A Week with Paula

Paula and Trish on Lago Nahuel Huapi

Somewhere in the recesses of my mind I knew the lakes district of Argentina would be a place that Paula and I would love. So when my guide-book reading started to include lake district chapters, and I could project a rough time frame for when we’d be there, I fired off an email.

It went something like this: Paul, (I always call her Paul) I know it’s a long way to come and I know you have additional travel plans for after the first of the year but we’ll be in the lakes district in early December and maybe you would want to think about meeting us. I understand if it’s not in the cards but I thought I’d throw it out there.

Her reply was swift. Of course there was her work schedule to consider…..and her other travel plans…..and it would be hard to be away just a couple of weeks before Christmas…..but….she was already looking into flights!

A whole pile of frequent flyer miles later her flights were confirmed and Mike and I pressed south to meet her in Bariloche.


Once we knew she was coming we began a wish-list that included (of course) car parts but also a new camera (the zoom on mine died several countries ago), peanut butter (desperately absent in Argentina), coffee (also absent in all but the big cities), and chiles in adobo sauce (a favorite ingredient that is unknown here).

Paula could write a very funny story about travelling with the car parts, especially the self-adjusting push-rod tubes that are aluminum tubes and therefore could have been construed to be a terrorist tool. Looking nothing like a terrorist but still worried about being delayed for questioning she nervously made her way through customs in Buenos Aires and caught her onward flight to Bariloche.

The plan was for Paula to stay in small inns and/or B&Bs while Mike, Chettie and I camped nearby. That plan quickly morphed into Paula and me staying in hotels and…..you know.

But then the four days before her arrival were absolutely spectacular: sunny, warm, and oh, so picturesque. Mike and I camped alongside lakes and rivers and couldn’t believe how beautiful it was. I began to send emails asking if Paula would consider camping with us. I wanted her to get the full experience of our trip. She hemmed and then hawed but graciously said yes, if there was room and if it wasn’t too cold she was game.


Meanwhile we scouted out a small lakeside hosteria for her first night. We met her at the airport and worked our way to the Hosteria Lago Gutierrez where she and I stayed and sent Mike and Chettie to the campground in the national park on the other side of the lake.

First of all it was hard to believe we were together and in a place so far from either of our homes. And then she began to unpack her suitcase and in addition to the camera, aluminum tubes and other requested car parts, she brought lots of great booty. Books! Music (from Phil)! Crossword Puzzles! Chapstick! I know, it doesn’t sound like much, but it felt like the best Christmas ever. Yes, the peanut butter and coffee made the trip too; the adobo chiles got nixed in favor of the aluminum tubes. (During one email exchange in which she said the peanut butter and coffee were out as they didn’t fit with all the car parts and fleece she was bringing I bribed her saying I’d give her a lilac colored Mountain Hardware fleece I had picked up in Chile but haven’t really been wearing.)

Okay. She’s here. We began to make plans. Hiking was our primary focus. The whole lakes district is rife with trails of varying character and we sketched out our itinerary. We wanted to sample different areas without spending all of our time driving from town to town.

Ever patient Mike went along with all our plans. He shuttled us to this trailhead and picked us up at that trailhead. He waited while we hiked. He waited while we hiked to lakes. He waited while we hiked to miradors. He waited while we hiked to cascadas. He waited while we hiked to more miradors. He waited while we hiked to a refugio had lunch and hiked back down.

And the whole time we hiked we chattered away about everything from childhood memories to future plans. We laughed about silly things we did as kids and shared the sorrow of no longer having Ma and Dad around. We gabbed about what our friends (who are by now well known by each other) are up to. We talked about Phil and John, Thomas and Heather, Liam, Doug and all the other characters in our lives.

As the days went on the weather deteriorated. Paula, a self-admitted weather jinx, wasn’t about to let that bother her. Her Cape Cod vacations have taught her you can’t let bad weather dampen your spirits and it did let her off the hook for camping in the van.  

