The Computer Problem

It´s not as though I was just rattling off blog entries, as you are well aware, but my already sluggish posting habit was stopped altogether about two weeks ago when our laptop computer up and died on us. Hard drive failure, of the first order. So, I no longer even needed an excuse not to post - how convenient!

However, I realized today that in a mere two weeks, I will be once again leaving for an epic tour of some of Peru´s hottest tourist destinations, this time with my parents, and I know that the tour with my parents comes exactly three months after the tour with my inlaws, and it really is ridiculous to not have posted about the initial trip three months after the fact. Mind you, I never did blog our trip to Sri Lanka on my other blog, and that is over a year and a half ago . . . eh, someday.

So, I am posting from an internet café, and therefore have no access to my photos, so this will be unillustrated. And I can´t honestly see myself being bothered to go back and insert pictures after the fact. So, if you want to see pictures from the big trip, click here. It´s a universally accessible photo album, so you should be able to see it. If you can´t, email me and I will send you an invitation to see it. Heck, you can even have the photo window open while you read the blog, and pretend that I did illustrate my posts!

Day Two: Lake Titicaca

Our guide, Willy, picked us up in the van at about 6:30 am, after we had eaten a perfectly acceptable breakfast at our hotel. We went down to the docks and stopped at a shop to pick up water and snacks, as Willy assured us that once we got to the islands, everything would be very expensive. We got into our private boat - a nice surprise - and headed out by about 7:30.

Our first stop was the Floating Islands of the Uros people, who live among the reeds in the bay offshore from Puno. It takes about a half-hour to get to the islands in a motorboat, and they really do float. The Uros people originally began living on these islands, which they construct themselves from the lake reeds, to hide from aggressive neighbours. Each island has a lookout tower, and the islands themselves are nearly camoflauged (sp?) among the thick reeds. We arrived on the island we were to visit at about 8:00 in the morning, with beautiful golden light all around, reflecting off the waters of Titicaca. The women on the island came out to the waters´ edge and called greetings to us as we docked. Once off the boat, we were escorted to a sitting area where the ladies gave a demonstration of how the islands are built, how reeds can be eaten, and how they have learned to sing songs for tourists in a number of languages Peruvian and foreign. We also met the three varieties of fish that live in Lake Titicaca. After our orientation, and a brief lecture from Willy on the geography of the lake, we toured the island and were swarmed by enthusiastic islanders attempting to sell us admittedly charming handicrafts.

The Floating Islands of the Uros are a relatively recent tourist attraction. Twenty years ago, the islanders were afraid of strangers and would not allow them near their homes. However, as time has passed and the fish stocks have been depleted by commercial enterprise, the islanders have realized the lucrative nature of tourism. In the 1990s, electricity bymeans of solar panels was introduced, and most islands have their own motorboats in addition to their traditional reed boats. The islands exist almost solely as a tourist attraction now. This, however, does not make them less interesting. It was funny, though, meeting a woman in traditional dress on a reed island, who sold me some of her weaving, and then asked to exchange email addresses . . .

We decided to take a very touristy rowed reed boat from one island to another before reimbarking in our "fast boat", and Aaron took advantage of this opportunity to get in there and row. Then it was off to the island of Taquile.

Taquile is a large island - not manmade - about a two hour motor boat ride from Puno. Lake Titicaca is already nearly 4000 metres above sea level, and Taquile rises up out of the lake´s waters to reach the indigo sky (sorry, I can´t help but wax a little poetic about the place!). The island is quite hilly, and one is obligated to hike up either a very steep staircase or a less steep paved path to reach the village. Mercifully, we were taken up the path, which nevertheless robbed us of air and left us puffing on the side of the paving stones while, more than once, we were overtaken by locals carting bottled beer and softdrinks up in crates on their backs. We were also innundated by children sullenly attempting to sell bracelets, caps, and knick-knacks, or offering "gifts" of muña, a mint-like local herb, and expecting "gifts" of pocket change in return. Like the Uros islands, Taquile has a short history of tourism. Before the mid-1970s, no tourists visited the island, and the journey from Puno took twelve hours by sailboat. By the mid-1990s, tens of thousands of tourists visited the island annually, with hundreds staying at least one night in a family guesthouse (there is no hotel on the island). The greatest industry on the island is tourism, followed closely by highly sophisticated weaving and knitting. Taquile is large enough to support agriculture, and potatoes and beans supplement a fish-based diet.

After a brief visit in the village square, where we paid local children to have their photos taken and bought Peruvian knit caps, or chullos, in the handicraft market, we carried on through the village to the restaurant where we had lunch. The meal was lovely: quinoa soup and fried trout and kingfish with muña tea. Then followed a hike down the steep stairs to another dock where our boat was waiting. Some of the gang also tried chewing coca leaves, as on Taquile, according to Willy, one does not greet others verbally but rather by offering coca leaves from a pouch, which everyone carries. As I watched white-haired grandmothers hauling goods imported from the mainland up the more than 500 steps, I thought of how exhausting even talking must be when you cross paths with another. Much easier, under the circumstances, to breathlessly nod and offer a few coca leaves to help with the altitude.

Back in the boat, several of the gang dozed while we debated - and discarded - the notion of going back to the Uros islands to try our hand at fishing. We arrived in Puno at around 3:30 in the afternoon and, after stopping off at the bus station to persuade the Cruz del Sur representative to release our remaining suitcase without a baggage stub (oops), we went into the centre of town to wander around, buy some souvenirs, and eventually eat dinner. Some of the party remained downtown for a while longer, but the little ones and their parents retired to the hotel for another good night´s sleep before the big train trip the next day!