Islands in the (Peruvian) sun

3–4 June 2013

Sadly, it was time to leave Cusco (and Jack's cafe!) and make our way to La Paz via Puno and some floating islands.

The scenery on the way to Puno was mostly sparse and uninspiring. It looked very dry, arid and desolate, with brown fields as far as you could see. In the distance were the occasional snow-capped mountain and glacier, and from time to time we passed through a small, simple village or farming area. But that and the occasional bush, tree or patch of brown grass was as exciting as it got. It was a bit like driving through the outback here, but with more mountains.

Puno itself is a smallish town, with about 200,000 residents. A lot of the buildings look incomplete, with work being done over what seems to be the long, long-term. The architecture isn’t particularly special, decorative or old. Quite ordinary in comparison with the other towns we’ve visited. Puno has a main square with an imposing cathedral, and a large, but not very long, main street with restaurants and shops. Its market has separate rows for fish, beef, cheese, chicken, vegetables, fruit – and potatoes! Like I said before, Peruvians love their potatoes.

Here’s a useless fact for my Irish readers: you can dry potatoes and they’ll last for 10 years or more! They go hard like rocks. Leave them out in the icy winter to keep, then just soak or boil them to rehydrate them. You’ll thank me come the next potato famine.

Surprisingly, we ran into one of the guys from our Lares trek in Puno (I guess most people take a similar route around the area). He’d arrived earlier in the day and was also out exploring.

We ditched the tour group for dinner and spent a quiet night in our hotel room, with bad TV, fried cheese, salad and pizza… and whisky (I’d had my daily Pisco earlier – an interesting mulled wine version). We must be getting old!

After a sumptuous breakfast spread the next morning, we caught tuk tuks to the pier, where we bought some food and toys for the families we were staying with overnight, and got on the boat that took us around the local islands. It was a gorgeous day – sunny and clear and not too warm or cold (even though it had apparently got down to 3 degrees celcius overnight). We sat outside for a lot of the trip, on the roof or out the back of the boat, enjoying the fresh air, view and sunshine.

First stop was one of the floating islands. These islands are manmade, cut from peat and covered in three metres of water reeds/rushes. They are very spongy to walk on – a bit like a trampoline or water bed – and tiny, only around 30 metres by 30 metres. You’d want to get on well with your neighbours! When new ‘land’ is needed, the islanders cut more peat from nearby land and move it to make another island.

The islands are surrounded by water reeds, which are the life blood of the island. Everything is built from them, including the ground, buildings, boats, mats, seats and souvenirs to sell. The islanders even pick and peel the roots of the reeds that grow in the water around their islands and eat the tubers like a banana. We didn’t want to sample any though, considering the water quality probably isn’t top notch because they use it as a toilet and garbage bin. However, some of our tour group were a little more adventurous than us (and survived)! Our guide told us that the reeds filter the water, so the locals can use it for drinking and cooking, despite also using it as a toilet. We weren’t convinced.

Four to five families live on each island, in little huts also made from the water reeds. Despite being so basic, surprisingly the huts had solar panels! But I guess they’re not exactly connected to mains electricity.

Sadly, the island was very quiet that day because most of the families were on the mainland burying a two-year-old girl who had lived on the island and drowned the day before. Apparently it happens sometimes, when the adults aren’t watching the children closely enough. The children usually know how to swim by the time they reach five or six years of age, but that wasn’t soon enough for that little girl.

In addition to the dubious looking weed, islanders eat whatever they can catch from the islands (mostly ducks and fish) or barter for on the mainland (rice, potatoes and other essentials). I imagine it’s a very limited and confined life on such small islands, especially for women. On Saturdays, the women go into town to the markets, but that’s it. The rest of their time is spent on their island. I can’t imagine how uncomfortable it must be in winter. The huts didn’t exactly look weatherproof.

The women and children there had a few stalls set up with various handmade items, including mobiles, pottery, cushion covers, jewellery and other souvenir type things. We bought some little bits of pottery, some pendants and a small rainmaker with the Peruvian trilogy on it (snake, puma and condor). I didn’t barter like I normally would. It didn’t feel right.

Next stop was Taquile, a ‘proper’ island two hours away on our boat. After a very slow, steep climb, we reached the small main town and visited its market, before having lunch in a garden restaurant, which had spectacular views of the lake’s shoreline, the water (a lake that is so big you think it’s the sea), and the Bolivian mountains and glaciers far across the water. We actually thought the glaciers were clouds, because they seemed to float in the sky and were an exquisite, pure white.

