Puno / Sillustani / Islas Flotantes

From cabanoconde we had to back track all the way to Arequipa to get a ride back to puno…which happened to be along the same road but had no connecting buses. It was another beautiful bus ride though, through the vast high desert plains pass breathtakingly beautiful lakes with flamingos and open ranges of alpacas grazing. Our first views of puno were a big surprise, coming over the mountain to find a valley densely populated and developed…not exactly what I had in mind when I envisioned visiting lake titicaca. But the town turned out to be alright, with some descent shopping and excellent restaurants, but not much focus on the lake itself, having the city center about a mile from it.
We did go on an excellent tour though to the funerary towers of sillustani. The towers themselves were impressive indeed, some up to thirty feet tall, but what really made it special was the location looking out over lake Titicaca and some gorgeous terraced hillsides and islands. We stopped at an amazing household as well on the way back that was traditional for the area and made entirely of rock…each family created a compound of sorts with an exterior fence with archway entrances and separate buildings for sleeping, cooking, and so on…even the pet guinea pigs had their own little stone houses with thatched roofs and stone fences…it was entirely adorable…something out of a fairytale, with little doorways about chest high and llamas out front to welcome you in…completely unique to anything we’ve seen thus far in peru.
Another jaunt out from puno was to the famous reed floating islands. Despite their utter over exploitation by tourism, the islands were still pretty amazing. There are about sixty islands in total out in the reeds about an hour from puno by boat. Each island beckons you over with a handful of inhabitants, mostly women in neon “traditional” garb. The visit consist mostly of brief explanation of how the islands stay afloat, basically by fastening the reed root structures together and then cross staking piles of more reeds on top, followed by attempts to sell the tourist handicrafts made from reeds and other textiles, and then a little joy ride around to some other islands via a huge reed boat. The enjoyment of the tour is based largely on which islands you get to visit…some islands we stopped at were nothing but tourist traps with only restaurants and souvenirs, while other were magical places with gardens, flamingos, cute little reed huts, and at least a sense of how these people lived traditionally. Basically, the islands were incredible in their ingenuity and unique aesthetic, but tragic in any sort of social studies sense.