Ninety seconds on Lake Titicaca
Two and a half hours of open water lie between the reed islands off Puno and Taquile, a terraced island with Bolivia in view across the lake. Leave by eight and give the crossing the whole day.
The first stop is the Uros, half an hour from the dock. With the tours on one timetable, you are likely to see thirty or more boats moored there at once. A family welcomes your boat with a rehearsed song in Aymara, Spanish and English, the island's chief shows how the reed islands are built, and a ride in a reed boat is extra; carry cash for it and for the crafts. The long crossing to Taquile follows. Lunch is in a family's home, at tables set out in the yard, sometimes with a weaving demonstration. The boat may move to a dock on the far side while you eat, and then you walk across the island and down to it.
Further afield in Peru
A lakeside village twenty kilometres south of Puno on the Desaguadero road, once the colonial capital of the province and still holding two…
A Quechua speaking island about three hours out from Puno, farmed in terraces and run by its own communal system rather than by the…
The larger of the two farmed islands out from Puno, north of Taquile and reached in about three and a half hours. There is no hotel and no…