La Paz

I arrived in La Paz with a slightly dodgy tummy, had one good day exploring and then needed the next few days to work on keeping my food in. Oh well, its the first time i´ve been sick during these travels so i cant really complain. And i´m fine now, back to sampling local market food!

La Paz is certainly a sight as you approach from the highway and look down on the city, snuggled in this huge valley. Its got a rather higledy pigledy older part, and further down the valley in the newer suburbs it sprouts highrise. I started by exploring its markets (they are huge and sprawl through streets) and main tourist precincts (main squares and shopping streets), but soon found most things shut for the peaceful demonstration that was happening. Yes, the people of La Paz don´t want the capital to move to sucre, and there was a huge march which shut down the city. And everyone marching from pan pipe playing school kids, to bolivian women dressed in their traditional skirt, shawl and hat.

I also managed to take a tour of Tiwanaku, Bolivias most well known ruins. These are in a valley about 2 hours away, and now consist of a few large pyramids, square enclosures and huge stella, some with some intricate carving. While the Tiwanaku human shaped stella and decorations where a welcome change from the pure stonework of the incas, the site needs some imagination to see what may have been there... lots of stones were taken for colonial buildings.

I also checked out some great museums (loved the weaving and masks), walked up to a lovely look out, sampled their saltenas (yum)... so La Paz wasn´t a complete wipeout!

Lake Titicaca

From Cusco I headed to Puno on the Peruvian side of Lake Titicaca, taking a bus tour of a few archeological sites along the way for good measure (More inca work, and a few churhes). Stumbled upon a town festival with great costumes as you can see.

Puno

Lake Titicaca is huge... yeah I knew that before, but when you find yourself only looking at a portion of it and still struggling to see the other side it starts to sink in. Puno itself isn´t really anything to write home about, but its a base - a functional city perched on the side of the lake with little charm.

From Puno I took a trip out to the famous floating reed islands of Uros where whole communities of people live... very strange and touristy, and I suspect that it will dissappear after this generation (what would attract a young person back after being educated on the mainland?). They tie floating reed rafts together to make islands, harvest reeds to plonk ontop to make a more stable platform, and live in reed houses, fish, and sell trinklets/handcraft to the tourists. All very odd.

I also took a tour to check out some nearby rock towers that are pre-inca and inca burial monuments... They are perched on the edge of the lake overlooking a smaller lake and are quite distinctive and impressive. Curious considering there´s no known ruins of a settlement for miles... whats hiding under the surface of the lake?

Copacabana and Isla del Sol

From Puno, I crossed into Bolivia without any hassle, and chilled out in Copacabana - a quite little town, with a nice lake frontage and tourism being the main business. (Mind you getting money out is difficult with no atm!) Its got a nice main square, and a outwardly impressive cathedral, and a priest who blesses cars and trucks twice daily! I watched one car being decorated with flowers, and then the priest came out to bless it and sprinkle holy water on. Once he´d gone an old lady (shaman?) came out to repeat the process with smoke from a little brazier being wafted in and around the car.

Copacabana also has an awesome lookout from hill... once you´ve puffed your way to the top (altitude makes climbing hard work, with the lake being at 3800m), you get rewarded with a great view back over the town and bay, and out along the coast to isla del sol.

I decided to walk out the peninsula to get to isla del sol, rather than just catch the ferry. It was a lovely 4 walk along the main road (although with only a handful of cars passing its not really main!), past small villages with locals ploughing fields with cows, planting crops of potatoes and oca by hand, and working on trout hatcheries. And when I got to the end of the peninsula, I was rowed out to the island about 30min away, by a very healthy 72 y old local! (yeah I felt like I should be doing the rowing not vice versa!)

Isla del sol is according to Inca legend the birthplace of the sun, and accordingly it has a few remains of inca houses, terraces, temples and holy places. So I went poking round ruins, climbing in and out of maze like rooms. It looks almost mediterrean in many respects. Theres also a spectacular walk to get from the south to the north which goes along the ridges of the island and has awesome views of the islands hills, terraces, bays and the lake of course. And another route back which meanders along the coast through the various settlements. Anyway I really enjoyed my days walk, even if the sun did take its toll... little on the pink side now. And to finish off a relaxing ferry ride back to Copacabana.

