Peru, Bolivia: Machu Picchu, Lake Titikaka

During my last week of ISP, I managed to figure out that google chat works, and got in touch with my friend Matt from Swarthmore, currently studying abroad in Buenos Aires, Argentina. On impulse we agreed to buy plane tickets to Cuzco, Peru and from there, to travel to Machu Picchu and Lake Titikaka together, within the 9 days he had class vacation and before I had to head back to Ecuador, scheduled the 2nd week after my ecology program ended.
In spite of a temporary setback caused by my miscommunication with my homestay family, in which I almost missed my flight due to my inability to access my passport (locked in their house) and made it to the airport 50 minutes before departure only because of the divine intervention of my guardian angel in the form of a 6 year old girl who helped me break in, I did in fact make it to Lima, the coastal capital of Peru, in one piece. Albeit accompanied only by my small backpack full of the previous few days worth of beach clothing.
But leaving that aside, I was thrilled to see Matt when I finally caught up with him at the hostel he had chosen as our meeting/storage place. Lima is big. Very big, and really different from Quito. It´s much more polluted, with wider streets, highways to get from one part to another, many many modern buildings, and I was also more impressed with the beautiful central antiguo part of the city than with it´s Quiteñan counterpart. We seemed to have picked into the ritzy touristish part of town, and that night we soon found ourselves wandering through a maze of restaurants, bars and clubs. Luckily we were starved. The Peruvian currency, the "Sol" definitely kept us on our math feet as we kept trying to translate back into currencies with which we were familiar.
Early the next morning we flew onwards to Cuzco, the ancient capital of the Incan Empire. Before we get there however, it is of vital mention that Matt and I made friends with an american couple we met in the airport. Matt convinced Shelby (guy´s name actually) and Katlin to come with us to our hostel since they didn´t have a place to stay at that point and at least check it out with us.
So the four of us go to the hostel that Matt found online. We are met by Vicky, a Peruvian lady who offers us tea while we wait for our rooms to be ready. The hostel was big and nicely decorated, with a little open breakfast room providing a nice view of the inner courtyard. We manage to bargain down the price of our accomodations by agreeing to stay, all four of us, in a single large room, with three beds. That sorted out, we all took a nap. Bored of napping immediately, I snuck out, checked my email and met some other people at the hostel. Matt, Shelby, Katlin and I explore central Cuzco – the beautiful Plaza de Armas where we are surrounded by churches and mountains, the narrow streets where we hug the walls to avoid getting run over, and we see the remnants of beautiful Inca architecture while wandering down an alley, the classic perfectly cut bricks so as to fit together exactly (couldn’t fit a knife in the space between bricks.) This was after all, the capital of the Incan Empire. And they chose a very beautiful headquarters, we decide, as we watch the sun settle behind the hills, red and orange meeting dusty brown. That night we decide to take the cheap tour of Cuzco – agreeing on 5 soles (U$1.50), we pay a taxi driver to drive us (all 4 of us) up to the big Jesus statue at the peak of an overlooking hill and get a great view of the city – all glittering lights in the valley, spread out below us. On the drive, we ask the driver if there is a red-light district in Cuzco. A few minutes later we’re driving through a very different Cuzco, it’s dirtier, generally more run down than the touristy side, and right after the taxi driver announces that this is the dangerous area, we get a flat tire. We spend the next twenty minutes trying to change it without a jack (lots of lifting power necessary) and hailing other taxis to see if they have one.
The next day we spend at the Artesenal Market where we find all manner of products Alpaca, find a very cheap gigantic lunch at a little hole in the wall restaurant (I find myself presented with half a chicken plus rice and veggies as the second course), and check out the Inca Museum. With Vicky’s help, we organize a trip to the Macchu Picchu ruins. The next morning we take a train ride to Aguas Calientes, passing through some great Andean scenery, both pastoral and highland-stream-enclosed-within-towering-mountains, to arrive at Aguas Calientes, the town closest to the ruins (where all the tourists stay.) We drop off our bags and continue to MP where Matt and I take a tour of the ruins in Spanish. They are truly spectacular, situated in the midst of gorgeous green mountains, overlooking everything, with houses, ingenius water fountain/gutter system, temples, courtyards, arches, altars etc. We learn that this was once the seat of the Incan elite; the priests, the royalty, the wealthy, and we also find out from Shelby and Katlin that the English tour said the opposite (wrong.) Oh well. We watch the sun set and then we go back to Aguas Calientes, where, after dinner, we check out the reason behind its name – we bathe in the hot springs (which was fun, though I woudn’t call it amazing.) The next day, while Katlin does some artwork, Matt, Shelby and I hike up the Putukusi Mountain nearby (we found the path following some other tourists’ advice and the train tracks) from where we can see once again, Macchu Picchu on the next mountain over. Good view, I highly recommend the hike if you have the time. It is Wednesday already and there is still so much to see. The four of us, ever a match made in heaven, have decided to explore Lake Titikaka next (yes, that is the name of the world’s “largest highest” lake.) So to save money and time, as Shelby puts it, “we board a bus, don’t pay a hostel for the overnight and in the morning we magically arrive” at Puno, a city on the southern edge of Peru. That afternoon, we take a short trip of the bay area commissioning a (fisherman’s?) very beat-up motor boat (he let’s us try driving, which is fun.) The lake is pretty, but the algal build-up all over the waterfront is not. We are not highly impressed with Puno as a whole, but we do enjoy wandering through the main street in the evening, where many people are outside walking around, hanging out and crowding. We see shops, butcheries and little plazas, then we pick a restaurant where we get to watch live traditional music, performers employing the use of panpipe flutes, drums and chorongos (sort of like mini-guitars.)
We decide to add another stamp to our passports – crossing the border into Bolivia on another bus, we arrive at Copacabana, a small town on the lake nestled amongst the hills. We wander the streets and eat lunch, then take a boat to nearby island Isla de Sol, recommended by other tourists we had bumped into beforehand. We sit on the breezy roof of the boat looking out at the lake, big enough to seem an ocean from our viewpoint, follow the coastline to the Island, where we have decided to spend the night. This turns out to be an excellent choice. It is hard for me to describe how unbelievably beautiful it was. From the dock we climb upwards, passing llamas, agricultural terraces and Bolivians offering us their hostels, to finally look out upon the blue lake, the tanned coast and finally to the stunning snow capped mountain range in the distance, the Cordillera Real. Shelby and I negotiate a game of soccer with some children. The mountains still a part of the surreal background, we play an exhausting game on a school basketball court that we ultimately lose (it’s the altitude really) and thus earn the right to buy the kids a coke. After that we all climb up to the topmost part of the island for an even better view of the lake now that we can see both sides of the island. We spend the evening playing cards with people we meet at our hostel, and the next day we slowly make our way back to Puno, Matt and I head to Cuzco and on Sunday we fly out to respective residences. The journey is uneventful except for our bus breaking down on the way to Cuzco, something about a “broken electric circuit”, but we make it back with time to spare before our flight.