Goodness gracious great balls of time. It’s been a hell of a little while has it not? Gona fly through this in Kerouac style choppy sloppy prose so forgive me if some of it doesn’t make sense.
Let’s hurry past the last couple days in and around Cusco. What I will say is that Rainbow Mountain and its neighbouring red valley are quite handsome. They are geological phenomena of odd colouration caused by mineral deposits and layered sedimentation over many a moon. Whole setup is located roughly three hours from the city; I say roughly because all sense of time folded up its clothes and set off for Benidorm during our visit. Despite the rocks and swooping range being quite marvellous from an aesthetic standpoint, we found the whole shabang slightly underwhelming on account of:
Being up at 3am
Sitting in a minivan for longer than legal
The hike up to 5000m being a slog
An absurd abundance of people at the top
Tough on the lungs and the buttcheeks and the soul. We move on.
Guinea Pig has the texture of duck but is far richer. It is a strange cuisine and not one I would rush back to, but you can’t go to Rome and not rub your nipples with Carbonara, or so the saying goes. Here's the poor little fella with a consolatory carrot.
Cusco was finally rid of us, but what a city. Our favourite to date. Anywho, these two pesky Brits are Puno bound. This is a big city kissing the brink of Lake Titicaca on the Peruvian side. The metropolis itself is fine — dusty and busy and loud and stimulating enough, but it’s the big body of water that really draws us in.
We arrive at 5am and nap in a garish room until we’ve enough energy to rent kayaks and work our way to the Uros community. This is a remarkable area consisting of 50+ manmade islands, each formed on a sturdy base of the ‘totoro’ reed and each home to 10-or-so families max. They were first fashioned by pre-Incans, those who fled from Bolivia to Peru in liberation from mining slavery. We meet with an older local woman named Savinah who puts on an informative performance in the form of mime, indicating how the islands are built out, secured and maintained. Get this, right: if you and the family in the straw hut next to you have a falling out you just saw the island between you and wave passive aggressively at dear Mildred as she floats off to some other spot.
Lake Titicaca has some medals in its damp little trophy cabinet.
Largest lake in South America.
Highest navigable lake in the world (almost 4000m).
Nicest big lake we’ve seen on our trip.
And some brief corresponding commentary:
Not surprised. Makes no sense to me how big it is. Was convinced at least 5 hours a day that this is all an elaborate ruse and that it is in fact the sea but no. I swear to you, Bolivia is landlocked. Look at some of the photos that follow and tell me honestly that you can fathom Bolivia is landlocked. I know we're still technically in Peru right now but we're about to be in Bolivia and somehow it is genuinely 'landlocked'.
As a result the kayaking was hard and so too were ascents of vistas. Alas, we are grown human beings and have grown accustomed to a little less oxygen of late.
A very important award. Upon receiving it, the Lake released a comment via its press secretary saying merely “gulp”.
Anyway we only spend a day in Puno and most of it is out there in that kooky community. An hour passes in the city’s main square, during which a mysterious cannon noise recurs as we watch the Pigeons of Puno perching on the police precinct and doing many shits.
I discover that beatboxing effectively is challenging at high altitude. Georgie comes out the freezing shower looking like a ghoul. These are unrelated.
The thing about spending two plus weeks at over 3000m is that your lips are constantly chapped and your mouth is constantly dry and there’s fuck all you can do about it.
I want to get serious for a hot minute and talk about Cholitas. Very many native women of Peru and of Bolivia adhere to a ubiquitous, traditional dress code. They wear polleras — wide, layered skirts that indicate child-bearing hips. Strength and bulk are the big hitting qualities in Cholitas, and you rarely see one without a big aguayo — colourful cloth containing any number of goods fastened near their neck. Whether it’s hordes of dry, polystyrene-like pork scratchings or a human child, they carry and they carry with grace. They also have long flowing dark hair that slopes out from beneath their bowler hats. It is, for all intents and purposes, an absolute vibe. Cholitas are the beating heart of these societies, the powerplayers of daily to-ing and fro-ing, bringing a timeless class to the spaces they occupy.