Over lunch, our guide told us about the local customs, mostly about relationships and marriage (I guess not a lot else happens around there!). People meet their partners at school or at unchaperoned dances. Courtship is a little aggressive, with boys throwing stones at the girls they fancy or shining torches/lights/flashing mirrors in their faces, as you do. If the girl flashes a mirror or light back, the guy is in luck.

Couples live together for two or three years before getting married (try before you buy!). After the two or three years, the girl cuts off her hair and they both weave it into a belt for the man to wear. He wears it for the rest of his life (and hopefully he washes it from time to time). Then they get wed.

Weddings last for three days and three nights, during which the couple sits apart on opposite sides of the room, looking solemn, to show their patience, while everyone else parties hard.

It’s a very communal/community driven town. The town gathers together to help build the newly married couple’s new home, on land their families gave them when they got married. In turn, the couple will help another young couple build their home later.

There is no divorce here. It’s shameful. As is cheating. (Let’s hope you don’t marry an abusive, cheating, gambling, drug-using drunk!) If you’re caught doing anything unwholesome, you’re kicked out of the community. Your standing in the community is everything, and the threat of ostracism is usually enough to keep people in line. There’s no crime here, no police or judges. People know everyone else and what’s going on and are quick to tell you to toe the line.

Incidentally, single people are viewed as ‘worthless’. You only have any standing in the community if you are married. And only married people and young children can attend normal town functions. Unmarried people and teenagers have their own functions, to encourage them to hook up with someone.

Also, interestingly, boys learn to sew and weave from five years of age, and make themselves a half red, half white hat. This means they’re single. When they get married, they make themselves a red hat. If they have a black hat, they are a town leader. Men do all of their family’s weaving, knitting and embroidery, making all the beautiful shirts, skirts, blouses, hats and vests the locals wear. They’re highly skilled artisans.

We spent the night on the next island, Amantani. After winning a dusk soccer game against the local boys, our tour group was led to the town hall, where we met our host families. Chris’ and my host family was Christiano (maybe around 45 years old) and his wife (whose name I didn’t catch). Then the Peruvians dressed us up in traditional garb – I was fitted out in a fetching heavy, layered, green wool skirt, pretty embroidered white blouse, belt and head scarf, while Chris wore a poncho and beanie with ear flaps. A local band played traditional music, while the people waved flags around in a tribute to Pacha Mama and Pacha Papa, and swung us quickly, almost violently, around the room in different traditional dances. As our photos later showed, it was all a bit of a colourful blur.

Christiano’s house was up a bit of a hill and quite large, with several outbuildings built around a central courtyard, in which they stored vegetables and labouring equipment. This style reminded me of buildings I’d seen in Europe and Africa – protecting residents and belongings against the elements and forming a central meeting and working place for the family. Our room was clean and tidy, and had electricity. It was dark by the time we got into our room, but in the morning light, we could properly appreciate the beautiful landscape and view: past the surrounding rocky fields filled with llamas, sheep, other livestock and the odd scraggy tree, the windy old stone fences and little cottages (again, very European), all the way down to the water, sparkling in the sunlight, and the breathtaking Bolivian mountains and glaciers far in the distance.

The toilet and washing area was down near the vegetable garden and kitchen, towards the back of the property. The kitchen was quite dark but clean and simple, with a wooden bench table and seats, an old wooden dresser for crockery, a radio, a gas cylinder and cooker, and a little wood stove in a little nook. The building, including the floor, was entirely concrete (as were all the buildings there). The lady had dressed up the room a little, with pretty curtains, a tablecloth and cloth on the seats.

We offered to help Christiano’s wife cook tea, but he dismissed us with a laugh, and we sat a little awkwardly at the dinner table, trying to communicate in what little common language we shared. I’m presuming it’s a cultural/manners-related thing, but she ate in the kitchen nook next to the fire, and he came back in to eat after we’d finished. It was a little odd, for us at least.

The food during our homestay was simple but delicious (and apparently all of the host families had fed their respective guests from our tour group the same thing – the host families are trained to look after us tourists, including how to cook and basic English). For dinner, we had soup and bread, carrot, potato and tomato stew and rice, and muna (mint) tea. Breakfast was pancakes, jam, bread and muna tea. Lunch was quinoa and vegetable soup, two types of potato, tomato, cucumber and fried cheese, and muna. We certainly didn’t go hungry, although I’m not sure we’ll opt for the potato option off a menu anytime soon!

