Peru, Puno

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Puno lies on the Peru side of Lake Titicaca. The city itself is pretty ugly, most of the houses here are only half finished, this is so the owners don't have to pay any tax. Loopholes ay. Not wanting to hang around for long we took a boat out on the lake to see a few of the 200 or so floating islands made entirely out of reeds. They've been inhabited by the Uros people since before the Incas. Times have changed and the islanders lives have now been completely immersed in tourism, so much so that they use it as main income and are probably demonstrating their culture to tourists more than practicing it. I know, I'm contributing, but they chose to embrace it and now they're sending their kids to school because of it. A few facts if your interested... each island usually only consists of one or two extended families. The islands only last about 25 years, then they have to build a new one. They peg their islands into the marshes to stop them floating away. If they have a dispute, it's normally solved by cutting the island in half and going their separate ways. They eat reeds, build reed homes, sleep in reed beds, sail reed boats and I think they may be made out reeds too. Second part of the day was spent visiting a pre-Inca burial site where the ancients built huge stone tower tombs. Similar in design to the 70's style water towers you get in the UK, I thought. On the way back to Puno we stopped off at a local farm and were shown around by the owners. We blessed a new crop of potatoes and ate them with some cheese and clay. Yea, clay and it tasted really good. [Tom]