Shelby and I arrived to Puno after our 7 hour bus ride and checked into our hostel. It's probably my favourite hostel so far just because the breakfast had something other than bread and jam, (fruit, ham, cheese, avocado, and fruit juices) a nice change. That day was the day we were to register for classes for next year and we both had people doing it for us at home (Christie did mine) so we were anxious so find out how the registration went. There are always snags so I wasn't completely surprised to find out I was still unregistered for 6 of my classes but it did bum me out a bit because it really screws up your schedule if you don't get into the lab you want, etc and the longer you wait the less chance you have. It turns out all us enviros has the same problem, and the college hadn't recognized one of our classes as a prerequisite, so we couldn't register for 4 of the 6. My other 2 unregistered classes were because the college had failed to recognize my online math class as an equivalent yet.I emailed them and got that straightened out right away but as of now I am still unregistered for the 6 classes and all their labs. So annoying. So we spent a few hours figuring that out together and then went to find dinner. We asked our receptionist and he suggested a great restaurant. It was a higher end restaurant and I was craving steak so I ordered filet mignon!! It came with two cuts of filet mignon in a mushroom sauce (so a lot more meat than I expected) and a quinoa risotto. Mmm it was so good. One of the best meals so far! And only $10 CAN. Can't beat that price can you?! You can eat like a king here on pennies, it's awesome. I don't wanna leave!

The next day was our Amanati home stay tour. We were picked up at 7:30 am and taken to the docks on Titicaca Lake, the highest altitude navigable lake in the world! Pretty cool. It separates Peru and Bolivia. We bought gifts for our home stay families at the docks (rice) and then boarded a boat. We had a quick 30 min ride to the Uros floating reed islands. The islands are literally floating! The people made them to escape from an invasion 600 years ago and have been living on them since. We stopped at one where the local women greeted us warmly and had us sit around a kind of learning station. When I stepped off the boat I was quite surprised at the texture of the island. It was very spongy and felt kind of like walking on a water bed. We sat on logs made of reeds and listened to our guide explain the ways of the people and then had a demonstration on how they make their islands. Each island is 2-3 m thick. The first meter is made of the roots of the reeds. The roots float to the top of the lake (I can't remember why) and when they do they cut the roots up into usable blocks. The roots just look like big brown blocks of soil but are very light and porous. They float up in big patches like 50 meters squared but they have to cut them up so they can move them around. When they have the blocks cut up they situate them however they want and then anchor them with sticks (the lake is pretty shallow). They then wrap ropes around the top of the sticks so all the blocks will stay together. They wait and allow the roots, which are still living, to knit together. Then they lay 2 meters of reeds on top, on layer on top of the other in a cross cross fashion. That's it but the entire process takes about a year. Which makes sense when you think about the size of a small island. Every 15-20 days they have to lay down another layer of reeds so they are always out harvesting them. And not just their island is made of reeds. They use reed boats, live in reed houses with reed mattresses and reed chairs and hats and everything. After our little learning session the woman invited us to see inside their homes which are just one room houses that look much like you would expect a modern house to look. They used to make them in a tee-pee shape but the modern square shape has more room for their families. The wife and her children live in one house and the husband lives in another. All they have in a house is a reed mattress with a tv, radio, and stereo. They have solar panels outside their homes which provide them with electricity. The lady who showed me her house dressed me up in her clothing and I got a picture with her! And of course I bought a souvenir from her. I bought a case for a cushion she had woven which is quite colourful and shows a picture of their life on the island. They make a living by hunting the birds, fishing, and foraging for the birds eggs. They then ride into the mainland and sell or trade with other people so they can buy other things like red meat or potatoes. Tourism has become a larger part of their living in recent years and has allowed their community to build a primary school and medical centre on the islands. The children must go to the mainland for school past primary level and our guide was telling us that almost 100% of them don't come back, because life on the islands is much harder in comparison to city life. So in 30-40 years he believes there will not be many communities left on the floating islands, so I felt lucky to have seen them.

