Alpacas, Argentina, Austin...Oh My!: Condors, Canyons, and an Island Getaway

Hello friends!

We’re just about halfway through the “traveling around” part of the trip, and as I currently find myself on an island in the middle of Lake Titicaca with no electricity but a full laptop battery, I’ve decided to write an update!

On Saturday we caught our flight to Arequipa and arrived late in the day. First thing first- the view around Arequipa is awesome! It’s surrounded by mountains and volcanoes- some extinct, one (El Misti) active- and it’s just beautiful. Arequipa itself is also quite beautiful- much of the architecture is built from white sillar volcanic stone, hence its nickname, “La Ciudad Blanca,” or “The White City.”

We basically spent the first night walking around a bit, resting up, and starting to adjust to the altitude (about 2300m above sea level). The next day, we lucked out (as seems to happen very often here) and after talking to a few tour agencies, found a man named Jack who offered us a super cheap deal to go trekking in the Colca Canyon, plus a deal on a hostel for the night, tickets for a bus to Puno, and place to store our bags. We signed up, switched hostels, and had the rest of the day free to check out Arequipa! We spent a fair bit of time looking at shops, and then headed to Santa Catalina- St. Catherine’s Convent. Still operational, the convent is really interesting for a number of reasons. It’s dubbed “a city within a city” and it really is. The different sections of the convent are color coded both on the map and in real life (the walls are painted really stunning colors), and there are streets, kitchens, bedrooms, orchards, a fountain, and several courtyards, as well as a section where nuns currently live and work today. Additionally, parts of the convent have been destroyed by earthquakes and rebuilt, while other parts have been added through time, so you can see the changes in architectural style as you walk through. It was really quiet and beautiful there, and there was a lot of well-translated information on a nun’s life, her habits (hahaha get it?), and the history of Santa Catalina. I did feel a bit cloister-phobic in some of the bedrooms (seriously, folks, I’m here all night), and the experience was a bit un-convent-ional (I can’t stop!), but it was really cool. We then had dinner at a lovely restaurant overlooking the Plaza de Armas, and headed back to sleep because our Colca Canyon trek/tour started at an extremely early 3am.

One of the beautifully colored courtyards at Santa Catalina

El Misti- the active volcano near Arequipa!

We were picked up at 3am and it turned out that overall we didn’t have a great idea of what a difficult task we were undertaking! Silly gringas. Treks are for mules. For one thing, it started at 3am with a super long drive to a condor viewing point and the town that we had breakfast in before we started trekking. We were given blankets and pillows, but it was tough to sleep in the van (there were about 14 of us or so) and much of the drive was on curvy roads next to crazy drops into valleys or the canyon itself, so I was a little too nervous to sleep. Unfortunately we didn’t see any condors, but soon after the viewpoint we were dropped off to start our hike! Our guide’s name was Orlando, and our group consisted of Christine and myself and two men, Emile (from Holland) and Laurent (from France). We quickly realized two things, 1) They were clearly a gay couple (although they said they were friends and roommates- oldest story of them all!), and 2) They were the coolest people ever. Both 42, they live together in the capital city of Slovenia, Ljubljana. Laurent works for the French embassy there, and Emile is an architect and a correspondent for an architecture magazine. Laurent speaks 6 languages and Emile speaks 5 (and Laurent likes to roll his eyes at Emile for not knowing Spanish because he says, “Eetz actzually vwery easy to learn”... I guess after 5 languages the 6th is a breeze!). They’ve traveled much of the world together (literally most of it, I think) and were just incredibly nice and friendly and interesting and so enjoyable to be around- and thank goodness, because we hiked together for about 9 hours in total! We’re hoping to meet up with them in Cusco as well- honestly, we just adore them.

The first day we hiked 18km, first down into the canyon (absolutely stunning), up a bit, then we ate lunch, and then we hiked up for an hour and a bit, flat for a while, and then down to our hostel for the night- an hour earlier than normal arrival time because we’re so darn fast. It was mind-blowing- we were in the bottom of Colca Canyon (which is absolutely gorgeous and gigantic), with the canyon walls as a backdrop, furniture made of palm trees, a swimming pool with one side made of a giant canyon rock, and hammocks and flowers and trees all over the place. At this point, we were a bit delirious from so much hiking at altitude, so everything seemed even greater as well. The bottom of the canyon is 2000m above sea level, while the top is about 3300m above sea level, so for our entire hike it was pretty difficult to take in enough oxygen and feel 100%. Unfortunately, on that first day a small cough that I had developed became much worse, and by that night I was having a lot of trouble with it and, as I found out later, was also quite feverish. I probably should have realized this right away, for the sole reason that I was unbearably cold and shivering, a sensation that I have experienced perhaps 5 times in my life.