Over this period of a few weeks I note wrinkles in people’s faces. These creases are tapestries; they hold stories and tales of lives led in lofty sunlight. Their mouths are missing teeth, be it from the sweetness of their tea or lack of dental infrastructure.
From Puno we head to Copacabana. New country. Proper noice.
Just a few things to mention here:
Saw a Monk blessing new cars that people bring to the front of the sanctuary.
Tried to get my limited swede around the fact Bolivia is landlocked.
Ate well decent steak and tatties for like 70 pence.
Really really good crusty bread, too. Nice work Boliv.
Then it’s Isla del Sol for a few days of unrivalled tranquillity. I write, we read, we eat, we watch the hot sun turn to cold dusky blue, and then the stars come out to play. Not a single mode of motorised transport on that island, just Cholitas and farmers and donkeys and sheep. Among the slap-dash residences are guesthouses and restaurants serving fresh trout. The views from everywhere are special. Lean on these photos for a better sense.
En route from Copacabana to La Paz we cross the lake at San Diablo De Tiquina. For fifteen minutes we’re on a bus moving backwards across water so what Jesus did was actually fairly mediocre. Later in the journey, the fringes of the lake resemble marshland, a swell home to languid flamingoes. As we enter the city limits we see hanging dummies — stuffed scarecrow-like figurines on telephone poles — a vigilante threat of punishment to robbers and the likes.
La Paz is bloody high n all. As a city it’s what happens when you give a frenzied child half a million terracotta Lego bricks. We spy the unfathomable sprawl from the series of cable cars that hover over the city. El Alto is especially frenetic, with market streets so ripe with life that a single additional hawker might throw out the equilibrium.
There’s an English pub in La Paz. Proper wooden interior. Quite naturally, we spend three hours there eating pie, drinking beer, watching the footy and tittering as the heavens fittingly open.
There’s also a proper nice spot called Bolivian Popular Food where you can get three delicious courses of local produce prepared fancifully for a tenner.
Absolute hotchpotch of a blog entry this.
I guess all there is to say by way of disclaimer is that all the little minutes and moments and memories that fill the gaps between the coverage are as rich and remarkable as the coverage itself, which is itself to say that no quality of travel writing can capture the full richness of travel.
We cycled Death Road. It’s actually called Yungas Road but this 60+km stretch was once a major vein connecting the capital with some of its most significant rural hinterlands, and being the only such route available for a long time, and being as it is a narrow, snaking road with sheer drops in dizzying numbers, well, it witnessed a very grave number of casualties. Nowadays it’s mostly people on two wheels hurtling down it, because the government built an alternative, wider, safer route for vehicles lower in the pass.
The cycle was exhilarating and tiring. An initial smooth stint down a tarmac road summoned giddying speed and unbelievable views, but you’ve gotta stay focused. Later, once the fog lifted, we descended and thrived and survived, with the harshest ailment being the incessant vibrations through our hands and knees. Honestly it sent my pinkies into some strange orbit around the handlebars. We had a small group helmed by a brilliant, charismatic guide, Victor, who we later spoke to about a whole host of Bolivian oddities...
...Witches are a big thing here, still, for example. The supernatural is tied to the ancient and enduring belief in Pachamama — mother nature. He told us a tale of when his mother got sick and they consulted a witch doctor and the witch doctor said “Pachamama needs an orange puppy”, but they couldn’t find one. Pretty frequently, Pachamama will request a male be given to maintain the natural order; this may go some way to explaining the abundance of missing persons posters around the city. A major ‘attraction’ in La Paz is the Witches Market; these stalls sell deceased llama and alpacas, foetuses (all of which, we’re told, died naturally), plus an impossible array of ointments and remedies and wood chippings to create sacrificial fires and…well…you get the idea. Quite alien to see fresh out the familiar English Pub.
Anyway, I’m Samuel. Out here it’s pronounced Samwell. Hope you’re well. Thanks for reading this. There will be another one at some point. We have been to the Amazon and all sorts. How fantastic.
Great read. Pictures are stunning too 🙌🏻