Day 1
It was time to leave the big city of La Paz and head to the
border town of Copacabana (not the Brazilian one!), so we had an early pick up
time of 7am and around a 3-4 hour coach trip.
Along the way, we just read and watched the scenery go past
and seeing all the half built buildings, which now I have learned is just a tax
avoidance measure by the residents. I was also quite amused to see the bowler
hat ladies involved in a 11-a-side football match, resplendent in their
traditional outfits (minus the bowler hats).
About 45 minutes before we hit Copacabana, we had to pull over for a river/lake crossing
whereby we all had to get off the coach and queue up to get a boat ticket
whilst the coach was loaded onto a larger boat and taken across separately. They
loaded as many people as possible onto these small boats, which was a bit
worrying as they were sitting so low in the water. But on the plus side we were
sat opposite some Cholita’s so Shell managed to get a sneaky photo!
Once over the water crossing we re-boarded our coach and
soon we were arriving in the touristy town of Copacabana. Copacabana is right
on the shores of Lake Titicaca, the largest/highest lake in the world. The town is also very busy with tourists as it
is one of the most popular border crossings to Peru.
We then found that our lodgings for the night were a bit of
the way up a hill and as this town is at over 3,500 metres, dragging our bags
up that hill in thin air was quite hard work.
However, on checking in we found the hostel to be quite nice and we had
a large room with views over Lake Titicaca.
After ditching our bags, we headed into town and had a drink
and a salad lunch whilst sorting out our plans for the next couple of
days. We then headed for a travel agency
where we booked our exit tickets to Peru and a boat trip to take us to Isla Del
Sol for the following morning.
Bookings done we headed to the Lake shore and walked around
for a bit, as I said it was very touristy here and not really fancying a swan
pedalo ride, we found a nice bar overlooking the lake below.
Unfortunately, Delhi
Belly had hit me quite badly so after a couple of beers we went back to the
hotel to rest for the afternoon.
In the evening I still did not want to be very far from the
loo so we just went out for an evening meal before returning back to the hotel
for and early night.
Day 2 – Isla del Hell (3,812m
Altitude)
The Night before had not been great as there had been
thunder, lightning and many trips to the bathroom for me, which meant neither
of us had a great night’s kip.
Getting up I decided to take some Imodium as we were doing a
day’s hiking on Isla del Sol today, although the remainder of the storm was
still finishing outside, so we were both dubious about going.
Anyway, we got ready and went down to breakfast where we had
the best breakfast we had been served in Bolivia (although I wasn’t feeling
it), which even included pancakes. Whilst we ate breakfast the rain started to
dissipate and whilst Shell asked if I was feeling up to it, we decided we had
nothing else to do for the day so we headed down to the Lake.
Once we located our boat we waited around for a while whilst
it filled up and waited while the skipper tried to get the motor started. Eventually we got on our way, only for the
motor to stop again 400 metres from shore, so we sat there bobbing about for 10
minutes whilst the skipper did some running repairs.
The engine now running again, we then had around a 2-3 hour
boat trip across Lake Titicaca which brought us to the Island. First, we docked at the main port on the
south of the island, before continuing around some pretty bays/scenery until we
reached the northern port of the Island (I say port, but jetty is more realistic).
had decided to do a hike from the northern end of the
island back to the southern end as this was recommended in our guide and we had
also been told it was quite a nice, 3hr, easyish hike to do. Getting off the boat and wandering around
aimlessly for a bit (along with fellow passengers), trying to find where the
walk started, we eventually garnered enough information which pointed us in the
right direction.
On the way to the start of the walk we went to an office where
we had to buy a permit for the hike (not the last on this route!) and then we
were off along the beach to the path in the distance that led upwards.
The start of the walk was uphill, but fortunately it was
going around the hills slowly, instead of going straight up them. Saying that though, when trekking at an altitude
of over 3,500 metres, a small incline still has you puffing and blowing after a
short while.
