Good evening my friends,
I hope you all are doing well. The other day Chetsi, Megan & I took a fancy bus from Cusco to Puno. It stopped five times along the way to give all of us the chance to see a magnificent 300 year old church, a few ruins and a local museum. Our tour guide was hilariously into the spiritual and esoteric. I tuned her out around the time she said that ruins at the bottom of lake Titicaca matched the description Plato gave of Atlantis. And oh, by the way - the only way the city was built was with nuclear physics. Scientists confirmed it, yep they did.
Anyway, I slept most of the time and took some neat pictures. My favorite may have been the remains of a sun temple that contained several columns the Inca used to track time. We also got to watch the landscape shift from the Andean mountain range I got to know so well to a high dry flat plain.
After arrival in Puno, we stayed in a dark, cold and empty hostel upon recommendation from my book (note: no longer recommended). We very excitedly dropped off our smelly trek clothes for laundry and grabbed a bite to eat. Still exhausted, we watched Anthony Bourdain in Peru while in Peru and passed out.
The next day we switched to a fancy hotel and wandered down to the port for our first proper glimpse of the famed Lake Titicaca. As soon as we told a tout we wanted to visit Uros Islands, we lost all control of what was going on. In Spanish, we were escorted to the proper ticket booths and herded onto a small boat. The ride was my favorite part - Lake Titicaca is impossibly blue and there were birds talking everywhere from the reeds that make Uros Island famous.
Upon arrival, we were herded again onto a make shift bench where a friendly islander explained for thirty minutes how his islands were made and his culture created - in Spanish. I shifted uncomfortably under the hot sun and tried to understand what was going on. You see, Uros Islands are "handmade" by weaving together mats of these native reeds. Floating blocks of decayed plant matter are tied together, then alternating layers of the reeds are laid on top. Under my flip flops the golden reeds were springy and soft. I almost tripped a couple of times.
Almost everything is made with these reeds - the food (we got to try some), the homes, the native boats. And lo & behold, our herd's next location was a short ride on a native boat. This was also hilarious because while originally the locals would paddle around, we are fat tourists. So a woman took her normal motorboat and wedged it into the native boat to propel it along - almost taking out a couple of tourists! One French guy made the mistake of sitting outside the normal benches and he almost lost a foot. Remind me to show you a picture of this one (it's not on my iPhone).
Anyway the boat dropped us off (for a small fee) at a place where - surprise! - we could buy more stuff. We settled for a Cusquena cervesa and made friends with an Israeli guy who recently visited Atlanta (he was a security guard for the Atlanta birthright kids in 2012. Small fucking world eh?).
Later we had dinner, drinks at a "mixology bar" that seriously impressed me, and prepared for our current journey to Arequipa & Colca Canyon.
More to come my dears.
Katie
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