Puno:
Lago Titicaca is the seconds highest navigable lake in the world and the largest lake in South America. The lake is the birthplace of the first Inca´s and it seemed a fitting place to visit before heading to Cusco and the Sacred Valley.
A cradle for early civilizations, the Pukara people settled in Puno and on Lago Titicaca in 200 B.C. and it has been inhabited ever since. The Uros culture lived on the shores of the lake in pre Incan times, and in an effort to escape the Inca´s created floating islands out in the lake made of reeds that grow in and around the lake. The culture constructed hundreds of floating reed islands where they also built their houses, schools, stores, boats, and clothes all out of the reeds. The islands are continually rotting and sinking, thus a top layer of reeds is added weekly. I took a boat out to the Islands to experience them first hand, and have never seen anything like it. They are all connected by ropes and anchors and the people have removed the reeds in the middle of the islands to create mini fisheries for food. It was crazy.
Sillustani:
30 minutes from Puno, nestled high on a peninsula above Lago Umayo massive funerary towers were constructed to house the most important Incan royalty on their way to the next world. Over 36 feet tall, the cylindrical structures are an engineering mystery. Archaeologists have been trying to rebuild and duplicate similar structures, using today's technology, without success. The pieces of rock are too big, the structures too high, and the quarry too distant to transport the rocks. Cusco:
I have settled in Cusco. The closer I got, the less I could resist is magnetic pull. And once I arrived, I immediately knew why. It is a magical city with endless ruins, markets, and museums to explore during the day, and parties every night of the week until sunrise.
After much haggling, I negotiated a room for a month for $100 and have been enjoying having my bag unpacked and a place to call home for more than a few days at a time. Cusco is full of old Incan fortresses, temples, and ruins of a lost time, suffice it to say they are all amazing and awe inspiring and it is beyond me to give them all due descriptions.
Here I am happy and with a full beard in Cusco.