Evenings, we’d all go out to dinner. Afterwards, bellies full, Paula and I would head off to our warm, cozy hotel room and Mike and Chettie would head off to their camping spot. Somehow, I felt bad for Mike camping in the rain and cold, but I shouldn't have because he and I have spent many a cold night in the van and it's pretty cozy in its own way.....but those down comforters sure were nice.....

Those who know Paula and I know that some of our visits have been clouded by fighting. Hard to explain how it happens but it does and when it does it leaves both of us sad that our precious time together has been marred by strife.

This visit was different. It was one of the best visits we’ve ever had. We didn’t fight and we spent every minute enjoying being together.

Paula on Lago Gutierrez

Parque National Los Arrayanes

Warming up with some hot chocolate after a chilly hike in NP Los Arrayanes

Trish, Mike and Chettie on Nahuel Huapi at the Hotel La Angostura

Paula on Lago Traful

Springtime in the Andes - Villa Traful

Super windy mirador - Lago Traful

Lago Traful

At the cozy Marinas Puerto Traful

Refugio Cajon del Azul - Outside of El Bolson

Sheer relief after the first of 6 obstacles

Crossing one of two suspension bridges the book describes as "hairy". How did I know Paula didn't like heights??

Feigned terror at the thought of crossing the bridges taken after the crossing was completed

Paula on Lago Nahuel Huapi

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Here’s a funny story for those who know our friend John Gill

Late one afternoon we were driving along this desolate dirt road, the main route between Uyuni andTupiza Bolivia. The towns are 200km apart. The wind was blowing so hard it was creating sand drifts across the road not unlike snow during a ground-blizzard.

The sun was sinking low when we came to a place where the sand had completely obliterated the road. No tracks passed through the drift and we could not see the other end of it.

Mike went on a scouting expedition to see if perhaps locals used the nearby dry river bed as a passageway when this happened. No, no tire tracks in the river bed and deep soft sand made up our 100 foot long drift. The wind was howling.

By the time Mike got back I had decided we were not going to attempt crossing the sand drift. No way, no how. I figured we’d head back to Uyuni and try a different route the next day. Ever the optimist and always up for an adventure, Mike suggested we try it.

In the heated debate that followed (after pointing out I did not think our marriage would endure getting stuck in the sand in the dark on this desolate road), I blurted out, ‘Some day when you’re with John Gill you can attempt something like this!” Some sentences convey more than their actual words. We turned around.

Mike suggested instead of abandoning our efforts altogether, we find a place to camp and try again in the morning. A good compromise, we found a place off the side of a side road. We spent the night speculating what would have happened had we made the attempt and what we might find in the morning. Plan A, Plan B, Plan C….

Burly Beast in the desert

View from the slider at our oh-so-remote campsite

Anticlimactically, by the time we got back to the drift the next morning a few vehicles had crossed, packing down the sand and our crossing was a breeze.

Bolivia

We entered Bolivia the same way we left Peru: along the shores of Lago Titicaca. We camped just beyond the town of Copacobana for several nights on a tip from Didi, a Belgian woman we met in Cuzco, and spent our days nosing further north along the Bolivian side of the lake.

The Burly Beast on Lake Titicaca

Looking back on Copacobana from our campsite

Mike Chet and the Beast on Lago Titicaca

I loved the lake and its many faces. So big as to be oceanic, Titicaca shared its many moods with us. Sapphire is the color we saw most often, but we also saw many shades of green and grey. Calm waters and frothy white caps all made themselves known.

Along the chilly southern shore of Titicaca

Sunset over Titicaca

However, I’ll share a sad truth with you. Much of the lake shore, especially near population centers, is choked with basura (trash). Certainly not unique to Lago Titicaca, Peru or Bolivia, but rather, a theme we have seen throughout Latin America, the prevalence of roadside trash is heartbreaking. Of course, plastic is a huge part of the problem.