Despite the cold (and wearing all our clothes), we slept well and long. We helped pod mountains of dried broad beans (Chris’ favourite!), sitting in the courtyard on stools, under the clear blue morning sky and warm sunlight. The lady showed us where they dry all of the vegetables. She had loads of beans, peas, corn and potatoes out drying on tarps on the ground and roof, and some already prepared and stored inside the outbuildings.

We explored the landscape, winding our way down the hill through the dry, dusty fields to the shoreline. We met stunted sheep that only came to our knees, chatty donkeys, and smiley fishermen and farmers. We followed the shoreline along for a couple of kilometres to the port, and sat for about an hour on a large boulder, watching the waves splash the rocks below us and the water ebb in and out with the tide, the ducks and seagulls floating along with it. A little sparrow-like bird flitted around near us. It was hard to remember that it was actually a lake and not the sea. You seriously can’t see the other side of it.

Our homestay couple saw us off at the port – the lady walking us down to the boat and Christiano coming over on a break from work to hug and kiss us and shake our hands farewell. It was very sweet.

Back in the big smoke, we explored Puno’s bars and restaurants, indulging in cocktails, Pisco sours, wine, nachos, and pizza and salad. Then some more cocktails (dessert ones, of course) and an early night in preparation for our eight-hour bus trip to La Paz, leaving our hotel at 6.50am. (Have I mentioned that sleeping in is so overrated?)

Come home with me, Senorita! (Finding love in Cusco)

31 May–2 June 2013

Some well-deserved – and well-needed – R&R was in order, and Cusco is the perfect place in which to do it. It’s a largeish town, very pretty, with lots of beautiful old Spanish colonial-style buildings and town squares, and is surrounded by mountains. Its food, architecture, fashion and daily life is a good blend of traditional Peruvian and Western/European culture.

Cusco reminds me a little of Quito, with its architecture, landscapes and little cobbled back streets. Also like Quito, Cusco is quite high up altitude-wise, so you have to take it relatively easily walking around or you become puffed and dizzy. But it’s the kind of place you don’t want to rush around anyway.

We had a few days of free time away from our tour group, and could do whatever we wanted. We chose to:

• not wake up to alarms
• sleep a lot
• eat and drink a lot, mostly at Jack’s – it’s a local institution: we saw people from our tour and Lares trek there every time!
• sightsee a little (the usual churches, galleries, monuments, shops)
• shop a little (well, shop a lot)
• people watch in the main town square (while we ate and drank some more)
• drink delicious cocktails, beer and whisky, and eat tasty tapas, in a cosy Australian-owned bar (Los Perreros?) that reminded us of one we’d find in Brunswick – chilled lounge music, couches and all
• eat chocolate and drink whisky in the comfort of our bed
• watch US crime and spy dramas, the only English language shows on telly (while we ate chocolate and drank whisky in bed)
• visit markets
• post our (my) shopping home (which was surprisingly easy!) – and say a prayer that it would make it (it did – about two months after we got home!)
• get massages (good ones this time!)
• watch military and uniformed groups, and kids in fancy dress, parade around the main square for the Corpus Christi festival
• play Connect Four in a Mexican restaurant/bar, with fires burning, music playing and red Chilean wine flowing (and me kicking Chris’ butt)
• make friends with local cats
• recover from our respective colds.

Our days started with a mid to late morning breakfast at Jack’s – usually an egg and veggie combination; sometimes porridge or burritos and salad; and always fresh juices, delicious lime/lemon, honey and ginger tea, and what Chris tells me was very good coffee. We’d chat with people from our tour and trek who were always there at the same time, read the paper or a book, and maybe write a little. (Hot tip: get there late morning and you probably won’t have to queue.)

After breakfast, we’d walk around to settle our food and explore, before eating and drinking some more.

There are four churches in the main square, Plaza de Armas. Three of the churches are connected, one of these being the quite impressive cathedral. Due to the Corpus Christi carnival (a big, religious shindig that goes for a week), there were a lot of religious effigies being carted around and displayed in Cusco. The cathedral was full of them. Around the effigies, the locals had put mountains of flowers and other decorations. If you could ignore the statues’ odd sizes, slightly creepy facial expressions and beady eyes that followed you (us heathens) around the cathedral, it was almost festive.

