Lake Titicaca and Bolivia

My last stop in Peru was Amantani Island on Lake Titicaca. Stayed overnight with a local indigenous family. Great vegetarian food in cluding sage soup (the sage grows wild on the island), cups of wild peppermint tea for altitude and dressing up in local costume for a fiesta.

I also visited Los Uros floating islands where everything, boats huts the islands are made of todoro reed growing in the lake. Now I´m back on the Bolivian mainland this morning after a couple of days on Isla del Sol - the birthplace of the Inca religion and in the 40% of Lake Titicaca controlled by Bolivia.
I arrived in La Paz late this afternoon. Was a bit scared about going to La Paz - warnings from DFAT, a Peruvian friend I have made, other travellers, guidebooks etc. But it really is quite amazing. Went through the witchcraft market which is close by my hotel. Everything for sale there including llama foetuses! La Paz gives the impression of being a giant market!

I leave tomorrow for the lowland savannah region of the Bolivian Amazon which is north east of La Paz. Then I will go south to Uyuni salt lake, apparently one of the wonders of the world. After that I´ll head back to Peru towards Macchu Piccu.

What I have learned of the Incas in my travels in Guatemala, Peru and Bolivia has been such a revelation. But despite all the trekking and high altitude practice recently, I´m still quite unsure of my ability to make the steep inclines of the trek to Macchu Picu. Never mind, there´s always a train.

After that I´m heading up the Amazon on a 5-day boat trip to Iquitos where my Peruvian friend Jesil is taking up a health worker job. Would like to get to Ecuador but I think there may not be enough time. Can't believe my travel is coming to such a fast end....

Yes, I made it back up from the bottom of the canyon

Well the trek down into Colca Canyon and back out again was fantastic. One half-day to get down; another half-day to cross the canyon to the oasis where we lazed the afternoon away by the pool fed from a nearby waterfall. And then yesterday morning we trekked back out by the light of the full moon.





That was a hard slog! Straight uphill; I had to do it nonstop - breaks did me in! And I said my mantra for most of the way in a rather solitary climb. But at 56 (and only a week or two), I was the lead woman at the top! Yeh go Jude! Meanwhile, of course, local people ran up and down every day!

I´m the one in the yellow hat!

And let me tell you about my fantastic group. Three women from Catalan (Barcelona) - Montse a 28 year old pilates teacher; Lydia a 38 year old Olympian gymnast (Seoul, 1988), and Raquel, 28, a teacher of physics at med school and part-time gym teacher. In their defence, they took breaks and 2 of them smoke! And then there were Pierre and Oliver, 2 young French students who skipped and ran up the canyon! And finally Waldo who was our guide.

They are a great group of people and we had a lot of fun together. And I really enjoyed the physicality of the days. We finished with a plunge into hot springs at Chivay and a great massage.

Oh and some fun last night before we headed to all-night bus rides and separate ways...


Next stop - on to Puno for a stay on the islands of Lake Titicaca (and just a little bit of hiking) and then on to Bolivia.

Well my first overnight bus ride in many years went OK - nothing like the journey on the magic bus from Athens all those year ago that put me off forever, well till now! We were even fed too. Arequipa is a beautiful colonial town with the volcanic Mt Misti presiding over all. Visited the most famous monument in the town, the Santa Catalina convent where the nuns lived quite splendidly. Both the mountain and the convent which is described as a city within a city, are in the picture here.

Strolled down the street from the convent into the middle of a big street parade for Arequipa's foundation day. There were fireworks all night and many still heading home when I set out this morning.

Today I went to see something fabulous, the mummy Juanita, a young girl sacrificed by the Incas high on Mt Ampato. She was found by chance when a volcano on a neighbouring mountain erupted and melted the ice that had preserved her for 5 centuries. It is remarkable to see her still intact in the same clothes and same foetal position as when she was sacrificed.

Tomorrow I´m off for 3 days trekking in the Golca Canyon which is deeper than the Grand Canyon. Along the way, we´ll be seeing giant condors as they fly off on their morning search for food. And yes, to put all your minds at rest, I will be with a group!

Lima

Tonight I leave Lima for Arequipa on an overnight bus; don´t know how that'll go down. I got the last seat and it's in front of the loo! Never mind - I figured it was meant to be.

My plans now are to go from Arequipa to Lake Titicaca and from there to Bolivia. I've heard lots of good things about from people I have met here. Then I´ll come back to Peru and head towards Cusco and Macchu Picchu, hopefully it will be a bit quieter in September. People tell me it´s really busy until at least the end of August.

Went to view a great private collection of pre-Inca pottery and textiles yesterday. It was collected by a Japanese Peruvian and is now looked after by a foundation. To see items of the quality and completeness of this private collection, it suddenly hit home for me how hard it must be for public museums to compete.

Can't believe how cold it is (hoodie all day, add scarf and jumper at night) - and it's so close to the Equator! There´s a haze that hangs over the city during these winter months which is due to some meteorological cause.

But that aside, all seems very gracious in the capital of Peru. Expensive, not too many homeless, but glimpses of shanty towns and graffiti suggest there's much more here than meets the tourist eye.

And if nothing else, this virtual dentist was a bit of a clue to something going on..

South America at last!

Finally made it 37 years after I first thought I might and Lima is well worth the wait.

Spent my final day in the US battling with American Airlines who managed to rip off the buckle and strap to close my pack and who then tell me they 'don´t deal with my type of luggage'! So had to shrink wrap at the airport because the stories DFAT tells you about Sth America make you think it´ll be 'open sesame on your exposed contents'. But this place is lovely, and everyone I meet, whether they've been in Bolivia or anywhere else in this region, has only good stories to tell.

Anyway, I have a lovely place nearby making a fancy leather repair for me - here is the owner posing for a photo. He thought I wanted the baby croc skin when really I wanted the whole shop, so obviously my Spanish still has a long way to go.

Well hope it improves soon, there´s a lot of travel ahead. Met a lovely young German woman who had heard of Bhopal although she was born in 1984. Shé's convinced me to go to Arequipa and meet her there for some canyon adventures. Managed to get the last seat on tomorrow night's bus right in front of the bano (bathroom) - the one place the guide books say not to sit! This will test me, an all-night bus ride.

Oh and Andrea ..just met more Canadians from Toronto!

And that's a happy birthday to me!

Ooooh just had the greatest birthday dinner ever! Shrimp boil, soft shell crab, shrimp salad, Donna's tartare sauce, crusty bread, and an enormous, delicious death-by-chocolate cake with gold candles!

Oh Texas!


Birthday thoughts today found me reflecting that this truly has been a fabulous 12 months, and I'm still having the time of my life!


Much as I loved Guatemala, I just wasn't quite ready for travelling again when I recently spent time there, but now I finally leave Texas in 2 days for Lima. I will be spending the next couple of couple of months in Peru, Ecuador and Bolivia.

I've changed my plans so that I don't spend any more than the few days in Chile before I fly out to Tahiti at the beginning of October. There is still quite hazardous ash from volcanoes in the area where I was planning to go. On top of that, I also heard from a connection living in Chile, that to go further south beyond Chaiten to the glaciers area, was really not the thing to be planning for late September - cold and icy.

So instead I'll be travelling overland from Peru to Ecuador and Bolivia and spending most of my 2 South American months' travel in these 3 countries. I'm sure it will be a wonderful time whatever I do.

But imagine saying goodbye to all this...



Cranes on the dock and possums in the rubbish bin!