Basura on the beach at Copacobana

From Copacobana, we headed to the Cordillera Central and spent several days chilling at the Altai Oasis in Sarota. I’d gotten the cold Mike had in Cuzco and this was the perfect place for recovery. The owner’s son loaded a ton of music onto our computer including Bossa N Stones a breathless girl band doing Rolling Stones covers. Totally fun to have new music! Check them out: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hFQVuJjvn-k

Despues de Sarota, we hit La Paz and loved it. It’s a cool city with a nice vibe. I enjoyed traipsing up one hill and down the other in this unique setting of a city built on a series of super steep hills. The weather was superb.


Overland travelers like us generally stay at the Hotel Oberland. It is in Mallasa, a tony suburb of La Paz and Swiss owner Walter has set aside a small parking area for overlanders. The parking area is basic to be sure but it’s great to have a secure place in a big city.

The hotel itself is lovely with a good restaurant serving food like raclette and fondue that was a salve for the Swiss and German travelers’ home sicknesses. There is a nice pool and a great sauna that allowed me to turn our stay into a spa vacation.

But the Hotel Overland is just one reason travelers come to La Paz. Another is Ernesto Hugg, mechanic extraordinaire. Travelers with all kinds of vehicles make appointments with the esteemed Ernesto while in La Paz and the lot at Hotel Oberland is full of travelers jostling for position based on who has the next appointment with Ernesto.

The scene at Hotel Oberland upon our arrival

There were a few things needing attention on the van, nothing critical but more in the ‘annoying’ category. Mike went and met with Ernesto, but decided if we were going to have parts shipped in he could do the work himself and we wouldn’t have to wait for an appointment. We left for Coroico.

Coroico is a cute little town halfway between the jungle and the mountains and thus has a very pleasant climate. The lower altitude was also welcomed after being up so high since Ecuador, through much of Peru, along Lago Titicaca (3820m) and in La Paz (3660m).

We hooked up with the local Spanish instructor and gave our language skills a boost, we enjoyed life in a small town, I got one of the worst haircuts and color jobs ever, and we just generally relaxed after being in a big city. Ralph and Corinna, two of our favorite people, crossed paths with us here for the third time. They kindly spent time giving us tips and info on travel in Chile and Argentina.

Ralph and Corinna with Tortuga del Mundo ( I love this photo, not only for how lovingly he is looking at her (they were married on their trip in Mendoza Argentina) but also for the smudge of dust on his shirt. Just as I was about to snap the photo he reached over and tried to dust off the 'Tortuga del Mundo' decal on the vehicle door, and then wiped his hand on his shirt in typical boy fashion!)

And then, a small antifreeze leak alerted us that a weird plastic part that distributes engine coolant had cracked. Uh-oh......

Mike went in search of a machinist in Coroico who could fashion a replacement piece, but everyone he asked told him to fix it with Poxalina. Now we had never heard of Poxalina but Mike bought some and we skeptically translated the package directions to mix the two part epoxy and mold it around our broken piece of plastic.

With the Poxalina’d part in place we headed back to La Paz thinking maybe we’d be going to see Ernesto Hugg after all. But upon our return to the Oberland we ran into Didi (the Belgian woman mentioned previously) and her husband, Guy. They had lived in La Paz for 8 years and Guy gave Mike the name of an old friend who owns a large construction manufacturing company, conveniently headquartered just a few kilometers from Hotel Oberland.

And this is how we met Miguel Reznicek at Pretensa. One of the nicest people we’ve ever met, Miguel set one of his employees up making us a new piece. And indeed, a few days later Miguel stopped by Hotel Oberland with a newly made piece. Check out his personal website  http://www.intoku.net/ for a glimpse into his ethos.

We’ll never know how long the Poxalina would have held. We know it held long enough for us to get from Coroico to La Paz. More importantly, we know the new piece is as strong as anything we would have had shipped in and we got to meet some great people along the way.

