Day 268
Lake Titicaca
Breakfast is so yummy at this hotel! Casa Andina. Displayed on the plates were alpaca, fruit of every description and an assortment of peruvian breads, which are the flatbread variety. At last we could eat and not worry about altitude! It was still pretty high here, around 3827 metres above sea level, but we didn´t have to walk as much as we did on the trek so it was ok to have a full breakfast.
Alpaca is the most tender of meats..and i would have to say, my favourite! If only i could stop envisaging that pretty face...............hence, i could only eat a taster but i´m sure if i were to live here i could get used to it! There are so many llama and alpaca´s here in Peru. It´s their most common of meats, along with guinea pigs! Lamb and chicken is popular too...as is the fish, particularly in the Lake Titicaca area, but the alpaca seems to be in abundance!
Jose met us in the breakfast room of the hotel and introduced us to our Lake Titicaca guide, Percy. We were told he had an interest in archaeology and in the local area and spoke Quechan, Aymara, Spanish and German! A multilinguist! Quechan is the Inca language and Aymara, an agricultural language is his preferred language and is pre incan. Both are the languages of the indians.
His lifestory is fascinating..i could write a lengthy epistle just about Percy!!!!
Meanwhile..we did have a little saga before we all loaded into the mini bus....Jose found out his backpack had been loaded into the wrong van (our worst nightmare!) so we had to wait while he sorted that one out!!!!
He was so calm about it! And just said, oh well, I´ll collect it next time! We were silently grateful it wasn´t our packs that took off in the van as we couldn´t have waited until any next time!
We spotted the boat we were to go over to the islands on...which looked like a real chug! The look on Greg´s face, as we discovered that was the boat we were to go on, was hilarious! Seemed to me the same look as the one he gets when he is a bit concerned about an aircraft...one of masked terror!!!
It really did look as though it was going to fall apart................
From the Puno port it took about 2 hours for us to get to our first island. Percy was in his element as he explained to Greg, Barb, Trish and I a little of the history of Lake Titicaca....
I wondered if that was distract us as we squished our way throught the reeds in our boat that was chugging along at about 5 knots.......
He saw us peering outwards and then told us a little about the varieties of fish in the lake and how tourism was very monitored in the Lake these days. To the extent that the locals direct where the boats will go.
The first island we landed on was called Uros Island. This is a floating island made of totora reeds and according Percy, their legend says they existed before the sun... when the earth was still dark and cold. They say they have "black blood"
and so therefore are immune to the cold!
Jose said they even drink blood.....
Their name is kotsuna which means they are the people of the lake and when you meet them you can see that is exactly what they are...people who live by fishing, weaving and relying on ¨gringo´s¨ (which is the name peruvians call tourists!) to buy their goods.
But when we arrived we were greeted by the nicest of people. After hearing all the stories i think we were imagining we´d be meeting canibals or something...
The island really is floating..and to stand on it, it is sqishy and soft and feels a bit water laden. The women were large and obviously spent most of their time spinning and weaving and cooking fried fish (as you can see belowª!)
One of the leaders of the island did a demonstration for us as well..to show us how the island was made.
He also showed us his boats..made of reeds..see below
They seemed such a proud simple people..and i bought a little textile from one of the children who was seated with all the beautiful colourful mats and things they had to sell! (how could i resist!)
We had to say goodbye to Barb and Trish after this...which was a bit sad, as they had become really good friends after spending 2 weeks together in the Amazon and on the trek.....and it was also time to say goodbye to Jose as well.
After this Percy, our new guide took Greg and i to Tequile Island for the night...where we were to stay in our homestay.
And that is where our adventure got really unique....
