Lake Titicaca spans the border between Peru and Bolivia and is "the world's highest navigable lake". But despite the rather specific title, this large, deep blue, beautiful natural wonder doesn't need to be stretching for it's accolades.
From Puno, a town of about 180,000 people, we set off by boat to visit three of the lake's islands and Copacabana (our first stop in Bolivia).
Our first destination was Uros, a collection of man-made islands that float on the water's surface. They're made primarily by chaining together mounds of the reed grass that grow in the lake, and then piling on layers of dried reed until the island is sturdy enough to support 10-20 families, their homes (made out of reed), and their meeting areas. The lavatories sit on separate islands, which serves as a good incentive for young lads and lasses from Uros to learn to row fast (on reed boats, of course). Uros sounds like an idyllic paradise, but the altitude and the lake bring rather cold, unparadise-like temperatures.
Our next stop was Tacquille, a much larger island with great scenery and a community whose men knit their own hats. These hats carry a special significance, as married men wear hats with a different color scheme than their single counterparts, and a prospective groom must make a hat with a tight enough knit that it can hold water to win his would-be father-in-law's approval.
The next day, we crossed the (entirely unprotected) border into Bolivia. We headed first to Copacabana, a pretty little town whose claim to fame is a cathedral that houses a statue of a dark-skinned Virgin Mary. Peruvians and Bolivians alike make pilgrimages from far away to pay homage to the Madonna.
From Copacabana, we caught another boat to visit Isla del Sol (Sun Island), the purported origin of the Inca culture. The island houses a small garden of native plants, a museum of Incan and pre-Incan artifacts found on the island, and a shaman who performed a short Aymara ritual blessing for us.
From Isla del Sol, we could see the Bolivian Andes on the far shore. Even though we were at 4000m ourselves, those peaks (especially Illampu at 6000+ meters) towered above us.
When we landed on shore around sunset, we took a bus to La Paz, the jumping off point for the final sights of our trip: the pre-Incan ruins of Tiwanaku, and the great salt dessert of Uyuni.
We arrived in La Paz just in time to catch the end of one of their biggest folkloric (carmivale-like) parades, put on by the university students.
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