Chapter Fourteen

PUNO is the biggest city on the shoreline of Lake Titicaca. The lake itself which measures 3,200 square miles, reaches a depth of over 900 feet in parts, and at 12,500 feet claims to be the highest navigable lake in the world. Sixty per cent of the lake´s waters are in Peru and the remaining 40 percent in Bolivia. The border between the two countries runs through the lake and Peruvian coastguard vessels regularly patrol the lake to prevent the smuggling of both people and contrabrand.



Trish and I took a two day trip to visit three islands on the Lake. In all, there are about 40 inhabited reed-islands in this lake, which more resembles an inland sea, than a lake. She was as excited as I as we made our way, courtesy of a 20 or so person modern cruiser to the world famous floating Uros islands. These are islands made of reeds on which descendants of the Uros Indians and Aymara people live in some degree of comfort despite the seemingly impossible task of doing so.



The islands consist of floating surfaces of reeds about one meter thick on top of which families have built their homes also made of reeds. We went to one island and met Maria, a pregnant 20 year woman who brought us to her home and showed us her colourful costumes and the bedroom she shared with Percy, that´s right, her husband. Her baby, she told us, would be born on the island and go to school at one of the primary schools in the islands.



There are no toilets on the islands. People simply relieve themselves into the lake and this, we understand, is causing pollution problems. The women, all dark skinned wear colourful costumes from neck to feet on top of which are perched Derby-type hats. Shopping is done in Puno, an hour away by boat, and many island homes have energy to power radio, television, mobile telephones and the internet, courtesy of solar panels placed on their roofs.



Like the islands off the Irish coast, teenage children are educated on the ¨mainland". Men and women make their living from craftwork which they sell to boatloads of tourists who arrive at the islands every day. The men also fish, and some have small trout farms attached to their island homes. Children are well educated and two little girls we met, both under 6 years, could recite nursery rhymes in six languages.



It´s difficult to describe the feeling of walking on their floating islands, except to say it is akin to standing or stepping on a rubber water bed. Trish said it was more like the feeling of bouncing on a trampoline.



The top reeds gradually sink as the bottom ones become water-logged and the surface, therefore, has to be regularly topped up with a fresh surface coating of reeds.These tortora reeds are the only building materials at the islanders´ disposal. They use them for building their islands, their homes, their canoe-like boats and even chew the interior of freshly cut ones - they say to them they are akin to bananas, but Trish and I who both tasted and tested this claim, beg to differ. Cooking is done on hot stones placed on the reed surfaces.



Trish and I took a half an hour ride on a reed boat in the lake. It may surprise some people to know these boats are now filled with tightly capped plastic bottles in order to maintain their buoyancy and extend their lake life. Floating the recycling concept has not gone amiss here !



After saying goodbye to Maria and purchasing some of her handcrafts, our cruiser made for the second island, Amantani, where we stayed with a lovely family, Mario who was 46 years old and Sylvia, a year younger, the parents of three children, one of whom was unfortunately killed in a road accident in Lima. The eldest son lived in the Peruvian capital and the youngest, a girl of just 7 years of age, resides with Sylvia´s grandfather who is aged 92 and deaf, and lives a short distance away.



As is customary we brought gifts of food to the family, including rice, cheese, flavourings, chocolate, pencils, pens, sweets, bisccuits, a nail clippers and a pencil sharpener. Sylvia spoke Aymara but had some Spanish while her husband, a small subsistence farmer with several fields of potatoes, a donkey and six sheep, was fluent in Spanish, coming as he did not from any of the other islands, but from a place in the Andes Mountains called Sicuani - a place with special resonances for Trish and I.



