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We spent the past two days on Lake Titicaca and spent the night with a family on the small island of Amantani. Travelling to Puno was our first night bus experience. And it was certainly an experience. Much more than I think any of us wanted: smalltown Peruvian reality tv shows blaring so loudly we were trying to stuff jackets into the speaker, seats that reclined uncontrollably, and the lovely smell of b.o. permanently wafting through the air. Upon arrival in Puno we were all pretty much dead from the experience. Our goal was to spend the night with a family on the lake so we put on our packs and took a cab to the boatdocks. As we opened the car door we were greeted by El Capitan, this is his real name from what we could tell, who then convinced us to take his boat to the small rural island of Amantani.
An hour and one trout breakfast later we were hopping on his boat heading out on the waters of Lake Titicaca to the reed islands of Usúa, which was quite an eye opening experience. These people live on floating islands of reeds, everything they have is made of reeds and you can even eat the reeds. They taste slightly better than celery and are juicier as well. The highlight was receiving a ride on one of their reed longboats, pretending we were riding on Kon Tiki. From Usua we rode though the maze of reeds out into the open water to Amantani. The trip was about three hours. Matthew and Ian made good use of this time to sleep (Check out the photo album).
We arrived to Amantani in the rain to find nearly the whole village waiting for us. The familys of the islands rotate in having visitors and all the women of the island show up to recieve their new houseguests. We were chosen by El Capitan to go with Irma who has two sons Jose (4) and Wilma (7). We spent almost the entire afternoon playing with them. We crashed cars, sank boats, played soccer. And, Matthew even manager to scare some sheep out of their enclosure within the first 30 min. of our arrival.
Irma and her sons live in a modest adobe house with no electricity, only a fauces on the wall outside for running water, and a seperate kitchen structure with an open fire to cook upon. Everything was really clean and Irma has a beautiful garden. The outhouse was on the other side of their potato field. This is the norm on the island. Only the main town square has buildings with electricity and there are no cars on the island. It really is quite an amazing place.
After lunch and playing with Jose and Wilma we hiked up to the top of the island where a very old walled fortress rests beneath which an elderly couple make hot cocoa and doughnuts for those who make it up to visit. It was a really good combination. We were all freezing. Dinner was a lot fun, we spent a long time conversing with Irma about life on the island and about her family. We learned a lot about Jose and Wilma too. For desert we surprised them with lollipops we had bought at the square earlier. They loved them. After dinner we went with two friends we made on the boat, Lisa and Theresa from Germany, to the local pub on the main square. Upon entering we found a group of cute elderly French people dressed up in local clothing dancing to the tradicional flute music of the area. One of them had their birthday that night so we all enjoyed some very good chocolate cake. Walking home from the bar was wonderful. The sky cleared to reveal the most beautiful night sky. I have never seen so many Stars before in my life. Quite magical.
It was sad the next day to leave our family we had had a great time together. Irma even tried to convince us to stay. From Amantan we took a quick but rouge ride to Taquile, Amantani´s smaller neighbor. We enjoyed tea and crepes with strawberry jam and went to their textile shop full of beautifully woven things. And then back to Puno we went where we enjoyed excellent pizza, Peruvians are professional pizza makers and have quite good Chinese food as well (Chifa).
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