The Weekend that Wasn't

Hey friends it's been a while! Sorry for the break I'm just soooOooOooOooo busy being popular I don't have any time to update. Just kidding...HA. Um, so this weekend (Fri thru Mon) a group of friendskis and I went to Puno, a city on Lake Titicaca. The name does NOT mean what I'm sure you think it means. Actually, no one knows what it means so it COULD in fact mean what you think it means. The translation the guide told us was something like "Rock Puma". Remember, pumas are the sacred animal of the earth world. ANYWAY. There was, like I said, a festival. La Festival de la Virgen de la Candelaria to be exact! This shit was beyond a parade. The outfits...not real. Actually, the whole weekend was unreal. Let me start at the beginning...

Wall at Rachi

The first day, we drove roughly 7 hours to Puno. It took that long because we stopped at a church and ruins. I only have a pic of the outside of the church cause they wanted you to pay to go in and you couldn't take pics. If you're scoffing at me I've already seen la Catedral in the main square of Cuzco and I feel like if you've seen one church you've seen 'em all.

soOoooOo artsy

Anyway, the next stop was these ruins called Rachi, I think. When we first got there there was a little market with kinda the same "handycrafts" as the Peruanos call them. Over the fence you could see a huge wall. The majority of us were so game to pay the 10 soles it took to get in, but three stayed behind claiming they could "See the wall well enough from here". WELL, we got in and the ruins were actually huge. We didnt have a tour guide so I didn't know what the hell I was looking at, but it sure was cool. Also, we stumbled across a f*cking tarantula. Not right. I got a sweet pic though. On the way out, we found some cool flowers so I took some ArTzY pIcZ.

just a tarantula NBD *voms*

Pretty flower

We finally arrived in Puno and after our driver asked 8 different randoms how to get there, checked into our hotel, showered and rested. At around 8, we went in search for dinner. A woman flagged us down and enticed us with a three course meal for only 18 soles (a.k.a 10 dollars) with wine or pisco sours included! The food didn't live up to expectations and we were all hungry afterward but didn't do anything but complain about it. Actually, the boys went and got a shit ton of rice/lo mein for 5 soles. We sat and played Phase 10 in one of the girls rooms but then all decided we were tired and retired to our rooms for the night where I took the best shower I've had since I've been here. Seriously, so hot and water pressure that I think is illegal in the United States.

How they build the islands

Saturday morning, we were up at 6:45, had breakfast at 7, and were out the door ready for our tour by 7:45ish. We got on a bus and picked up other groups that were touring with us, then went to the boat. There were 22 people in total on the tour but only 8 of us from USIL. There was this one hispanic family that everyone hated because they were rude and took pictures of us like we were zoo animals. Otherwise this other group of Brits with Toucan Travels who had a cute tour guide named Rico, a couple from Sweden, some random other American girls, and finally our tour guide named Leo.

Leafy

my pride and joy of a pic

We rode on the boat for about an hour before we got to the Uros floating islands. These things were seriously so cool. They showed us how they built them which is with dirt, and these reed things they lay on it. They put it out there and basically just let it grown and then add layers and layers of reeds for the flooring. The island itself is like 2 meters thick. They use special anchors that go way back to shore to keep the island in place and then live in these little huts. We got to try the reeds which are really good and apparently good for you too.

They mostly tasted like you'd expect them to taste - kinda lettucey. Luckily I like lettuce so it was delicious. We took a cool tourist reed boat over to another island where I got my passport stamped and took probably the best picture I've ever taken. It might not be as cool as I think it is but I'm really proud of it.

I found the island from Lost!

After the floating islands, we took a 3 hour boat trip to the island Amantani for the tour and homestay. The boat trips were one of the most fun parts for me for some reason. A lot of us just sat on the top of the boat and basked in the sun and shot the shit and over all just enjoyed ourselves. The only thing we were missing were a few bottles of cerveza cusquena! I got sufficiently sunburnt on the ride over and as we approached the island I thought we were for sure going to capsize the waves were so big. We didn't, in case anyone was wondering *WINK*

Anyway, we got to the island and got split up into two groups of four and assigned host families. This island seriously reminded me of the Shire from Lord of the Rings, and all the views were honestly breathtaking. We hiked up to our host mom's (Mary) house, passing sheep and donkeys grazing on the greenery. The people here live such a humble life it made me wonder how they would fare in los Estados Unidos, where everything is rushed and hectic and there is never enough time. We finally reached the house and took a little rest before we had to leave to play a soccer, pardon me, futbol, game against the locals.

Hiking was seriously KILLER here. You really don't realize how much the altitude affects you until you're out of breath from going up a baby ramp that was maybe twenty feet long. Not to say it wasn't hard, I was sore from my ankles to my butt on Sunday. Anyway, they asked us to play soccer which I haven't played since 8th grade. We lost pretty pathetically to some little shits from Holland. They were offsides basically the entire time and won by CHEATING. At least, that's what I'm gonna tell myself. I look pretty much like a dumb ass in these pics but I did get the ball away from a girl!

