17 / 18-9-2010: Day 7-8, Isla Taquile, Lake Titicaca

The sapphire blue of Lake Titicaca, the highest navigable lake in the world, overlooking Cordillera Real of Bolivia.

An Inca ruin on the island.

The amazing Inca terrancing against the blue of Lake titicaca.

One of the archs on the island where the air was magically clear.

Our room, with a surprisingly comfy bed and hay covering the red soil of the island.

A local with his cow passing through one of the many archs just before sunset.

The beautiful sunset overlooking another island.

A rainbow colored sky!

Our host family cooking our dinner. The stuff in the blue bag is for burning the fire. By the way, it´s cow´s poop! But it didn´t stink and is supposed to be really good for cooking. According to our host lady, the cow here only eats grass and corn´s leaves and it is very natural.

Our candlelight dinner at our room: Fresh water trout from Lake Titicaca and mate de muña just picked from the fields. It was amazingly good!

Me at a rocky beach in the island.

Another cup of mate de muña. Absolutely loved it!

The signature arch in Isla Taquile.

On our way back to Puno, a local man was knitting in the boat. One of the greatest traditions of Isla Taquile is that the men are responsible for doing knitwork, from hats to gloves to scarfs. The hat this man´s wearing signifies that he is single by the white top part. Married men would wear one entirely red.

After 2 more hours of boating, other travelers and I arrived in Isla Taquile, a nature island with native inhabitants that have been living here since very ancient time. Their lives seem quite separated from the rest of the world, and indeed you would feel like you were in a different world in this island, so were in the floating islands. Two other travelers from Germany and France and I were greeted by the locals, who are our host family and we stayed with them. We had to climb a steep and stiff hill which contained about 500 stairs! At 3800m above sea level and carrying our heavy backpacks, it was not easy. Our host picked a herb called ´muña´ on the way and showed us how to smell it. It´s supposed to give us more energy and help us cope with the altitude. Nonetheless it works, it smells really great, similar to mint. Later we had mate de muña, which is the herb´s infusion tea, and it was so refreshing! We watched sunset at a hill, and we got to see the limitless horizon of Lake Titicaca, which suddenly seemed like a sea. It was so beautiful and peaceful. In the morning, I woke up at 5am to catch the sunset. I walked down to the plaza where there´s a mirador and the sun came out from the cloud in the middle of it. The weather was bitterly cold, but the air was as fresh as ever. It was so beautiful to see the sun coming out from a fairytale land. Being in Isla Taquile was an unique experience, and it was especially worthwhile after visiting super touristy Cusco and the Sacred Valley. It was a breath of fresh air, literally and metaphorically!