We continued along this path for a while stopping, starting
and admiring the views (if only for an excuse to stop again) until we reached a
viewpoint at what seemed to be close to the top of the island. From here we had nice view over the lake and
various small islands/rock outcrops in the distance.
Noticing some people gathered in the distance we thought we
would see what was happening so we headed downhill for a bit until we reached
them. When we got there what we found
was an original Inca Sacrificial rock table with some locals going through some
sort of ritual, for the tourists (not a sacrifice though!!).
By now (an hour in) my stomach was not very happy and
neither was I as the next section of the walk was yet more up. However, we both soldiered on upwards,
puffing and blowing with regular stops until we reached what we thought was the
summit of the island, where we stopped for some refreshments (banana &
water).
The sun was now beating down on this quite barren island and
my belly was still playing up, which had me scouring the landscape for a
suitable sized rock to squat behind (I didn’t). But, in the positive we were
heading downhill or at least that’s what we thought.
For the next couple hours, the walk was undulating, so not
exactly downhill and every time you thought you had done your last incline you
saw another one coming up in the distance, which for me and the way I was
feeling was agony (Shell’s idea this trip, so I think she has had revenge for
the volcano!).
After about 3.5 hours we finally made it to the village at
the top of the southern harbour, but this also meant quite a steep descent. The
trip down to the bottom took about another ½ hour, but it was interesting along
the way as we were being passed by heavily laden donkeys that bring all the
goods up & down from the harbour accompanied by their Cholita task masters
(those women are tough old birds).
Back at the bottom, we came to the conclusion that we did
not fancy on staying on the island for the night as planned for two reasons: 1.
it seemed there would not be much to do in the evening and 2 more importantly, was that most of the cheaper
hostel’s were near the top of the very steep hill we had just come down.
That decided we just booked a
boat ticket back to Copacabana, which was departing in about ½ hour and just
gave us time to have a drink whilst watching all the jetty activity below us,
lots & lots of donkeys.
On the boat trip on the way back
I was completely wiped out, so I slept whilst Shell read and watched the
scenery go by.
Now back in Copacabana it was
around six-ish, so we headed to a nearby bar and sat outside and had a couple
of drinks and got chatting to a couple from Switzerland/South Africa who were
doing a long trip as part of their honeymoon.
Before we headed home for an
early night (and to be closer to the toilet) we popped into a restaurant next
door for dinner. I chanced it with the
most bland pizza on the menu (a margarita) but when it turned up it was
possibly the worst pizza I have ever eaten, bland would have been an
improvement!! I must say Shell’s beef
steak with pepper sauce and mash potato seemed a much better choice, although
Shell did not rave about it afterwards,
Day 3 – And relax
After another stormy night (in
more ways than one), we were pleased with our decision to return from the
Island, which meant we could have a small lie in rather than have to catch a boat.
We headed downstairs to have a
nice breakfast before returning to our room for most of the day. As we were facing another long coach trip to
Peru the next day and the fact that I still wasn’t feeling great, we thought we
would take it easy, do some blogging and research around Peru.
Later in the afternoon we headed
out to sort out some chores (buy shampoo/get some Peruvian Sol) plus look
around some of the town that we hadn’t seen yet. We wandered about for a bit,
not being very successful on the shampoo front, so eventually we found
ourselves on a rooftop bar where we
could watch street life going on bellow us.
On a visit to the bathrooms
(after she had tried to strike up a conversation with the bar parrot) Shell
then returned with a new friend who would not leave us alone. A puppy that
spent it’s time jumping from Shell’s bench seat to mine, trying to devour as
much of the sheepskin coverings as possible, that will be one sick dodgy in the
morning.
Anyway, all that eating had made
us hungry so after a few drinks we chose the healthy option and headed back to
a chicken shop we had spotted in town. As the food in Bolivia hadn’t been that
great we didn’t feel too bad going for our chicken supper and in all honesty,
it was quite good, still not sure about fried plantain though.
After eating we headed up the hill
once more to our hostel for an early night as we had a new country to get to
the next day.
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