Lake Titicaca

D'oh! I deliberately waited around La Paz on our last day just so that we could have lunch at an Indian restaurant that was supposed to open at midday. But of course, come the appointed hour the place was all locked up. We hung around for 45 minutes in a nearby cafe, but still no sign of life. I was really disappointed as Sarah had eaten there once while I was feeling a tad dicky, so I'd only tasted her leftovers, but it was great to taste a good Indian after so long and I was really looking forward to a big proper meal there now that I was feeling tip-top again. The good Chinese place also wasn't open for lunch, so we despondently headed to an Arabic place and had a fairly good feed there instead, but it just wasn't the same...

After the disappointing lunch we grabbed our rucksacks and crammed into a local minibus to the main La Paz cementery from where local buses departed for Lake Titicaca. It was easy-peasy to organise again, just popping into the office to pay our couple of quid for the next bus, and then I walked around the interesting cementery while waiting the 45 minutes for the bus to depart. Yet again we left right on time, and arrived pretty much on time too, and the comfortable journey was through beautiful Bolivian landscapes.

We arrived at Copacabana on the shores of the lake just as it got dark, around 6pm. As we strolled toward a guidebook-recommended place we popped into a nice looking place just off the main square (Residential Sucre), and were very pleasantly surprised at the cheap price he offered us. So after a wee bit of further haggling (Sarah's certainly getting better), we took a lovely ensuite room and settled in.

The town is well known as a stopping off point between Peru and Bolivia, and a great place for trips to a couple of the islands on the huge lake. We spent 3 nights there, the first day just hiking up a couple of the hills that overlook the town and lake, and generally just wandering about soaking up the lovely weather, views of the lake and the charming town. The weather has continued to be fantastic in general, lovely and warm with clear blue skies during the day, and just a tad chilly in the evenings, but the town is lovely with loads of nice cafes and the like, so it was easy to relax. As usual we ate really well in the best restaurants we could find, fresh trout from the Lake being the speciality here of course.

So on our second day we did the obligitory island trip, just strolling down to the harbour at 8:30 and hopping on a small boat for the trip to Isla del Sol. It's a slow boat trip of about 1:45 hours to the North of the island, and then you hike back to the South of the island to get the return boat to Copacabana.

We'd checked out of our room in the hostel, but left our rucksacks in storage, as we weren't sure if we'd overnight on the island or not - turned out we didn't bother. Arriving on the island we had to buy our visitors tickets and checked out the tiny little museum (all the explainations were only in Spanish though, which is quite common), and then just strolled off to check out the local Inca ruins at the start of the island trail (I think we were supposed to wait for the guide who was explaining stuff to everyone else from our boat (about 20 people), but he only spoke Spanish and so we hadn't a clue what he was on about, so I just decided to head off in the direction I thought the ruins were in). Luckily I did too, as after walking for about 20 minutes I looked back to see the big gang being corralled along the beach all following the guide, something I would have hated having to do, waiting for the slowest person, etc.

So we were well ahead of the game, and had the impressively situated ruins pretty much all to ourselves. It also meant we had peace and tranquillity along most of the hike down the length of the island too. Basically the trail follows along a high ridge giving great views of the Lake and the surrounding mountains on all sides, the ones on the left being dramatically snow-capped.

Here again I couldn't get over the shear 'blueness' of the Bolivian daytime skies. I don't know if it's the altitude (mostly being above 4,000 metres or so about sea level), or just the atmospherics, but the deep blueness of the skies here is just mesmerising to me (the only other place I remember such deep blueness is stepping off the plane in Malawi after we'd had two months of hazy skies in Kenya and Uganda). The blueness is reflected by the Lake too, giving it it's famously gorgeous sapphire appearance. As an aside, our first copy of the Footprints guidebook we picked up in Argentina had comments on various places scribbled in it by it's previous owner (obviously a young English guy). The usually dismissive, caustic comments had for Lake Titicaca: 'It's just a big lake - waste of time!'. I wonder if he'd make the same comment if he revisits the lake when he's a bit more mature in a few years to come, probably...

Anyway, along the trail we had the irritating obstacle of local people looking for more money to pass along sections of the trail. We'd been told by other tourists that you didn't have to pay them (the ticket you get when you arrive should cover the entire island), so the first ones we just walked past after trying to explain we already had tickets, and the second ones we just paid as they were more persistent. I now think though that they were both legitimate, as we saw signs at the port that reiterated what the locals were saying. Ah well, it was still very irritating - a single ticket really should cover the whole island as having people along the way hassle you for more money is just annoying.

As we were ahead of all the other people we arrived at the South end of the island quite early and so we just relaxed with a drink outside a lovely little cafe perched on the ridge just starring at the great views. As the boat departure time approached we strolled down the cool Inca stairway to the port and hopped on a boat back to the mainland (Sarah haggling very well again as we hadn't bothered to get return tickets (in case we stayed on the island), and the cheeky buggers were trying to overcharge for the return leg - Sarah actually managed to get the return leg cheaper than the first leg).

I had planned on hiring bikes the next day and riding the 17km along the shore of the Lake to a wee town for lunch and then riding back again, but Copacabana doesn't have an ATM and the bank only opens in the afternoon and so it's a tad awkward getting cash advances, and I hadn't gotten enough money out the first time. So I just decided to leave the cycling this time and just hop on a bus the next day to the town of Puno in Peru, also on the shores of the Lake.

The bus didn't leave until 13:30, so we had time to kill, and so we just sat in the lovely main plaza reading our books before getting lunch and then the bus. During this time a church procession took place in the church compound,with the usual firecrackers going off all the time. I think it was part of the car-and-truck-blessing ceremony they do here every day (all very strange), but I'm not sure - interesting to watch for a bit anyway.

So after a lunch of Pique a la Macho (one of the traditional dishes here that is just chips with sausage and beef in a mildly spicy sauce) we hopped on a lovely comfy Peruivan bus. I'd heard Peruivan buses were much better than Bolivians ones, and this first impression certainly confirmed that. Yet again the bus left right on time, and we finally left Bolivia after 5 great weeks.