The scene at the Hotel Oberland upon our return (we are in the far upper left-hand corner).

Mike holed up in our little corner of the parking lot of the Hotel Oberland as we waited for the newly crafted part.

Okay. Titicaca was great. La Paz was great. But, really, the highlight of Bolivia for us was the Salar de Uyuni, the largest salt flat in the world. I was skeptical before we arrived. It was hard to imagine what driving and camping on a wide open sea of salt would be like.

The Salar is in the remote south west corner of Bolivia and driving there is part of the experience. Just 10 percent of the roads in Bolivia are paved and some, even major routes, are worse than many 4-wheel drive roads we are familiar with in the Colorado mountains. We traveled kilometer after kilometer of filling-loosening washboard over which the maximum speed is 15-20 miles per hour. This slow approach gave me plenty of time to ponder what was to come.

We spent two nights in the desert and then passed through some really small native villages before reaching the Salar. It was late and the sun was setting as we drove out onto the salt for the first time. We headed for the Isla de Pescado (my nickname-sake island).

Our approach to the Salar de Uyuni

Mike, Chettie and the Beast (and my long shadow) at sunset at Isla Pescado

Pictures say a lot more than words about the salar but the words we've come up with are:

peaceful

unique

otherworldly

eerie

windy

vast

mind-boggling

salty

spectacular

flat

white

empty

crystalline

....And of course, Mike seeking enlightenment



Company’s coming!

We’ve been on the road a little more than a year and we’ve had but one visitor, Mike’s brother Jim, who as you know came on a car parts mission.

Despite many friends expressing a desire to meet us somewhere along the way, life and all its complications makes turning a desire into reality difficult. We understand.

BUT!

Once Mike and I had identified a rough time frame for being in the lakes district of Argentina, my sister Paula (always up for travel and adventure) didn’t waste one minute making her flight arrangements to come and meet us.

Paula and Trish in the Bariloche Airport



Y entonces, JoAnn, one of the Wild Women, has just turned Cinquenta. She has decided an adventure of large magnitude is in order to commemorate the event. She’s meeting us in El Calafete in January and we’ll travel south together to Ushuia.

Imagine. The Reid girls do the fashionable Lakes District and the Wild Women do the Fin del Mundo! It’s too fun to think about.

Peru: Take Two

Yes, indeed we are greatly impacted by the weather. After all, we live in our van. We are intimately aware of the temperatures both day and night. We are tuned into the phases of the moon. And we are cognisant of our altitude as it impacts the temperature and thus plays a role in our general comfort.

And so……things shifted for us in terms of the weather and therefore our feelings about Peru somewhere near Arequipa. While in the north we had plenty of grey weather, in the south the sun came out for real.

Views from the Pan-Am north and south - we prefer blue over grey

Arequipa is a big city and a tourist nexus, not usually our kind of place. But, it is well laid out, clean, and the weather was perfect while we were there. Our set up at the Hotel Las Mercedes worked well and allowed us to explore and enjoy the city with ease. We strolled the streets and lolled in the Plaza de Armas (as the main plaza is called in many South American cities, as opposed to Parque Central as it was called in Central America), we dined out and generally enjoyed our time there.

Cathedral on the Plaza de Armas - Arequipa

My requisite tourist activity was a visit to the Monesterio Santa Catalina where I spent a relaxing afternoon marvelling at how beautiful it is. Built in the 1500s and still in use today, it is so big they refer to it as a city within a city. Sure, the history and information on the lives of those who live there was interesting, but the setting was stunning.

Scenes from Santa Catalina

At the Hotel Las Mercedes we bonded with Suzanne and Didi, a Swiss couple who are traveling north, comparing notes on highlight locations and best places to stay. It was a nice transition for us from northern Peru where we mostly ‘wild’ camped and interacted with few other overlanders.

The Peru-love meter began to climb.