The churches were built on top of Incan ceremonial sites/temples and monuments (of course), to blend Incan and Spanish religion. The architecture was meant to be a blend of Inca and Spanish design as well, but we couldn’t see anything about them that looked Incan. They looked very similar to the other South American churches we’d visited: with more than one scary-looking Jesus bleeding left, right and centre; blingy Marys looking down at us angelically; weird cherubic heads being stood on by old men in robes; and lots of antique artwork, gold leaf and wood carvings. I guess it’s the same in Europe – the churches (as pretty as they are) start to blend into one after you’ve seen, well, more than one.

Steven, the older man from our tour, told us there was a surprisingly unassuming wooden cross in one of the churches that Pizarro carried with him on all of his travels. We think we saw it in the Company of Jesus church, but weren’t sure. (We couldn’t get an audio guide because of the festival, or closing times or something.)

We visited the Inca Museum and Museum of Pre-Columbian Art. They were both quite good, and featured historical art and artefacts dating from around 1500 BC to 1500 AD. The Inca Museum has a much broader and more general display than the art museum, and was more interesting than the art museum, even though the quality of its displays isn’t as good. The art museum has high-quality, well-preserved displays of pottery, silver, gold and woodwork in a nice environment, but terribly cheesy and pompous descriptions that we stopped reading after a few minutes.

Shopping in Cusco is very good – with a range of proper silver and goldsmiths and their (expensive) shops, wool mills and their (expensive) shops, pottery makers and their (expensive) shops, and (relatively inexpensive) markets. There are also general clothing, shoe and souvenir shops. We bought some locally made jumpers, boots, sandals, herbal medicine and tshirts – and posted a big box of stuff home, because there was no way everything was going to fit in our backpacks!

While we were out shopping, I befriended some of the more furry of the locals (as I tend to do). At the market, I met a particularly affectionate tabby with a very large, cartoon-like angular head. He pushed his way up onto my lap when I bent down to pat him, then gave me head butt kisses and snuggled into my arm pit, where he drooled away happily as I scratched his ear. I stood up and this little guy held on to me, paws stretched around my arm and nuzzled in in a big hug. He didn’t want to let go of me. So very cute.

I also became attached to a rather gorgeous, chilled out, calico cat called Senorita, who lives in a dark and dingy rug/poncho/blanket shop among all the posh restaurants and clothing stores in the main square. We went back several times to pat her. The owners, who proudly display behind the counter a picture of their elderly mother with Mick Jagger, invited us in to pat Senorita each time, without trying to sell us anything (quite refreshing really!). Said elderly mother sat quietly in a chair next to door, a blanket over her knees and white Maltese terrier on top. Of course, because they were so lovely, we felt like we should buy something, but couldn’t see anything we wanted (other than the cat of course, but she wasn’t for sale). Incidentally, Senorita’s fur seemed to coat all of the rugs/ponchos/blankets for sale, probably because she lounged wherever she liked.

We could have done more sightseeing in Cusco, and there was more to see, but what we did was perfect. We felt much better for these few days’ rest, getting on top of our colds, catching up on sleep, and being well fed and watered. We felt a little more human, back to our relatively normal selves and ready to tackle the final leg of our Peruvian tour.

Machu Picchu

30 May 2013

The rude start to the day with alarms at 4.45am, breakfast at 5.30am, and bus to the ruins at 6am was worth it for the sunrise over the centuries-old ruins atop a mountain in the middle of a Peruvian jungle.

Understandably, we were extremely, bone-achingly, mind-numbingly, stomach-churningly knackered after the hike. (I had to try very hard not to vomit on the bus ride up the mountain. Although that may have had more to do with the fact it was a very windy, one-way road, without railings, upon which two big luxury buses had to pass each other as one went up and the other down.) Our exhaustion made fully enjoying the experience – taking in the stunning views and all of the guide’s information – a little difficult. But we did our best!

We started with the traditional photos of us on the rock jutting out over the side of the mountain, with the ruins in the background. Then we watched the sun rise over the mountains, with shards of light shining down onto the remains of temples, homes and businesses below.

The members of our tour group who had trekked the real Incan trail, which ended right then at that point on the mountainside, joined us. They didn’t look too bad considering their efforts, although apparently two of the English girls had been very sick along the way. Their route was longer than ours, although it didn’t climb as high (and our guides assured us ours was harder!).

A local guide took us around to the various points of Machu Picchu interest for two hours, regaling us with tales about the area’s history, right back to the Ice Age, plus how the Incas came to live here, and how they lived here.

