Puno, Copacabana and La Paz

So we left Cusco and headed on a long journey to Puno. Well we didn´t get started off too fast since we were temporarily delyed by the start of a bicycle race......
Anyway we stoped in the little town of Ayaviri for lunch along the way. Atilla and Gaetano gave us the heads up that it was going to be a traditional lunch and that they only served one thing. I heard the word Pollo (chicken) and had hopes until they brought out the soup and fellow memebers of my group started spooning up chicken feet! Ummmmmmmm I passed and decided to go to the little market down the street and bought a bag of rolls, 6 bananas and chocolate waffers for 3 sols ( about one dollar) instead. Thom ate the soup.....not the feet though....he said he thought he got the ankles...whatever BLeh!!!! Where is Anthony Bourdain when you need him!

Next back on the road where we had a little road rage with a guy on a bike who pulled out in front of our gigantic truck and we almost swerved off the road.....no worries Attilla and Guytano hunted him down in our truck and then got out to give him a piece of their minds......I think some choice words that translate into any language were used to sum up thier feelings of the situations and then it was back on the road.......Good Times!!!

On the way to Puno we stop at Sillustani a Pre Incan Burial Ground complete with Sun and moon dials and Common tombs. Even though it was pretty cool I was kind of getting tired of seeing ruins and hearing a lot of the same information. Luckily my nose did not agree with the altitude and started bleeding so I got to head back to the warm truck.....no really it was cool I was just cold and if you have read about all the other ruins I have seen already you would feel the same. So bloody nose, back to the truck and were off to Puno again.

7:30 pm we arrive at Puno for a group dinner. We take taxis to the main Plaza where we had the most amazing Itallian meal I have ever had in Peru.....HA HA HA.....Really it was soooooooooo good but it was an Itallian joint. At least I had Peruvian red wine to go with it.

The next day we went to the Reeded Islands know as the Uros Islands. We met up with Anna out guide for this and took a boat to the islands on the Peruvian side of Lake Titicaca. There are about 40 islands now made up of reeds and everything on them are made of reeds as well. The island we went to was called Kontiki. We were greeted with bright smiles and a great demonstration of how they made their islands, bartered for food and handicrafts and makde their boats. They actually use reeds and recycled plastic bottles now for thier boats because they last longer.. They dressed us up in their traditional clothing and sang songs to us. Then we got to ride thier pretty awesome boat which actually looked like something from the orient with two Puma heads on the front made of reeds. It was quite nice.

Next we were off to Copacubana, Bolivia.
We arrived at the boarder crossing with no problems for anyone except "Carmen" our truck. Apparently there was some clerical error and the registration number was copied wrong in Peru......sigh.......after poor Gaetano ran back and forth between two buildings for an hour we were on our way again......We went to a group dinner but I was getting sick so soon after we went straight to bed.

Ok so this is one of those things that you just got to love about traveling abroad. We wake to take a shower and when we put the water on it makes this extremely loud high pitched sound that pretty much woke up the whole damn hotel....no joke people were asking what that noise was later and I pleasently got to say "no that wasn´t the fire alarm it was just me trying to use soap and water at the same time, however if you think you need a wake up call tomorrow just let me know and I will schedule my shower then."

Today we were heading to the Isle of Sol ( Island of the Sun) located somewhere in the middle of lake Titicaca.....We had to take a boat that took 2 hours to get there. On the way we sat on top of the boat and saw many beautiful landscapes including the Andian Mountians. However I was still not feeling very well at all. I think I have a throat infection....eh....

So we get to the South side of the island and they tell us that we are going to hike for 3-4 hours to the other side and I honestly didn´t feel up to is so Thom and I went part of the way which was really beautiful to see....guess what.......MORE RUINS!!!!!! THere was a rock that supposively looked like a Puma which is an important animal to the Inca´s and is actually what Lake Titicaca is named after (not the dirty words we think of...LOL) Titi = puma in someone´s language. Now back to this Puma Rock.....well maybe if I was chewing on massive coca leaves I would have woke up and said "Hey man check out this rock...kinda looks like a cat I saw once." Eh.....there was supposively a face to but you needed to be on acid to see that one. Then we walked back to the boat to the North side, waited for everyone while we napped in the sun and then headed back.
Since my throat still felt like sand paper everytime I swallowed Thom and I decided to go out to dinner by ourselves so we didn´t have to wait for 12 people to order and be served. We had another lovely Itallian dinner and went to bed. Sorry I am not eating llama, alpaca, or cuy so everything else is a version of something we might eat at home.
I am an extremely diverse person except when it comes to food.....ask my parents, I can sit at a table until the sun rises and falls. Plus the weak gag reflex is more insulting I feel then saying no thanks.

Ok so we are currently in La Paz now and HOLY ALPACA!!!! This place is huge and busy. It´s like times square with out the lights. We are a few blocks from what they call the "witches market" Um it is only my first day here but besides the dried aborted/still born baby llamas and a few burning herbs and weird fatty looking stuff........It is really just a long streat of fun shopping for tourists. So that is where we will be tomorrow and then we leave the 31st to come home. That I am sure will be a plane ride from hell.....it is going to take us three planes and 798765167899643613579765465 hours to get home but we will be back on the first of Sept. and I can´t wait to catch up with everyone!!!!