Touristin' HARD

After soccer, we went on a hike up to the temple on the highest point of the island. This hike is the hike that made me want to not live any longer. We tried this natural plant called Muña. If you roll it in your hands and then deeply inhale it smells like mint and completely clears out your respiratory system and helps you get your breath back. Great for hiking at 12,000 feet! I can't get this out of caps, omg...ovs it. Anyway, we got to the top of this "mountain" and I never wanted to leave the view was so incredible. Honestly, even the beautiful pictures don't do it justice. If you walked around the temple three times and made a wish as you took a rock and put it on the temple wall, it's supposed to come true. But you can't walk around it more or less than three times and you have to go to the right not the left. It was seriously so beautiful though I can't say that enough.

THRILLED

We walked back down in the dark, and I nearly broke my ankle. Okay that's an exaggeration, but it rolled a FEW times and scared the shit out of me. We got back to our host house and ate dinner, which I loved but everyone else hated. It's weird how picky I used to be and how picky I'm not now. It was rice and potatoes and random vegetables. Of course soup also. Oh, we also had lunch there where I had the best cheese so far on this tour. It was fried and it was squeaky and DELICIOUS. Anyway, after dinner we went to "descansar" or rest, which is something they do a lot here. A half hour later our host mom brought us lovely traditional garb to put on before we headed to the discoteca. 

 Happy campers

I was not feeling it and as soon as we got to the discoteca a friend and I bought a beer and planted our asses on the sidelines. Call me a party pooper but I hate stuff like that where everyone looks stupid together and they call it "fun". After the beer, I was ready for bed and we left for our host house. The three other girls and I talked about our pets and how much we missed them before we fell asleep.

Yes, I was that close

On Sunday we woke up at 6:45 again to get ready and eat our breakfast of strange luke warm pancakes and jam. After that we headed back down in our ponchos to the boat. We said goodbye to our host mom and headed back onto the boat. We did about an hour of traveling to another island called Taquile. The hike up Taquile was another miserable one and I have never been so uncomfortably hot and freezing at the same time. I got a cool pic of a cow, though.


We got to the main square and I got the best banana I've had here, then headed to the restaurant where we had to sit and listen to the tour guide talk about shit we did NOT care about for an hour. Mostly, we were hungry and wet and crabby and didn't care which hats they wore to signify if they were single or married. I just about murdered the inconsiderate spanish speaking fam because they talked through the whole thing. The daughter was in damn heels for Pete's sake. IT WAS A HIKING TRIP. Moving on...we finally ate and then headed back down the 569 stairs to the boat. My legs were jelly by the end of the stairs, but I am so glad we did went up them instead of down. 



A few friends and I were the last stragglers (sorry not sorry) and when we arrived we were told that the Brits were jumping into Lake Titicaca. The water was maybe 40 degrees so this is a crazy thing to do, but two friends and I wanted to do it as well. I went to get my swimsuit cause conveniently I had packed one for the trip only to find I had left it with my other back at the damn hotel -_-. I wouldve done it if I had another bra/not see through shirts/a change of close but I had none of these things. So I just stared wistfully as my two friends jumped into the chilly water.

Then it was another three hour trek via boat to Puno. When we got there, apparently it had rained because the streets were flooded and I was horrified to find that these men were running their Bicicletaxis BAREFOOT in janky ass water. To each his own, I guess. We got dropped off at our first hotel, and had to walk to our second which was significantly less classy. After a slight catastrophe with the showers, we finally got hot water and showers. We went to dinner at this place called Mocjsa (I think) where I had the best Sangria I've ever tasted. After the restaurant, we went to find booze and mixers, returned to the hotel, and pre-gamed for the night out on the town.
We left and danced with the parade and got called gringos and I loved every single second of it. We found this bar and I had the best drink of my life called "California's Dream". They played American music and I ate that shit up. I actually think we all did. I talked to a bunch of people from so many places and it was a great experience. The next morning was rough with a capital R. I got up for breakfast but wasn't too keen to eat much of it, went back to bed for a bit, took a shower, then actually was ready to check out at 11 and go walk around. All of us were cranky and hung over and hungry so it took us a damn hour and twenty minutes to finally agree to a place to eat. After that, we split up and went shopping for random shit before the bus picked us up at two. It's weird to explain, but I was actually homesick for Cuzco. Puno was cool, but Cuzco is just better. I slept for a bunch of the car ride home and otherwise we all laughed and chatted and listened to the drivers weird music. When we finally reached home it was verryyyyyyyyy nice.
And THAT is my weekend! Otherwise, my other host sister, Lucia came home from Lima. She is so nice and I can't wait to get to know her better. Also, I found out that my host fam is building a bathroom and putting furniture in the bedroom upstairs so I can live there and Lucia can be back in her room. The upstairs bedroom is huge so I must say I'm pretty damn excited about it.