PERUsing with Rebecca: Lake Titicaca

Fact: I have officially been on the highest navigable lake in the world, Lake Titicaca. Late last Thursday I boarded a bus headed to Puno with my friends Alex and Laura. No worries, the bus was really nice. We paid an extra $5 each way for the large first class reclining comfy seats so we could sleep through the night. Worth it? Oh yeah. We arrived right during sunrise and found ourselves wandering the city at 5:00 in the morning in search of breakfast. Unfortunately, nothing was open and we didn´t meet up with our tour until 7:00. Therefore, we walked down to the lake for a bit and then found a cafe open at 6:00. It was a gorgeous day and the sky seemed to blend in with the beautiful blue of the lake. The lake itself is huge. It´s the largest in South America and is the border of Peru and Bolivia.Our tour began with a boat ride to the Uros Islands, also known as the floating islands. There are 63 on the lake and on each there are anywhere from 5-10 families. They taught us how they are built and maintained (see picture below). It was so cool. I couldn´t believe people actually live there. I could feel the whole island rocking with a boat came near. After the Uros, we had a 3 hour boat ride to the island of Amantani. There we were assigned host families that live on the island. We had lunch and dinner with them and then hiked the volcano on the island to watch the sunset. It was gorgeous. That night they dressed us up in traditional clothing and we had a fiesta. Man, I don´t know how those women do it. The belt was almost a corset and they hike up the volcano everyday with a baby on their back and things in their arms. They´re either crazy or really in shape. The next morning we woke up to pancakes. Score! We boarded the boat again for another 3 hour tour ;) I hope you got that reference. We got to another island called Taquile and hiked up to the top for lunch over looking the lake, which by the way is so big that it´s almost like an ocean. I was sad to leave the lake because I just missed being by water. We stayed in a nice hostel for the night and woke up early the next morning for our bus. I´m sorry it got a little rushed at the end here. It´s been a busy week and I´m out of time now. I hope the pictures will at least keep you satisfied.