Lake Titicaca - the Peruvian side

The next day we woke up at 6am (yes, that equals four hours of sleep, and yes this was vacation) to hop on a bus to Puno. Puno is on the shores of Titicaca and about a 7 hour drive from Cusco, winding through the high Pampas region. The scenery was incredible despite a somewhat obnoxious tour guide and we got to stop at some interesting sites along the way.

These are live sheep riding on top of a van. Saw it multiple times.

The next day, we spent on a boat out on Lake Titicaca. Lake Titicaca is at about 12,000 feet and is the highest navigable lake in the world. The weather was beautiful, though chilly in the mornings because of the high elevation.

Puno city

Our first stop was the Uros floating islands. Way back when the Spanish came, they were trying to enslave the locals. Some of them took off in their boats made of reeds and began living on their boats to escape the Spanish. Eventually they discovered that they could create floating islands made of the reeds that grow in the lake, and began creating and living on these islands. Today it is fairly overly-touristy but it was still incredible to see the way that these people had been living for 500 years.

Our next stop was the Island of Taquile which is known for its amazing textiles. We got to walk across the island, visit the textile market, and eat lunch with a great view.

We had heard Puno was a boring/ dirty town but actually found it to be quite agreeable. Decent $2 local meals, great $12 tourist food, and fairly lively and safe feeling. The boys ordered Cuy our second night there. Cuy is a Peruvian delicacy also known as guinea pig. Ashley and I each tried a bite and all agreed it was fine but somewhat like chicken wings....greasy and boney. But hey, now we had all tried both guinea pig and alpaca.