Sun, sacrifice, and small dangerous boys

I like getting on boats whenever possible, and so while in Copacabana, we decided to head out on Lake Titicaca for a trip to Isla del Sol. Isla del Sol is a very small but long-inhabitated island, about an hour and a half from Copacabana.

From the small bay, we hopped on one of the many boats ferrying people over. Our boat lingered several minutes past its supposed launch time, and more and more people kept piling on. Finally, the captain came up top and said, ¨hey, [we put too many people below and] the boat is too heavy in back, will anyone sit up on the front tip of the boat, in front of the railing?¨

Yeah.


Hunkered up front with the Bolivian flag

It was great.

As we rounded the corner of a peninsula jutting into the lake (one that we had earlier aimed to bike to, though did not reach), we suddenly saw the Cordillera Real. On the lake, surrounded by low golden hills (not unlike, Marty pointed out, the East Bay hills), in the hot sun, it was easy to forget we were at 12,000 feet or so. Until those 20,000-foot snow-covered giants popped up.



Reed boat against a rather spectacular backdrop

When we arrived at the small bay of the Isla del Sol, it was already 3:30, three hours before dark, and we got a few different estimates of how long it would take us to hike the length of the island. We should not have been surprised by these varying answers: it´s sometimes hard to pin facts down in Bolivia.

Anyway, we thought we´d better get moving, so we huffed and puffed our way up the Escalera del Inca. This is a tall staircase of dark stone that climbs from the lakeshore up to and through the little town of Yumani; along it runs the Fuente del Inca, a spring trickling down the hill.

You may have noticed an Inca theme here: the Isla del Sol is an ancient site of many ancient Andean ruins (some pre-Inca), and there are Inca creation myths about the island, so some call it the birthplace of the Inca. Inca artifacts have also been discovered underwater near the island. There is almost no information about this that we found on the island or in Copacabana, so we largely enjoyed the island for its natural rather than its historical value.



The path we took from village to village may have been historical -- it´s wide enough for two people to share easily, and is bordered by stones the whole way. It seems like a lot of work for modern-day people, who wander all over the hillsides, not just on this path.

It was a beautiful place to walk.




A few of the locals

We saw almost no one on our four-hour walk from shore to shore, with the exception of some toll collectors. I don´t know if these toll collectors were on the up-and-up or were just extortionists, but we paid. Our trust was shaken because each toll collector would tell us we didn´t need to pay again, and that anyone who asked was just malo. But then that argument didn´t work with the next guy. We wished they´d sort it out among themselves.


¨No, no, that last toll you paid only covered the first third of the island...¨

At the very far northern tip of the island, we arrived at some pretty spectacular ruins, a sort of a stone labyrinth of walls and doorways, with stairs down to the water. We enjoyed wandering through this, ducking through low archways, ending up at dead ends, and temporarily evading one toll collector.





Nearby was a massive stone table, with low stone chairs arranged uncomfortably far away (at least for dining), where they say the Incas made sacrifices. I couldn´t decide if it was disrespectful to sit on the mesa but I guess it´s pretty disrespectful to sacrifice people. Or even critters.


Sacrificial and perhaps sacreligious


The moon and the sacred rock (at left)

Night was falling as we started the end of the walk down to the shore, where we devoutly hoped that we would find dinner and lodging. It was far too cold to camp on the beach.


Arriving in Challapampa

Fortunately, we did in fact find lodging at the bare-bones but perfectly serviceable Hostal Cultural, which may have had the cheapest room we´ve had on our whole trip, at about five dollars. We wandered out again looking for dinner and found an obliging family restaurant who cooked us up a prix-fixe meal of quinoa soup, eggs or pasta, and coca tea.

We woke up early to the braying of our neighbors.



After some more eggs and bread we were on our way back to the southern end of the island. We could have waited for a boat to pick us up, but honestly, Challapampa didn´t have a lot of entertainment offerings for the next four hours.


There´s always pick-up soccer... or carrying a truly enormous amount of reeds



The boats of Challapampa


Looking back at the village


We think this may be a burro-llama cross

The entire island, and most of the hills along the shores of Lake Titicaca, are heavily terraced. Apparently, at least on the island, these terraces are very ancient and carefully made, with layers of stone and sand beneath each level to allow them to drain. They have an effect from a distance almost like geological features.

Today people appear to grow wheat and corn on these terraces, and perhaps other crops -- it´s a little hard to tell, as it´s the dry season now, and most fields were covered with stubble and/or haystacks.



We made our way in a fairly leisurely fashion back to Yumani. Our most memorable stop along the way (aside from our rather pathetic nuts-orange-Snickers lunch stop) was to try to put out a fire.

Two little boys, maybe 5 or 6 years old, were hollering and whacking the ground uphill from the path. We saw as we drew closer that the grass was burned in big circles under them, and then realized that the edges of the circles were still on fire. We went up to help put the fire out, stomping around on the low flames.

Then we realized they were also lighting more fires.

Just a couple of nights before had been the celebration of San Juan, when people all over Copacabana lit fires in the streets and on the hills -- filling the town with smoke -- and asked for new things in the coming year. The kids said this too was for San Juan. Maybe they´d forgotten to ask for something.

We put their new fires out and tried to give them a stern talking-to about how peligroso this was on an incredibly dry island. I hope it worked, but who knows.

A couple of sun-soaked hours later, we arrived at Yumani. After clambering over a couple of fences to try to get a late lunch, and getting turned down, we arrived at what looked to us like paradise.




The La Paz beer, which features both a merry barrel-riding king and a picture of the unlovely brewery

It took a while, but it lived up to its billing: how often do you get quinoa along with your broccoli, onion, and locoto (spicy Bolivian pepper) on your pizza?


Worth the wait

We both almost fell asleep on the boat ride back to Copacabana. Good thing we had a long night ahead in a good bed before the bus to Cusco....