the views from La Raya - the highest point on the journey at 4313 m above sea level and a wonderful view of Lake Titicaca as we descended into Puno. Tomorrow we have a day tour out to the amazing floating island called Uros, as well as one of the main permanent islands called Taquile.

Day 22 Saturday 27th December 2008 Puno to Uros Floating Islands to Taquile Island

Another day trip today, first out into the Puno Bay to visit the amazing Uros Floating Islands ... these are islands constructed from the totora reeds that grow around the edges of Lake Titicaca. They are literally floating islands, built on top of the reed roots with layers and layers of reeds that end up several meters thick. And then the buildings on top of the islands are also built from the reeds ... albeit it seems with a little help from the occasional piece of modern plastic between the layers of reeds. The whole thing is very tourist oriented, but the locals are extremely polite and welcome you to their island should you visit ... and there are 52 separate islands to choose from, each housing around 4 to 5 families. The only reason given by the tour guide for these islands is that the people just don´t want to live in Puno ... but there must be some more history to it than that ... the people produce income from tourists and from fishing ... they go to the mainland to the local markets to trade for the fruit and vegetables they cannot grow on their islands. We also were offered ( for a price of course) a ride on our hosts´s reed boat ...

The reeds themselves are multipurpose - nothing is wasted ... the base of the stalk is for oral hygiene i.e. a native toothbrush and can also be eaten, the middle section is used to feed the few animals they keep (such as guinea pigs) and the top section is the part that when dried out is used to construct the islands. The flowers of the reed also have medicincal properties ... all in all, another fascinating place to visit. We then continued to Tacquile Island, an inhabited permanent island further into the middle of the lake .. the population here is known for their weaving and textile skills that end up being sold locally and in Cusco.

The island rises steeply out of the lake, so we endured a long, slow climb ... but were rewarded at lunch at a local co-operative restaurant with absolutely spectacular views across Lake Titicaca ... there is one pic in the blog, will add more in due course. As noted in the photo album notes, we have just run out of photo quota for December, so could only add a few pics of this day trip ... once we have a new allocation available on 1 Jan we will be sure to add a few more ... they will be worth the wait.

Tomorrow we continue on from Puno around the lake and into Bolivia to visit some sites down the southern end of Titicaca ... so we farewell Peru and look forward to more adventures in Bolivia for the first time ... tomorrow night we are at an Ecolodge on Sun Island at the southern end of the lake so are not expecting Internet access. We´ll be back blogging again in a couple of days time ... until then ...