Juxtaposed to Arequipa was the Colca Canyon, our next destination. About 3 hours from Arequipa and worlds away, Colca is deeper than the Grand Canyon. To get there we crossed a pass that was 16,000 feet—we were winded just driving.

Atop the pass there are hundreds, perhaps thousands, of little piles of rocks...very cool, kind of weird.

I left a ´lucky rock´we´d been carrying since Utah on another rock on the top of the pass

The Colca Canyon was great for us—plenty of wide open spaces with camping possibilities at every turn. We soaked in hot springs, Chet and I hiked to a ‘geyser’ (really a natural steam vent in the earth’s surface—super powerful and somewhat scary), saw Andean Condors and took in a program at the planetarium to learn more about the constellations we are now seeing.

Pre Inca terracing in the Colca Canyon

Andean Condors

Roadside Art - Colca Canyon

Campsite near the geyser

Geyser - aka steam vent - Colca Canyon

Again, the weather was perfect: warm sunny days, cool, crisp nights (okay, the nights were really cold but we are equipped for that so it was no problem). There are a string of towns along the canyon rim and each had its own charming personality. In so many ways, the Colca Canyon was everything I had hoped Huaraz and the valley between the Cordilleras Negra and Blanca would be. The Peru-love meter climbed several notches.

From here we headed towards Cuzco. This drive could have been done in one day had we taken the road most traveled. But since the cute girl at the tourist office told Mike that a different road would take the same amount of time, we set off on the road less traveled. By the time we realized that the drive time was going to be far greater we were well underway and it was pointless to turn back. So off-the-beaten-track was this route the road was not on my map but as we all know, sometimes these ‘mistakes’ turn out for the best....we forged on.

We came to a crossroads with precious little signage. Wanting to confirm that we were indeed headed to Cuzco, we stopped to ask two women who were sitting at the side of the road near the intersection. They were working on some craft-type textiles destined for some tourist´s luggage and listening to a static-y transistor radio. In addition to directions we inquired about the availability of gas, having set off without knowing we were headed to the hinterlands. One of the women (the more animated of the two, though they were both darling) said she had gas in town, 3 kilometers away. We loaded them up into the van and headed to town.

Our two new friends piled into the Burly Beast

And when we got there she and Mike funneled gas into our tank and our spare can for the journey. She owned a tienda (variety store) and I also picked up a few veggies and TP and off we went.

Along the road less travelled

The first night we stayed along the road at the start of a long stretch of altoplano. Very beautiful. Only us. Doubt many gringos have been here, let alone stayed here. And in the morning we continued on, across miles and miles of altoplano and herd after herd of llamas, vacunas, sheep, etc. Desolate but beautiful. Dirt roads the whole way.

I eyed the map and dead-reckoned to identify a few places we might be able to stay the second night, knowing we probably wouldn’t make it as far as the main road to Cuzco. The best choice was along the Laguna Layo. More driving, no laguna. Finally, a roadside sign for the town of Layo. We turned right and headed into town.

We asked a few people about places to camp and had identified our best spot and then stopped at a small tienda for some bread and water. Eduardo, a boy of 14 tending the store, was interested in the gringa (me), and asked where we were staying. I told him and asked if he knew of another place.

He told me other people camp at the end of the lake and so that’s where we headed. Yup, another cool campsite. The lake was beautiful and we hung here for two days watching the sheep, cattle and llamas go out to pasture in the morning and returning in the evening. Super peaceful. Again, our Peru-love meter rose.

The daily comings and goings of the local livestock

Chet at sunset - Laguna Layo

And then we set off for our final approach to Cuzco. Again the weather impacted our first impression of the city, with a grey cloud cover dampening our spirits and the Peru-love meter slid a few clicks. And, while probably delightfully quaint 20 years ago, Cuzco sprawls down its valley for miles.