The Incas originally moved inland to escape natural disasters and the threat (and reality) of invasion. However, they didn’t have the adventurous, explorer instinct that the Europeans did. They had all they needed to survive here in the highlands, and were happy to live here quietly. They had no currency, but used minerals (gold, silver, quartz, copper) for exchanges as needed. Their justice was swift and deadly – people who did bad things were killed, and the whole community had to bear witness so people learned to be upstanding citizens.

Apparently they lived in quite an egalitarian society, where everything was merit based. Regardless of your age, gender, social status or family, if you were smart enough and could do the job you aspired to, you could be and do anything you wanted to. And each role was seen as equally important – from farmer and labourer to astronomer, leader and priest. Although the rich or powerful people, the ‘thinkers’, lived at the top of the mountain, and the ‘workers’ lived at the bottom. But that may have been more for practicality's sake, as they lived near where they worked. 

The Incan people were very intelligent and resourceful. They knew the Earth was round, and created a calendar based on the sun that will be accurate for the next 1500 years. They knew about equinoxes and solstices, and understood about the angle of the Earth’s axis. They also followed the stars and constellations, replicating them in their temples and other structures. 

Machu Picchu itself was built from granite on top of a very, very big mountain. The Incas levelled the mountain top first, gathering stone from that mountain and surrounding areas for buildings, and then terraced its sides. There were no gardens as such, other than for fruit and vegetables, because the people were surrounded by nature, by the jungle. Unlike us now, where we have to build gardens and parks to feel close to nature.

The Incas designed and built buildings that have survived countless earthquakes, and their irrigation and drainage systems still work today. Like buildings we’ve seen in other parts of Peru, Machu Picchu architecture features special gaps and windows in walls, certain sized rocks used in certain places, special materials (different sand and gravel) compacted to provide stable ground for buildings, and foundations that go particular depths into the ground – all to provide stability and absorb tremors to successfully stop buildings collapsing during earthquakes. Buildings were also created with natural ventilation to preserve food and create a hospitable environment for those living inside, and on certain angles to protect them against bad weather. Eight to 10 people lived in each house, and there were about 100 houses at Machu Picchu. Priests and astronomers lived alone.

They were truly ahead of their (and our) time with their knowledge. Researchers have come from around the world to study their designs and structures, and to try to replicate them.

The Incas were relatively peaceful people, so the Spanish had no problem invading and imposing their beliefs on them. One of the Spanish beliefs was that women were second-class citizens. The Spanish tortured and burned alive any educated Incan woman – leaders, astronomers, architects, engineers, healers and priests, all gone. And along with them, all of their knowledge – and Incan society’s equality. Thankfully, the Incas were able to protect Machu Picchu, hiding it from the Spanish by leading them on random hikes on trails through the mountains and often ‘losing’ them along the way. But other townships were not so lucky.

The direct, full-blooded descendants of the original Incas live very remotely, one month’s hike further up in the mountains in relative isolation. Anthropologists find it really difficult to find them, so have relied mostly upon Spanish chronicles (which aren’t all that reliable and are pretty biased) to trace and retell the Inca’s history. That and they guess it from what they’ve found among the ruins.

Archaeologists are also still discovering new parts of Machu Picchu and new information about the Incas. In 2012 they found another Inca trail leading to a sun gate they found 20 years ago.

Chris and I spent a couple of hours battling among the hordes of other tourists walking around the ruins, up and down and around the mountainside. The views, like elsewhere, were stunning, with beautiful sheer, rugged mountains circling and forming the valleys, huge lumps of rocks and land covered with jungle, and deep crevices in the mountains through which rivers flowed. Clouds smothered the mountain tops, drifting down into the valley, with tufts of jungle poking out. A cloud forest. A city in the clouds. Without all of the tourists, it would have been quite a spiritual and peaceful place. You did feel like you were closer to God, or to nature at least.

At midday, we hopped back on the bus to town and met our group in a restaurant for lunch, where we all ate and drank and rested well for a couple of hours. We got the train back to Ollayantambo (I slept the whole way), and the bus from there to Cusco (the train lines were blocked). Thankfully, we managed to somehow get a better (less smelly!) hotel room than last time. And after a shower and rest, our first port of call was… Jack’s for dinner, of course! Simple food, but delicious.

Even though we were so exhausted at Machu Picchu, it was truly special to visit and see how beautiful it is, and how the Incas lived in relative peace. We forget how important it is to live with nature, to be close to it. We search for so much in material goods and each other, when all we need to do is spend some time with our heads in the clouds and our feet in the sand/sea/soil/grass, to find what we need to be happy.