Peru VI: The Lake Titicaca Man-made Islands

We met our Puno area guide, Elijah, on October 8, 2022.  He explained that he got his name because his birthday was the Saint’s Day for the prophet Elijah!  Our main guide, Raul, will travel with us throughout the trip.   Gate 1 also hires local guides for each area we are visiting—Lima, Arequipa and Colca, Puno, and the Cuzco/Machu Picchu/Sacred Valley area.  Both Raul and the local guides tell their personal stories, as well as telling about their home area with special fondness.  That's not Elijah, but Mike in the photo above, dressed as a Uros islander from the man-made islands of Lake Titicaca. 

We piled onto a boat this morning and sailed through a channel, lined with reeds, to the Uros islands in Lake Titicaca.   The islands that dot the lake are handmade from tatora reeds.  Many years ago, the Uros people were chased by the warlike Wari tribe from their homes on dry land into the lake.  They survived by using reeds to build new islands whenever an old one began to sink, or when a new family was formed.

There are about 120 Uros islands.  The island association assigns each tourist boat to a different island to receive a tour.  

A man from our island used a rough model (piece of water-logged reed with model homes and people made from reeds on top) to show us how the islands are created and how the islanders know when to create new ones.

They showed us the fine embroidery the islanders make, and they took us on a tour of one of their homes, made of reeds.  Even on reed islands, they have cell phones and electricity.

The islanders then dressed us in native clothes for photographs.

After touring the island, we took a boat ride across a portion of the lake on a boat handmade of reeds.

 

After returning from Lake Titicaca, we walked through the streets of Puno to a restaurant our guide suggested for lunch.  Of course, fried guinea pig was on the menu!

Churches are at the heart of Peruvian towns and cities.  On October 8, we got to see a bride and groom leave after their wedding.

Raul took Dave and me to the local market to buy a new suitcase, after the zipper on my suitcase broke.  "This was probably smuggled," Raul said of the suitcase.  Bolivians import all sorts of consumer goods without being required to pay taxes by their government.  Peruvians then smuggle the goods across the Peruvian border to avoid the Peruvian tax collectors.  "Smugglers would bring a few suitcases at a time, in a private car, rather than a big truck of them," Raul said.

As we walked the Puno streets, we saw many women in traditional dress, including the distinctive bowler hats.

After lunch, we visited Sillustani, a pre-Inca burial ground.  The Incan kings assembled an empire stretching from Ecuador in the north to Argentina in the south, in the 1400s.  The Incas were conquered by the Spanish in 1532.  There are many Inca ruins in Peru, including Machu Picchu, but there are also lots of ruins from the tribes that reigned in Peru before the Incas took control. 

In early times, Peruvian dead were buried above ground, curled up in the fetal position.  These receptacles held their bodies.