We worked our way to the famous-among-overlanders camping Quinta Lala and who should we find there but Suzanne and Didi our friends from Arequipa. They had arrived just two hours before. A ray of sunshine and the love meter climbed again. (Don’t ask me why I don’t have any pictures of them….we spent lots of time together but never got the camera out.)

Quinta Lala is a little oasis for travelers like us. It is just outside the city but an easy walk or short cab ride and it has what we need: bathrooms, hot showers, wifi, laundry facilities and a small kitchen. We stayed several days as other travelers arrived and left. Every few days llamas were brought in to help maintain the grass.

The scene at Quinta Lala

Sadly, there are many chickens at Quinta Lala and Missy Chettie has an appetite for chickens. We had to keep a close eye on her (never did tell you about the chicken she killed, and we subsequently bought, at a campsite in Mexico). At one point at Quinta Lala she broke her leash in hot pursuit and had a chicken in her mouth before, luckily for the chicken, I interceded. Remember, Chet is a bird-dog. I digress.

The cloud cover that had tainted our initial impression of Cuzco lifted and as the sun shone and as I explored the city on foot, the Peru-love meter again climbed higher. A tourist portal for those headed to the Sacred Valley and Machu Pichu, the city is crawling with extranjeros (foreigners), but consequently is set up to service our every need. We exchanged books, got haircuts and bought good bread, cheese, coffee and granola.

Exploring the side streets of Cuzco

Doorway Dogs - Cuzco

And then we had a decision to make: to Machu Pichu or not to Machu Pichu.

Reasons for going:

One-in-the-world kind of place

Certain to be powerful and impactful

People will think you are crazy if you were in Cuzco but didn’t go to Machu Pichu

Reasons for not going:
A bit of a harangue to get there
Height of tourist season—reports of having to jostle with hundreds of tour-group members
We are traveling with a dog (though a friend offered to care for her while we went)
We are not ruin site fanatics
Mike was sick
Who cares what other people think

Many, many conversations later we opted out of the Machu Pichu experience and headed instead to the Sacred Valley. This was the right decision for us and the Peru-love meter climbed again.

One of our campsites above the Sacred Valley

The valley is beautiful and we spent plenty of time poking around its many side valleys and towns. One night on our way up the valley out of Ollyantatambo looking for a campsite we picked up two young boys walking home from school who flagged us down (everyone flags us down, we look a lot like the local ‘micros’ or ‘combis’ that the locals use as their main source of transportation. Also, people walking long distances will flag down any vehicle going by and as a vehicle going by it’s a courtesy to pick them up. It often opens doors and conversations for us.)

The boys hopped in and told us they lived 20 minutes further up the road. As we climbed higher in altitude, we asked if they knew a place we could camp for the night explaining we sleep in the van, showing them the bed, fridge, kitchen, etc. One boy said, Yes, he knew of a place by his house. Both Mike and I feared a yard full of chickens but we continued on, chatting with the boys and telling them about our lives and adventures and asking about theirs.

Finally the boy pointed out his house, down in a valley (no access road to the house; not needed if you don’t have a car) and then pointed out a small, level plot at the side of the road where a new house was being built. The workers were just finishing up for the night and said it was okay for us to stay there. Cool. We got what we needed (a place to stay) and the buys got what they needed (a ride home). BTW, they walk about 2 hours (one way) to school every day.

One of the boy´s houses below our campsite

They stayed and talked to us for a long, long time just wanting to know about our lives. And we were joined by several other kids as they made their way home from school (Again, didn’t get the camera out. I feel awkward about putting a camera in someone’s face just for being who they are.)

The next morning as we worked our way down the valley we encountered some of the same kids (though not our two original boys) and each of them flagged us down. We ended up with 8 kids in the van and served as the local school bus that day.

Of course, we communicated in Spanish but I asked one of the boys what language he used when he spoke with his friends and he told me Quechua, the language of the indigenas. Such a treat for us to see this glimpse of a world so different from ours.

