Incan Express

     Tonight we are in Puno, on the Peruvian side of Lake Titicaca. A wild city, with streets filled with women in native dress selling their wares or attending weddings in outrageously fancy dresses plus bowler hats, three wheeled motor rickshaws, bicycle rickshaws and, of course, cars, buses, trucks, dogs, cats, pedestrians, and peddlers of all types. When we arrived, we drove through a parade of women doing traditional dances and men marching with their traditional instruments (literally through, the bus just cut across just before the women), down a street lined with furniture on the sidewalk -- couches and dining room sets and a parrot on one side, stacks of colorful mattresses on the other -- then through the Saturday mercado which went on for many long narrow blocks, and on to the lake where the bus station is located. The city is not nearly as beautiful as Cusco, with its tiled roofs and Incan paths. We plan only to overnight here before heading on to Bolivia tomorrow on the 7.30 bus.

     This morning we woke up early again (the latest I've slept in by a couple hours in the last two weeks was 7), and boarded the bus to Puno.  We made 5 stops on the way, the first one at the "Andean Sistine Chapel".  We spent about 45 minutes there, and it was incredibly inricate and beautiful.  Originally all the walls were painted with murals and some were still visible, but as the church got more funds they began to cover these up with paintings and gold leaf.  Like almost all of the Spanish churches, this was built on top of an old Incan shrine in the 17th centure.  Unfortunately, we weren't allowed to take any pictures and there is no website with multiple pictures that I could find.

     After another couple of hours in the bus we stopped in a town to look at the only surviving two-story Incan structure and some store-houses and houses for nobles.

     We stopped for a buffet lunch around 11.30, and were excited to see fresh lettuce.  Salads are one thing that I really miss here.  While we ate there was some traditional Andean music playing, and it is beautiful but I will shed no tears if I never hear another Andean pipe in my life.  

     At the highest point the bus stopped for pictures, but it was not particularly impressive so we stayed in the car.  Then, maybe 2 hours before we reached Puno, we stopped at a small town to visit a musem.  They had a few small rooms with pottery or weavings or mummies in them, as well as a few domesticated vicunas.  This is a gap in my narrative: allow me to take a brief interlude and explain the camelids of Peru.  First there is the llama, which is used for weaving but does not have particularly fine fur.   You can shave a llama once a year.  Llamas can carry no more than ten kilos.  They are distinguished from the alpacas because they do not have hair on their faces.  Alpacas can be shaved every year, but their fur grows coarser each time so the owner has to decide how often to do it.  They cannot carry much weight at all.  Then there are the vicunas some other animal, neither of which are domesticated.  The vicunas have very very fine fur, but it is quite expensive because they have to be caught before they are shaved, and they only grow fur on their stomachs and that can only be shaved once every three years.  I do not know anything about the fourth type of camelid.

     So anyways, we saw the vicunas.  They have really beautiful eyes, and enjoy eating carrots.

     We arrived in Puno a little after five, and took a taxi to our rather dismal hotel.  Almost immediately we walked back to the bus station to get our tickets to Copacabana for the morning, and took a motor-rickshaw to our hotel, then went out for dinner (pizza).

     It seems hard to believe that we've been in Peru for a month and a day, but we are saying goodbye to it tomorrow.  Tonight I am to tired to add another installment of our Lares trek, but will continue tomorrow.