A photo of my bum as taken by our guide, Orlando, as I climb over a steep part of the trail.

Cañon de Colca! Hard to see the depth...it's about 1.3 km deep!

The swimming pool at our hostel in the canyon- so awesome.

An interesting fact about the people inhabiting the Colca Canyon- Orlando told us that the typical life expectancy of villagers is over 100 years old! His own grandparents live in the canyon and are 92 and 98 and still working every day farming, and he says that his grandfather is ridiculously strong. He told us that the villagers’ secrets to a long life are drinking pure water instead of sugary drinks and pop, walking every day, and eating organic food that hasn’t had hormones added. Crazy ideas, huh?

The hike the next morning was only 5km, but it was entirely uphill, consisting of 1.3km straight up. We began hiking at 5:15am (without breakfast- a big downside) and Christine and I arrived at the top around 8:20am, right on par and really proud of ourselves. Empty mules left the hostel at 6am, walking past the hikers on the trail in case anyone wanted to give up and ride to the top. In spite of the lack of adjustment to the altitude and my cough/fever, we ended up passing a number of hikers who had left 45 minutes before us! Overall, we felt pretty badass and I’m happy with how much it pushed me physically and mentally. For you tree planters out there- it felt comparable to that first week of planting when you’re not in good shape yet and you find out that you have 6km walk-ins every day through the snow and you get a cold at the same time and by the end of the week you’re not sure you can move anymore, but you put in those last thousand trees to close out the block anyway. And then after it’s done and you can walk again you feel really happy with yourself for pushing through and you like how much money you made and you forget how hard it was and you sign up to plant again the next season. You know what I’m talking about, planters of the world. So all in all, I’m incredibly happy that we did it, but if I were to do it again I would take a little more time to adjust to the altitude first, and maybe work out in extreme conditions for a month or a year or 5 years ahead of time. I would also bring a jet pack because 1.3km straight up is a LONG WAY and it is HARD. And I imagine that, in time, I’ll forget how difficult it was and wish I could do it again.

This picture turned out this way because my camera was in my pocket and I got it all sweaty. Ironically, at 5:45am, 30 minutes into the trek, slightly delirious and severely lacking in oxygen, this is actually how the mules walking by looked to me!

At the top with left to right, myself, Emile, Christine, Orlando, and Laurent- we made it!

A small portion of our path down the Colca Canyon, from the first day's hike.

After another 30 minutes or so of flat walking we made it to a town for breakfast, and spent the rest of the day in the van stopping at different look out points and at hot springs, which felt absolutely amazing. After the hot springs though I started to feel a lot worse and spent every moment in between look outs passed out in my seat and trying not to barf. When we got back to Arequipa we went to grab some juice and I bought a thermometer and realized my hot and cold flashes were actually a fever of 100.5ish. Fortunately I was able to get antibiotics right away, which was especially good because that night we boarded a bus heading to Puno! We arrived in Puno at 4:30am, which was tough because a baby cried behind us most of the way there, it was cold, and the altitude in Puno is about 4000m above sea level! Luckily we found a cheap hostel fairly quickly, at which point I went to bed until 4pm that day.

Christine walked around a bit and then we both napped for quite a while, adjusting to how high up we were (and still are). We then headed out in search of info for the next day’s adventures. We chatted with some tour places about the Uros Islands and Taquile, and before deciding on one we decided to go check out the port first and see if we could find any info there. Walking down to the lake, a man named Felix asked if we wanted to go to Taquile Island the next day and we said heck yes Felix! So he took us to talk to a captain who is part of a regular boat service to the island. For half the price of the tour company the captain would take us to the Uros Islands first, then bring us to Taquile Island (about 3 hours away) and find a friend of his with a place where we could stay for the night. Our tickets were good for 15 days, so we could stay as long as we wanted, and return on a boat leaving the island at 2:20pm every day. It was basically everything we were looking for! We signed up and said we’d see them at the port the next morning at 7:30am.