For, as it turned out, it was here that Des Kelleher, our Spanish teacher, ministered as a Catholic priest for over 20 years. Known as Padre Albino to his parishioners, perhaps on account of his white skin, it turned out that Mario who has two brothers still living in Sicuani, remembered Des and recalled his ministering in the community. What a co-incidence, and what a stroke of luck ! Imagine ! Travelling thousands of miles to a new Continent, visiting a lake two and half miles high in the sky, going to an island where Aymara and not Spanish was the language of communication and finding a family who knew an Irish man who both Trish and I also had the pleasure of knowing !



In the public house Trish and I once owned, The Woodpecker in Ashford, Co Wicklow, we had a picture-poster on one of the walls, saying:"There are no strangers here......only friends who´ve never met! " Nothing was more apt to describe our relationship with our island hosts. We heard later that Mario and Sylvia who only once before accepted foreigners into their home were pleased with the Irish couple (Trish and I) they had been allocated.



There was laughter and jokes and stories around the table and Trish took out her electronic disctionary whenever we were struck for a word in Spanish.



That evening all the island visitors and their island hosts went down to the main Plaza to make sure that all was harmony and undestanding. Our guide to the islands asked everyone if there was any problems with food or communication, and when we said we were very fortunate to be guests at the island´s best restaurant - Sylvia´s kitchen - there was widespread laughter, and Sylvia blushed at the tribute to her cooking skills. Mario was proud that his wife had been singled out for her expertise.



That evening we returned home, had a three course dinner , after which Sylvia called Trish and asked her to try on one of her traditional island costumes. which included two skirts, an inner and outer one, a blouse, a colourful crios-type belt and a large black, decorated shawl , typical of the type the island women wear. I also was kitted out in a poncho and a knitted long-eared hat.



We were being dressed up for a purpose..........we and the other island visitors and their host families were off to a special function.....to a dance in a small island hall where the four-man orchestra played the pan pies, flute and drum. Sylvia was my dance partner for the night and Mario Trish´s. And what a night it was was as we danced non-stop for nearly three hours to traditional Andean music, with not a drop of alcohol in sight, and with the island men and women laughing at our feeble attempts to accompany the music.



Between dances, Sylvia chatted to the other women about us. Outside the hall, rain fell and there was thunder and lightening, "fuego en cielo" or, in English, "Fire in the Sky,"as Mario called it. Just after midnight, the dance over, we all made our way home in the drizzle, laughing and joking in broken-Spanish. Our bedroom was warm, dry and candle-lit.



The whole house was candle lit for although the island had been wired for electricity and street lights were in place in the main plaza, the decision had not yet been made to "turn it on."



Next morning after a hearty breakfast, we said goodbye to our host family. There were warm hugs, exchanges of addresses, and a recognition that despite the cultural and language differences, a warm bond had been forged and a good friendship kindled. Mario in his Sunday best accompanied us to the pier and saw us safety aboard our cruiser. It was with some regret we were leaving a lovely, humble, hospitable family who welcomed us into their home and treated us, not as stangers, but as "old friends who had never met." Nothing more could have been asked for. The pleasure was on both sides.



Our final port of call was the island of Taquile, this time a rock-solid island with a 500-step climb to the top where the only meals and drinks were available. But we were lucky. The day we called, the 1,200 or so islanders who live on this steep rocky outcrop were playing host to a group of dignatories and VIPs from the mainland. Bands played, speeches were made, processions were held and the island men and women displayed their artistic and craft skills.



Here, apart from subsistence farming, the men do not fish - instead, they knit from dawn to dusk while the women spin and weave. A strict division of labour applies. Men can been seem walking their island´s mountain paths with four or five kneedles in their hands quite unashamedly knitting their latest creation for sale in the markets in Puno or to visiting tourists like us.



There were no roads, and therefore no cars, motocarros or motor bikes on this island. Every yard travelled is by foot.



Our next step, however, was to complete our lake tour and return to Puno, from where our journey would bring us to Cusco, which the Incas had as their capital before its destruction by the Spanish in 1532.



This was going to be a critical part of our South American journey.



And we were surprised at the turn of events......... when they did come.