As we dropped them off at the school the teacher was waiting at the door (checking us out to make sure we meant no harm) and laughed when I told the kids to ‘Aprender mucho’, (Learn a lot!). Here, we did bust out the camera as by now they seemed more our friends than an oddity to be photographed.

Trish and the school kids

We tracked our way up and down the Sacred Valley enjoying the setting and the scenery. In order to appease the Ruins Gods for our decision to opt out of Machu Pichu, we toured the ruins at Ollantatambo thinking if we were so moved by the experience we could still make the trip to Machu Pichu.

We had a great guide who understood we were as interested in hearing the information in Spanish as we were in what was being said. He obliged us by telling us about the site first in Spanish and then in English, so we could check if we were ‘getting it’. He also doubled as our photographer, asking for the camera at all the key photo-op locations. (Reminded us of our wedding in Salzburg where, for $26, a man played Mozart melodies and doubled as our photographer…a story for another day).

And after our visit to the ruins at Ollantatambo we stopped into Inca Bucks for a coffee

The ruins were….interesting. While I wanted to be so moved I’d just have to go to Machu Pichu, I found them interesting and pretty, and that was that. Answer me this: if you go to (or live in) Colorado but have never been to Mesa Verde, have you seen Colorado?

We continued to poke around the Sacred Valley, with one more great encounter that must be discussed. We ended up one evening at Los Girasoles, a lodging accomodation owned by Peruvian, Jose Luis and his Austrian wife Christa. It is a little slice of paradise, very serene and peaceful. When Mike called in at the gate he saw a beautiful Westfalia parked on the property and figured it was another traveller.

The Westy was actually owned by Javier and his wife Patricia who are living in one of the houses on the property while their house is being built. We instantly bonded over the Westys and Mike shared lots of information on the various systems as they haven´t owned it very long. They in turn shared the home-made lp gas tank adapter with us, that made filling our tank the next day a breeze. They could be the only ones in all of Peru that have such an adapter and it was incredible that our paths should cross.

Patricia and Javier invited us to their house the next night along with Jose Luis and Christa. We shared a great evening and felt more like old friends than lodging guests. It is a rare gift indeed to be able to make people feel so welcomed and comfortable in such a short time. This sent the Peru-love meter higher still.

We eventually left the Sacred Valley and headed towards Lago Titicaca.

On our way to Titicaca we stumbled into the gorgeous Canyon Tinajani (not in any guide book or even labeled on the map) and spent two incredible days lounging in the sun, hiking and gaping at the scenery.

This forlorn sign....

...led to this scenic, Utahesque canyon

Then on to Lago Titicaca where we stayed in several different places, each with its own personality.


Puno: Big city with corrupt police who tried twice within our first hour in town to extort money from us for some fictitious infraction of the law. Our lodging was in a hotel parking lot, not our favorite, but convenient with a shower that rocked and stong wifi. Puno highlight: touring the Yavari, a ship that was made in England in the 1800s and shipped in pieces and carried over the Andies to Puno. Cool ship, moored right behind the hotel.

Yavari

Llanchon: My personal favorite. Small indigenous village at the end of Capachica Peninsula. Beautiful setting that gave us a glimpse of what the lake and its villages were like before the masses arrived. We met some kindly locals. We hired a local fisherman to take us to the island of Taquile that was beautiful but sadly, lost to tourism. We wild camped on the shores of the lake and watched local life go by for several peaceful days. At night we had great views of the lights of Puno across the lake.

Grazing sheep - Llanchon

Playa de Chatuma: Natural caves carved out of rock along the southern shore of Titicaca. A roadside sign lured us in for one more night on the Peruvian side of the border. It poured rain and we barely got out of the van; woke to a mini Lake Titicaca under the van.

Storm clouds gathering - looking towards the Bolivian side of Titicaca

By now you know that our feelings for Peru changed as we visited the southern part of the country. Our mode of transportation allows us to see places more in depth than just hitting the major attractions and random encounters with people positively impact our experience.