Salkantay trek and Machu Pichu

Salkantay trek

I decided to go on a 4 day trek to reach Machu Picchu. Not the famous Inca Trail, as thats booked out months in advance, but the Salkantay trek. This trek takes you close to Mt Salkantay (peak of over 6000m), over a pass of 4600m before decending into the jungle and river valleys, and of course ending up in Aguas Caliente for a morning hike up to Peru`s most famous ruins.

It was a great walk, covering very different terrain... from snow capped peaks strewn with large boulders (presumeably from previous glaciers), to lush river valleys. We had horses to carry some of our stuff and the camping gear, two guides and a cook to look after our food (not bad), but facilities were basic - a distinct lack of toilets along the way, and tents that weren`t all that waterproof... luckily it didnt rain for long! Luckily too, it was a great group of people from all around the world - enthusiastic and friendly. Our guide told us the trek is about twice the length of the inca trail, and passes a higher peak... I`d still love to do the inca trail sometime, but can heartily recommend this one as an alternative. Did I mention we visited beatiful hotsprings, the bus almost backed off the side of the road/cliff trying to make room for traffic coming the other way, we rode in a basket suspended by wire across a river, and we all thoroughly enjoyed a hot shower at the end of the trek!

Machu Picchu

Since we`d walked almost everywhere else, we got up at the crazy hour of 4 to start to hike up to the ruins, which opened with the first busloads at 6am. At that hour it was a bit mysterious, with low clouds drifting across, obscuring the ruins in parts. We had a guided tour taking in the main temples, and were then let loose. Its pretty amazing the extent of the ruins and their condition... and there`s surely more hiding under some of the tree cover. Pity most of the things found here are in a Yale University museum in the US. But gotta love the llamas roaming round and apparently admiring the view!

Having climbed several steps and mountains over the last few days we figured whats one more, and headed up Waynu Picchu, the mountain overlooking Machu Picchu that only 400 people a day are allowed to climb. The view was great - the clouds cleared so that they just drifted across, and we could see down to the valley where we had walked around the previous day. From here I took a mysterious path with steps hugging the rockface and ladders in parts down to some caves and temples, which was nice and peaceful with only a few visitors... mind you the hike back up all the steps was a real killer!

Back to the main ruins, I wandered round exploring, tuning into tour guides to pick up more info along the way. Theres still a lot of theories about the place and its use, so its hardly surprising that to the untrained eye you just see house after house or more accurately walls, doorways and windows! Still, get to the top area, sit down and you cant help but admire the picture postcard view of the city and surrounding mountains.

Back down the mountain, and we caught my first Peruvian train to Ollyantambo and then bus back to Cusco.

Cusco and the Sacred Valley

I arrived in Cusco to find it full of Gringos, and also full of markets, restaurants, travel agents and photo/internet shops... yes tourism is big here. Yet its actually quite a pleasant place, with a lovely central square, cathedral, some streets lined with incan stone work and heaps of good cafes (with book exchanges - yay!). Its also a perfect base for exploring the nearby ruins, and taking a trek to Machu Pichu.

The city was originally the Incan Capital, and its main temple was reported to have gold plated walls and gardens of Golden plants and animals. But the spanish arrived, and set about wiping out traces of the locals... cathedrals built over palaces, churches built over temples, stone walls converted to bases for colonial houses. Still theres no mistaking the superior stonework that has withstood earthquakes while colonial buildings have collapsed and had to be rebuilt.

I went on a days tour of the sacred valley to check out some of the incan ruins. There are some quite impressive complexes with stone terraces for growing crops, storehouses, houses and temples. Quite often they are perched on mountain sides, with the lower towns being converted into spanish towns. I found the terraces quite intriquing, and the temples rather bare... there is only stonework remaining and no intricate carved decorations (unlike central american ruins) or painting evident. Its thought they were well decorated with textiles but none remain of course. So its really admiring the stonework that fits together snuggly like a giant jigsaw puzzle.

I also took a local bus out to see some ruins within walking distance of Cusco, and spent a day leisurely walking and visiting the 5 or so ruins on the way back. Of these, one was for a water spring, another thought to be a guardhouse on the road, another a sacred cave in a hillside dedicated to the moon, a temple of unusual shaped rocks, and finally a fort with a very impressive zig zagging wall. The incans had the sense to bury/hide some of these to protect them from the spanish!