As I’m writing this it’s Thursday night and I’m on Taquile Island! I won’t be able to post this until Friday night or Saturday morning, but I think this is a great point in the trip for an update. We headed out this morning on the local boat- which had lots of room and was super comfy, except for the very loud and smelly engine, and got to stop at one of the Uros Islands for about 25 minutes. Here, the president of that island gave us a great explanation about how the islands are built and showed us a house as well. A little side note: It is really awesome being able to understand enough Spanish to book tours with Spanish-only companies, and be able to understand our Spanish-only guides! But back to the islands...they are built on floating reeds that grow in the lake. The root mats of the reeds are thick and float well, and these are tied together with stakes and rope. On top of these are placed layers and layers of dried reeds- there is about 2m of root mats and 1m of dry reed material on top of that. These floating islands are anchored with a stake in the root mat, tied to a rock, and staked 6-9m under the water to a solid land mass, in order to keep the islands from floating to Bolivia (the president said they didn’t have passports so they needed to stay in Peru, haha). The reeds are replaced or added to every month, and an island lasts about a year before a new one needs to be built. On top of these constructed islands, houses are built out of reeds. Root mats are used to build cooking areas, because they’re humid and will prevent the island from catching fire (which is for the best, I feel). Additionally, fish farms can be built into the island- the one we were on had two trout farms on it! About 4-8 families live on one island, and they each elect a president as a leader. Everything is made out of reeds, including the beds and the boats, and some of the homes have solar panels to power a light or a television. We didn’t get to stay there for very long, but visiting the Uros Islands was a really unique experience. I can’t think of any other place like it, and I can only imagine how tough it is for the people living their to maintain their traditional way of life.

The president of this island in Uros explaining (complete with dolls and small reed houses) how the islands are built and maintained.

After Uros, we carried on our way to Taquile. Upon arrival we had to walk up a incredible number of steps, which was quite challenging. Once we got to the top, our captain found a friend who had a room for us, which is where I am currently writing this from. Tomás, his wife Ines, and his children Lizbet, Jessica, and Brian are so lovely and we can’t help feeling overwhelmed yet again by the incredible hospitality we have experienced in every part of this country.

It is difficult to do justice to Taquile in writing- it’s breathtaking here. It’s about 1km wide and 7km long, and about 5000 people live here. There are no cars and no dogs, and Tomás says there are no police and no theft as well. The majority of the island is made up of agricultural terraces, and it would appear that every house has a small plot of land for growing food. The only electrical power is solar, so tonight we ate and read by candlelight. There are a few restaurants, tiendas, and people selling their artesenia, with the artesenia and restaurants seeming to cater mainly to the tourists that come for a few hours around lunch time. We feel especially lucky with our circumstances because we weren’t stuck in a tour group and were spending the night, so we were free to wander around the island as we pleased and talk to people. It’s so refreshing to see things like the little girl in the main Plaza today, playing jacks by herself and having a BLAST doing it, or hearing from Tomás about how a bunch of people were lower down on the island helping his brother to build a house. I feel like Taquile Island is reminiscent of early pioneer, farming, and homesteading communities, with no one person or group causing a huge impact, and people working together for a stronger community. There are schools on this island from primary to secondary, a health centre, and a municipal building. It’s truly amazing and we are so lucky to be here. Tomás even served Christine and I a delicious dinner! After the horrible sickness day of Tuesday, I had a lot of trouble keeping food down so tonight I had something besides soda crackers and gatorade for the first time in 48 hours, which feels great.

Taquile Island! ie...Utopia?

The view from the main plaza on Taquile- you can see the Cordillera Blanca and Bolivia!

And one last quick update from today, Friday: We had an awesome rest of our stay on Taquile, starting with honey pancakes that Tomás and his wife made, and then spending the day taking some photos of the traditional weaving practiced on the island, and wandering to check out the ruins and the highest point on Taquile. It’s interesting that both men and women spin, weave, and knit on this island- most people are walking around while spinning with a drop-spindle, and men walk around knitting scarves while others work on their looms. It’s really cool, and UNESCO declared Taquile a world heritage site in an effort to help preserve this unique tradition. The weaving is so incredibly intricate and takes so much work to finish! Mom and Katie, you would have loved it! Hopefully some of the photos can do it justice. From what I overheard from one of the tour groups going on today, it's a challenge for Taquile to keep its current way of life and to uphold its traditions today, traditions such as the style of weaving, the colors/clothing worn by the people, the Quechua language, and the traditional symbols used in their weaving. I also talked to Tomás a bit and found that you can't move onto the island yourself- you have to be born there. It was a really beautiful and interesting place to visit, and I hope that amidst the changes taking place elsewhere, it continues to function as well as it has for so long.