It was the sheep that woke us up. Baaa. And it was very cold last night. When we woke up our teeth felt fuzzy because we had no water to brush them with last night. This morning out of desperation, we used our bottled water and brushed our teeth in the outhouse. We were already dressed when we received a basin of warm water and a towel to wash with. Too late, the sunscreen was already on. We feel like lizards, our skin is peeling so bad.
Gladys and her mama gave Anton pancakes for lunch, and an egg and potatos for Frankie. Gladys absolutely loved the Canadian gloves we gave her, and the pretty placemat set. Then she galloped down the hill, with us in hot pursuit so that we could be at the boat on time.
Our boat took us on a very choppy one hour ride to the next island called Tequile. Lots of people were green on this boat ride. Tequile is another island with local people, about 600, no cars or anything like that, and everyone dressed very traditionally. The whole island is layered with pre-Incan terraces, like Amantani. It is tradition that men learn how to knit, and a woman chooses a husband based on how well he can knit. The knitting is so skillful that it has been recognized by Unesco.
When our boat landed there, we had a very steep climb up, about 3 km, until we got to a public square where we picked up some postcards and some Snickers bars. Manuel took us up a back alley to a restaurant patio, where we had quinua soup and lake trout. Then a gruelling climb down to the other side of the island where our boat was waiting. Even the locals were puffing on these steps. Okay, they happened to be carrying huge propane tanks on their backs.
A 3 hour boat ride to the mainland, much calmer this time. Anton slept a lot, and Frankie and Heather had some girl time on the roof of the boat.
We left Manuel back in Puno. At the hotel we collected our laundry (47 soles, $19) and our luggage from storage. We can't wait to get to Cuzco and get everything organized, we have stuff all over the place. We get to be at the same hotel for 5 nights in a row, yippee! Our new driver Henry picked us up at 5 pm and we had a 6 hour drive to Cuzco. The roads in Peru are excellent, but we ran into a long stretch of construction where we were caught behind a truck. It was dark, and the truck was kicking up a lot of dust, all we could see was a huge dustcloud. We still haven't figured out the high beams system here. It seems to replace the car horn signal "I am here". When cars see another car approaching, they put their high beams on instead of turning them off. It's brutal.
Sent from my BlackBerry.
No comments:
Post a Comment