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The amount that can happen in a week out here is pretty mental so this may seem a little drawn out but I will start where I left off last Saturday just before meeting the group I would spend the remaining time in South America with.
We started with the inital group meeting at 7 in the evening and did the standard what´s your name and what´s your story icebreakers (which to me never seem to break the ice). Then we headed off to dinner, with very few names memorised, in a restaurant with somewhat adult artwork on the walls (1 week down the line and this seems to be a running theme in South America. We were in Bolivia so the food was very cheap and the conversation was good; the group were a great bunch. After dinner it was straight to bed in prepartion for the 8 hour bus journey to Puno in the morning.
The bus left at 8 the next morning, so after a rather dilapidated buffet breakfast we were ready to go to Lake Titikaka. The journey was fairly mundane until we reached Copacobana at lunch time. We stopped for a quick bitew to eat and wandered around what sights the town had to offer which included a large church with a huge gold altar inside. At the time it was home to a wedding and unbeknown to us at the time it is tradition to let off bangers outside the church. As you can imagine we momentarily thought we had stepped into some sort of gunfight.
The surprise was overcome fairly quickly and a further 4 hours on the coach to Puno loomed. We arrived in Puno at around 5 to have a quick walk around the city before being briefed about the trip to Lake Titikaka (which I was buzzing about).
After that it was off to dinner which proved difficult since it was a sunday and everyewhere the team leader recommended seemed to be closed but we eventually found a nice place. After that a few of us went for drinks in a bar that seemed to be lit solely with UV and candle light but it turned out to be alright (they even served Jagerbombs or Jagerbooms as they called them but at 6 quid a hit they were more expensive than revs!).
Monday morning was an alright start to begin the Lake Titikaka tour. We left the hotel and got Tuk Tuks down to the port which, due to the lack of traffic, turned into a sort of Tuk Tuk Mario Kart race. At the port we bought some gifts for the families we would be spending the night with (things like rice, tinned peaches and fresh fruit) as they don´t get a chance to go to the mainland very often.
By 9am we headed off for the first stop of the Uros floating reed islands in the middle of the lake. Here we were greeted by the locals with the Quechua greeting of "Allillanchu" which means hello. Here we sat down and were told about the people, their history and how they build their islands. This was very interesting and one of local created a model of the island to help with Blue Peter style "here´s one I made earlier" houses and people. We then had a chance to wander around the small island, home to 26 people, to see how they live and by some of their weaved goods (this was the point at which someone in the group spotted one of the families watching The Bill in their small reed houses!). We were then given a quick ride on a tradition reed boat which was moored next to a 15hp 4 metre skiff (another sight I chose to ignore) before jumping back on our big boat and heading to the island of Taquile.
At Taquile Island we had around a 45 minute walk, got some lunch and learnt more about the local people. It is quite staggering how you can move from island to island on the lake and the beliefs and traditions of each group of people can vary so greatly. For example on Taquile Island if you want to get a girl you don´t take her to the cinema or to dinner, you have to weave for her! A fact that made "Weaving for dummies" a better seller than "The Game" on that particular island.
Having had some lunch we then headed to Amantani Island where we would have a game of football before meeting our families for the homestay. It became very apparent that the Peruvian played "home team, home rules" as our pre game warm up involved a 30 minute uphill trek and theirs was probably a pint in the local. However we reached the pitch and it was decided it would be 5-8 vs 5-8 game depending on how many of them turned up and how many of us were willing to play after the walk. We (Team Gringo) started strongly going 3-0 in a first to 4 game, but the Peruvians made a comeback with 2 goals from the very young strike force to make it 3-2. However the comeback attempt was quashed when we scored from long range to make it 4-2 or so we thought. However, we were then told you could score from behind halfway and so the goal was disallowed and the Peruvians went on to win 4-3 much to the disgust of the vocal travelling supporters.
After the game it was Baileys and hot chocolate in a local bar before heading off to our families (Juan and Maria) for an evening meal which was Quinoa and vegetable soup followed by veg and rice with cocoa tea. Unfortunately the entire island is vegetarian so a juicy medium rare steak was out of the question!
Juan then dressed us up in tradition ponchos and hats to head off to the local "discoteque" for some music and dancing with Peruvian grannies. This turned out to be a really surreal experience. The only way I could describe it would be like a year 7 disco whilst on a previan exchange at an old peoples home. Basically there was live banjo music and all of us stood on one side and all the peruvians on the other until a peruvian of the opposite sex came over and asked for a dance. Which led to awkward hand movements and arches style dance moves. By 11 we were all exhausted from the activites and my "Papa" Juan took me home.
The next day we were up to help Juan harvest his crop of oca and quinoa. Juan, being the type that liked a challenge decided not to have a field next to his home but rather one on the other side of the island. Nonetheless we headed off to said field to help with the harvest and at 69 years of age Juan insisted on carrying all the tools himself! The harvest tool around 2 hours to do roughly 10% of the field as Juan only needed to feed himself, his wife and his daughter. On the way back Juan decided to carry all of the crops allowing us only a pick axe style tool each (I was staying with another guy from the group called Max).
Once we arrived back at his house Maria prepared a meal of oca, potatoes and fried cheese with a quinoa soup using the ingredients we had just harvested. After food we headed back down to the port to go back to Puno and along the way I had a good Spanish chat with Juan about where his future was going, whether he thought his community would die out or not and why he hated sheep so much (deep stuff!). After a quick goodbye we hopped back on the boat to Puno with the knowledge we would be able to go for a quick swim in the lake on the way back.
The boat came to a halt after about 15 minutes and the 6 of us willing to brave the 9 degree waters climbed onto the roof of the boat to jump off. Beer and I went first, shortly followed by everone else but as soon as you hit the water the cold took the air right out of you! We paddled around for 5 minutes and then clambered back on the boat to jump off one last time (as if the first time wasnt cold enough). We finally got back on the boat for good and headed back to Puno.
On arrival Beer and I had a meal at around 4 as lunch was so early and then headed back to the hostel for a nap. Dinner was then at 7 and this was the first time we found out how much Nick (one of two Danish brothers in our group) could drink as he ordered himself a bottle of red with dinner. After dinner we went back to the UV bar where he subsequently saw off 4 or 5 Long Island Iced Teas with no effect.
On the Wednesday we were up early for the 7 hour bus journey from Puno to Cusco which again was a very dull trip and we didnt arrive in Cusco until 3pm so we got a late lunch/ early dinner which I really needed by that point as I forgot to buy snacks for the journey. That evening we decided to go for a liquid dinner which involved darts, stairwell piggy backs and an Irish Bar. The reprecussions of which were felt by a number of members of the team in the morning.
Finally, Thursday morning. We left the hostel at 8:30 to go white water rafting with a number of stops on the way due to self induced illness (not me I hasten to add). The rafting started at 11 and by 12:30 we reached the rock jumping point which was a bit of a rush, especially for the guy who decided that a backflip would be a good idea! By 1pm we were finished and quite tired from the 2 hours of excercise and we headed back to the hostel for the evening.
Thats all so far but I really enjoyed the trip around Lake Titikaka and finding out how Juan and his family lived. Next up we start the Inca Trail to Machu Picchu which is both daunting and thrilling at the same time. So thats me done for now.
Much love,
Charlie
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