August 4th and 5th, 2018
It was time to leave Cusco and Peru, after close to 3 months in that amazing country!
Direction La Paz, Bolivia. To cut the trip in half I stopped in Puno for 2 nights, I did little exploring of the city on the first day, you can see some pictures of the market on Friday night here.
The next day I took a day trip to the floating islands on the lake and then a trip to Taquile Island, a 2h30 boat ride, it was interesting to say the least, it was windy and the boat was rocking a little bit. The next morning I took the bus from Puno to Copacabana, Bolivia where I had another boat trip, this time to Isla del Sol and then finally, La Paz.
Full album link here.
When we arrived on the floating island , that our driver decided would be the good one for us, we were greeted by the chief of the island:
Just kidding he was just showing off his hunting rifle, needed to survive on the lake, mostly to hunt birds. The floating islands are very small, 2-3 families live on each island and they have to redo the “floor” every couple of months. The islands are all hand made. Here’s the bath on the island:
Kids living on this island:
They live on the island but the place is basically a little market, they live off the tourists mostly from what I understood, felt a little ridiculous being on that little island and seeing the same stuff for sale that you see all around Puno.
More pictures of the island as we left for the Taquile Island:
Here you can see more of the “market” I was talking about:
Riding in a canal, where the water is shallow and that’s the reason for such vegetation and also why is possible to have the floating islands:
After the boat ride to Taquile Island you need to hike about 30 minutes up to the plaza and the village:
Photographed some locals, they are very colorfully dressed, as usual so far, they don’t really like to be photographed:
The view from the village main plaza:
Local kid:
Every hat has a meaning on the island, they don’t have any type of police or security, the mans with these kinds of hat are the only authority they have and respect:
Random ladies from the village:
This woman was doing some work in the field, would hapilly let you photograph her…for tips:
Another girl from the village dress with a colorful dress:
This day trip was completed, it’s a nice trip but very, very touristy, people are constantly trying to sell you stuff, which I understand but it’s also not my style of trip. So what did I do ? Took another tourist tour the next day!
Woke up before taking the bus to Bolivia to shoot the sunrise on the lake:
I used Bolivia Hop for this tour but mostly to cross the border, I heard many horror stories crossing the border to Bolivia, where buses would drop you off at the border and had you cross to Bolivia and when you get to Bolivia no bus would be there, I heard Bolivia Hop was very reliable and they were, happy I paid extra to avoid any hassle. The crossing was painless, you do need to walk across the border with you luggage but other than that it was really painless.
We stopped on Copacabana after crossing the border and I had a little trip to Isla Del Sol on the lake. It’s pretty impressive to see Cordillera Real from the island:
Views from the island:
One of the ports of the village:
Then it was time to go to La Paz, we crossed a little pass of the lake in Tiquina, we stopped for food and I took a quick shot of the stars:
Pretty long day for just a trip from Puno to La Paz but it’s a nice day, I’d recommend this instead of the Puno day trip. Either way it was nice seeing so much of the lake.