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On Wednesday night we took a night bus from Arequipa for the 7-hour journey to Puno, a town on the Peruvian side of Lake Titicaca. Before jumping on the bus we played some pool and had a couple of pints at Marco´s hostel. We then grabbed some Moroccan food before heading to a bar for the ´Hora Feliz´ (happy hour). Caroline managed to get hilariously drunk and so when we arrived in Puno the next morning she was nursing quite the hangover. We had no intention of staying in Puno as we had heard that it was a drab place. These reports were most definitely accurate. The weather didn´t help, with rain spattering against the bus windows, but Puno looked unappealing at best. We jumped on a bus heading to Copacabana.
When we crossed the border, there was an official money exchange and I wasn´t given any funny treatment by the Bolivian border staff. I was liking Bolivia already. Caroline had lost her Andean Immigration card (it says card but really it´s a small piece of paper with a stamp on it) and so she had to spend $10 on a new one. Apart from that, everything went smoothly and we were in Copacabana within 15 minutes.
We checked into Hostel Arco Iris, which had a half decent description on Wikitravel. At B20 (c. $3) for the first night and $6 for the second (because it was Friday and there was some sort of festival going on) it was a steal. We grabbed some breakfast for B25 ($3.5) which consisted of toast, eggs, pancakes, coffee and fresh fruit juice before Marco went to bed and Caroline and I climbed up a nearby viewpoint. It took just 30 minutes to get up the small hill overlooking the town and the views out onto the lake and the surrounding countryside were beautiful.
We all had a few things to do that day (Marco´s local side, Basel, were playing Chelsea in the Europa League, I had some blogging to do and Caroline wanted to get on Skype) so the afternoon was spent relaxing. We also booked tickets for a boat journey to Isla del Sol the next morning. That night we re-grouped for dinner, which consisted of a help-yourself salad bar, bowl of soup, main of fish, rice and veggies, as well as a desert of lemon meringue pie, all for a grand total of about $6.
We jumped on the boat at 8:30am the next morning, and arrived at the North side of Isla del Sol a couple of hours later. We decided not to take the guided tour and simply walk ourselves to the south side.
The walk was around 10km in total. Lake Titicaca is the largest lake in South America (when measured by volume) and at 3,800m above sea level meant we were higher than in Cusco. This was evident during the walk which had some long uphill sections. It was a beautiful sunny day and having walked an hour or so, we came across a set of ruins. After Machu Picchu these were really of no interest to us and so we spent a few minutes resting and taking some snaps before moving on.
The whole journey to the other side of the island took us until around 2pm. We had to stop along the way to pay various taxes/duties, which weren´t significant but given that no one tells you about these they were a little irritating. The trek was tough at times with the altitude really taking it´s toll. I was not quite feeling right during the last hour and a half or so and the uphill sections became a real struggle. Despite the difficulties, the walk was very much worth it. The views over the lakes and over other sections of the island were impressive. We could see other islands on the lake as well as various rock outcrtops in the water, and we could even see Peru on the other side of the lake. One thing that really hit home regarding the size of the lake was that it stretched out to the horizon, like an ocean.
We stopped for lunch at a small restaurant overlooking the bay on the south side of the island. I spotted Robin (the German guy I had travelled from Colombia with) and went to say hello for a few minutes before we jumped back on the boat back to Copacabana. Strangely, we were all feeling quite unwell during the journey back. I had a headache, my body was aching and I felt feverish, with Caroline and Marco having similar symptoms. In hindsight it seemed none of us had protected ourselves from the intense sun and mild sunstroke had kicked in. We got back to Copacabana and all collapsed into bed from around 6pm until about 10pm. Marco and I grabbed some food before we headed back to bed.
After an uncomfortable night´s sleep, we were up and ready to grab a bus in the morning. We stopped for breakfast at a Cafe owned by an Irish guy and his Bolivian wife. We enjoyed the local equivalent of baked beans on some toast made from fresh baked bread, as well as some scrambled eggs and coffee, before making the 4-hour journey to La Paz for a mere B15.
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