DAY 27

We were up and ready to leave the hotel by 7am sharp. We had a transfer from the hotel to the public transport bus station.

Eddie organised our tickets, it was a double decker five star bus. The seats were huge and reclined 160 degrees! Perfect for a 6 hour journey to Puno, where 3 million people live at the altitude of 3,820 metres.. We stopped for a late lunch, Eddie pre ordered our burgers because we only had a 15 minute stop and we had to be on the road again for another two hours.

Driving through the towns before reaching the town of Puno was quite shocking. Almost every building was still under construction and not complete. Eddie later explained that town in particular don’t pay their taxes and actually had someone from the government killed for not giving them what they wanted.

We then had our orientation walk around the town of Puno. There were so many shops I can’t wait to go back for some shopping. We went to the local fresh fruit and vegetable market to buy our family that is having us for the community stay. Shane and I went on a spree, we were to spend $15solas each. We got our family; a big shopping bag, salt, sugar, red grapes, bananas, noodles, mandarins, beans, carrots, cheese and a packet of chips.

Eddie took us out to dinner at a really nice restaurant that had a little bit of everything. I decided to get a Woodfire pizza to go with the bottle of red Shane and I shared.

DAY 28

Our breakfast at the hotel in Puno was horrible. There was barely any food left to eat and when we asked for more bread or bowls for the cereal the lady said no.. So Shane and I headed out for breakfast before we needed to leave. Sounds like an easy thing to do but it’s been so hard to find an open restaurant / cafe early hours of the morning, by early, I mean 7.30/8am. We stumbled across a trip advisor approved restaurant / bar / cafe and ordered a quick bite to eat before heading out for the day.

We walked out our hotel expecting a bus to be waiting, like all other transfers we’ve had and there were little push bike took tooks waiting to take us down to the port. It was so much fun going down hill, the driver was tooting for traffic to stop in front of us. We flew down to the port, then little things get up some speed. We arrive at the port and embark on a slow motor boat. We visited a community in Uros, Titinos floating islands. The Titinos islands are built on the more shallow parts of the lake. They are made by \240bricks of soil, the root of the reeds and many layers of the reeds. The reeds are topped up once a month. The islands get by, not with money but by trading. One of the main islands have a market every Sunday to trade things from their farms; knitting, alpaca, beans etc. this is where people come together from other islands and get to communicate and build relationships with people from other islands.

Our next stop was our community stay for the night. Lucky they speak Quechua, which is what our last community family spoke. We met our mama;

Amelia - 40 years old, happy laughing husband, four children. Oldest two are studying in city, younger two we met at home. They have a big farm; 2 cows, 1 donkey, lots of sheep, baby lambs, chickens and they have a motor bike.

Amelia cooked us lunch when we arrived, soup for entree and a tasty thin omelette with rice, beans, carrots and potatoes.

After lunch we had an hour siesta before we woke up and went outside to help bash the beans out of the shell of these dried out sticks.

We had a group activity in the afternoon; we versed the mamas in volleyball. \240Apparently they have never lost before so our group got very competitive and we won. After that the mamas dressed us all in traditional clothes for dinner. We had a joint dinner together, we all helped peel potatoes (with knives) before we had our soup and a vegetarian dish. Our mama walked us back to our homestay for the night, which was a mud brick home. Shane and I shared a single bed so we didn’t get cold. We used the blankets off the other single bed and had about 6 over the top of us. They were very heavy blankets. Our mama bought us two plastic bottles with boiling hot water in them to put at our feet under the bed to warm us up.

DAY 29

This mornings wake up was more sutle than we are use to, we were woken up by the farm animals; the donkey, roosters and lambs. Breakfast was at 6.30am, our mama cooked us pancakes, with strawberry jam while we kneed the damper into small circles. She then gave us a boiled egg each with the cooked damper and tea.

We said Asta la vista to our mamas down at the port. They were so lovely, our mama kept kissing and hugging me. They were so grateful, I teared up from how beautiful and giving they were.

On the boat again for an hour to Eliseo’s (our local guides) hometown, Taquile Island. 2,000 people live here and the highest point we climbed is 4,100 m. Here, the tradition of knitting is strictly a male domain, and women do the spinning. To be accepted into the in laws, the men must make a high quality beanie so tightly woven that you can drink from it and the women need to cook a specific spicey quinoa for the mother in law to taste and approve of. It is very important to be married on this island. If you are married you are heard and listened to as a couple. If you are married, you are elected as authority together and are included in the island. You don’t have much of a voice if you are single, the people of the island don’t respect your opinion.

Pedro Taquile - is the first Spanish landlord that came to the island, the island is now named after his surname. The land use to be called the sun and the flower.

Eliseo’s grandfather told the story and still believes; there was no lake back in the day and that where the lake is now was a paradise. The people were told by the god that they will keep the paradise if they don’t climb to the top of the mountain. They heard a voice of an evil spirit that told them to keep climbing, so they climbed the mountain. The sun god was so sad he started to cry which created the lake.

We hiked for about an hour to the peak, with stops and informative stories from our local guide on the way. Lunch had a stunning view of the lake on the top of a mountain. Another 3 hour boat ride back to Puno where we say goodbye to our two boat men and our local guide Eliseo. \240

Titi - Means puma

Caca - Grey colour / stone (be careful with how you pronounce caca)

Travel day from Puno to La Paz

Breakfast at 5.45am

No lunch

Walk around La Paz

Witches Markets

y comfortable local bus to Desaguadero and cross the border into Bolivia. At the border you will say goodbye to your Peruvian leader and a local Bolivian leader will take over for the last portion of your tour. After border formalities at the Peruvian migration office, you'll walk across a bridge to the Bolivian side, submit your passport at the Bolivian migration office, then board the bus again. Head for La Paz, and after 30 minutes or so there's another stop where your documents will be checked by authorities. The journey to La Paz takes about 5 hours (don't forget that Bolivia's timezone is 1–2 hours ahead of Peru!). When you arrive, you might feel like you're on top of the world at around 3,600 metres above sea level. Discover the colonial architecture and browse the markets – you'll see this town is a interesting mixture of the indigenous and modern.