Copacabana style at Lake Titicaca
Breathing a sigh of relief on the bus, I bade farewell to La Paz. I was now en-route to Lake Titicaca.
Copacabana is the main Bolivian town from which to do excursions onto Lake Titicaca and to the nearby Isla del Sol (Island of the Sun). The town itself offers little other than boating trips to the island and a large amount of restaurants serving trout (trucha) and another fish called pejerrey.
Wikipedia:
"Lake Titicaca is a lake located on the border of Bolivia was born here.and Peru. It sits 3,812 m (12,500 ft) above sea level making it one of the highest commercially navigable lakes in the world.
On the Isla del Sol, there are over 180 Incan ruins. In the religion of the Incas, it was believed that the sun god, Inti, was born here"
Our bus getting ferried across on the dodgiest pontoon I have ever seen
Some tourists thought it necessary to hire a military boat (complete with front mounted machine gun) to ferry them to the island
I shared the bus with another South African called Grant whom I had met the previous evening at the Wild Rover. Grant, Doris (Austria) and myself all got on the first ferry out of Copacabana to the island. The trip was on an overloaded junker ferry that used a tiny 40 HP outboard to send us chugging on a slow 2 hour journey to the island.
I got back in time for a quick breakfast and then marched back down the steps of the Incas to catch the ferry back into town. It was a bit unlucky not to catch a sunny day whilst I was there as that it is what the area is renowned for. However the Isla del Sol was quite pretty and interesting in itself and I have heard there is good trekking on it besides what I had covered that morning. In other words, don't take my acocunt of it too seriously as I was in a bit of a rush and didn't have time to fully explore.
Next bus was to Cuzco where I would meet Britters.
Copacabana is the main Bolivian town from which to do excursions onto Lake Titicaca and to the nearby Isla del Sol (Island of the Sun). The town itself offers little other than boating trips to the island and a large amount of restaurants serving trout (trucha) and another fish called pejerrey.
Wikipedia:
"Lake Titicaca is a lake located on the border of Bolivia was born here.and Peru. It sits 3,812 m (12,500 ft) above sea level making it one of the highest commercially navigable lakes in the world.
On the Isla del Sol, there are over 180 Incan ruins. In the religion of the Incas, it was believed that the sun god, Inti, was born here"
Our bus getting ferried across on the dodgiest pontoon I have ever seenCopacabana
Some tourists thought it necessary to hire a military boat (complete with front mounted machine gun) to ferry them to the islandI shared the bus with another South African called Grant whom I had met the previous evening at the Wild Rover. Grant, Doris (Austria) and myself all got on the first ferry out of Copacabana to the island. The trip was on an overloaded junker ferry that used a tiny 40 HP outboard to send us chugging on a slow 2 hour journey to the island.
Arriving at the Isla del Sol
Once we were there we needed to climb the "204 Steps of the Incas" which was pretty exhausting considering the altitude we were at. At the top of the steps was our hostel which had spectacular views over the lake. I took a long nap and awoke for a quiet dinner before going back to bed. Doris told us that she had been advised that the sun rose at 5am and we should all wake up to watch it. Even though I was sceptical, we all set our alarms and at 5am woke up. There was no sun at all. Waiting until 6:30am I managed to spot a bit of light on the horizon but there was so much cloud that the sunrise really never happened at all for us. As I was up, I took a short hike across the island to the ruins of Pilko Kaima which were not particularly spectacular although I did spot a blue hummingbird!
A pretty little island
The ruins of Pilko Kaima
I got back in time for a quick breakfast and then marched back down the steps of the Incas to catch the ferry back into town. It was a bit unlucky not to catch a sunny day whilst I was there as that it is what the area is renowned for. However the Isla del Sol was quite pretty and interesting in itself and I have heard there is good trekking on it besides what I had covered that morning. In other words, don't take my acocunt of it too seriously as I was in a bit of a rush and didn't have time to fully explore.
Next bus was to Cuzco where I would meet Britters.
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