After our floating island visit we went to Amanati island, a real island about 3 hours boat ride from Puno (but the boats are very slow). When we got there we were paired up with our families. Our "moms" were there to greet us and Shelby and I were paired with Fajustina (j's are pronounced like h's). We were lucky to be paired together. We had about a 15 min walk uphill to her home. We took a very interesting route, through fields and up hills but never on a walking path. She speaks zero English and her main language is actually Quechua, but she spoke Spanish so I was able to talk to her some but I couldn't carry on a normal conversation so I felt quite bad and wished we could have talked some more. When we got to her house we dropped our backpacks in our room and then had lunch. We entered through a gate in what would be her back yard. She had a tiny courtyard like thing, with the house to the right, the kitchen to the left, and the toilet straight ahead (all separate buildings). The courtyard was not a nice courtyard though, just dirt and buckets of water everywhere and only about 5 ft squared. It was a poor house to be sure, but we expected that. Our room was upstairs and we entered through some stairs outside that led to a balcony (super rickety, I swore I was going to fall through and break a leg. Our room was simple with three twin beds. There was a light bulb but it didn't work after dark which seemed pointless. But there was lots of blankets for us to keep off the cold. We went down for our lunch which was HUGE. They eat so much. I eat a lot and I was bursting by the end of it! She gave us a vegetable quinoa soup and a huge bowl of boiled potatoes. Like 5 huge potatoes. Can you imagine eating that many potatoes everyday?! I can't. After one day of potatoes I never want to see another one again. We also got a hunk of fried cheese on top of the potatoes with a few slices of tomato and cucumber. The kitchen is very simple and run down. There is one tiny tiny stove with a couple burners. The oven had no door and is used as a shelf. The kettle and pans are very old and charred. I wished I could have bought her a nice new pan! Beside the stove there is a dinner table like a picnic table with a couple wooden folding chairs and stools. There was a back room beside the stove that I think was a pantry type room but I never really saw into it. All the buildings are made of concrete but not well made. The walls are very bumpy and warped, not straight and smooth. There are no shelves or really any furniture besides the necessities. I'm not sure what the roof is like but there must be holes because the ceiling was all tarped. And everyone is so short I have to duck a foot to get through the doorways! After an awkward lunch of trying to talk a bit with one another Shelby and I went to our room and had a nap! At 4 we met up with our tour guide and the rest of our group at the main square and started about an hours hike to the top of the island. Hardest hike of my life! The path was sooooo steep (no steps just slope) and we are very high up so my lungs were not having any of it and soon my calves weren't either. Eventually we made it to the top just in time for the sunset which was well worth it. But as soon as the sun went down we were freezing our buns off so we hiked back down. The hike down was easier on the lungs but not on the body. We had to lean back like 30 degrees so we wouldn't fall forward and the momentum of going down the hill made it really hard on the knees, banging with every step. When we got back to the square we had a delicious hot chocolate which made it all better. We also got talking to some local guys who just had to get a picture with us because we are "so tall". More like they are so short. But they were laughing their asses off at the height difference, it was quite entertaining. Then our "mom" came to pick us up and show us back to the house because it was pitch black and there are no street lights there. When we got back I expected to meet her husband and son but I guess they were not there because we never met anyone else but Fajustina. We had supper (even though I was still full). The same soup but with noodles instead of quinoa and a dish of rice, potatoes, and carrots. SO MANY CARBS. We also had mint tea made simply from hot water and the mint leaf pulled off a bush outside! Very good! After supper we got to have another nap and then we got dressed up in Fajustina's clothes (a colourful skirt, woven blouse, rainbow belt, and a long black shawl that drapes over our heads) and went to the local hall to learn some Peruvian dancing! The dancing simply consisted of everyone holding hands and doing sort of a grapevine thing, winding around the room! It was fun and we stayed and danced for about an hour before heading back to go to sleep. That was when we realized the electricity didn't work and the toilet didn't have a flusher or a toilet seat and there was no sink to wash our hands or brush our teeth. But we soon learned that's what all the different buckets of water were for. I got into bed as quickly as possible because it was absolutely freezing outside. Also when Shelby went to get into bed her bed broke! A couple of the wooden slats that hole the mattress up just collapsed on the floor, so it was a good thing there was an extra bed for her to sleep on. The next day we woke up, had a breakfast and bread, a pancake, and jam, and headed back to the docks to say goodbye to our moms and get back on the boat to visit another island. All in all I enjoyed the experience. If nothing else it showed me how good I've got it back in Saskatchewan but it was also interesting to learn about their culture. We had an hour boat ride to another island where we hiked (again) for an hour to the other side of the island. This hike was to see the Bolivian side of Lake Titicaca, but by this time I was getting pretty sick of hiking and wondered why they couldn't just drop us off on that side... But that's just me needing a day off and the hike was easier than the day before. We met up with our guide in the main square and he showed us to another restaurant about 15 mins walk away. We ate outside and had a beautiful view of the lake and the Peruvian shoreline. We were fed trout, rice, and French fries. It was an ok meal but it made me sick :(. I'm not feeling so well right now. During lunch our guide talked a little more about their way of life on the islands. They are kind of a communist community, where everyone helps everyone with each others work and they have to follow certain rules if they want to live on the island (including how to dress). You have to wear certain colours and different hats if you are a single or married man or woman and if you are a community leader. Everyone must love one another and do no wrong. This rule seems to work surprisingly well because our guide said they have no police officers or jails on the island. Also there is only one building in which people can sell their goods. The men and women farm, knit, and weave to make a living. The men knit and the women weave (quite different)! They can only plant once a year (in the rainy season) because they have no form of irrigation, even though they live surrounded by a fresh water lake. They also have some cattle, donkeys, and sheep. After lunch we got back in the boat and headed back to Puno. Shelby and I just got back to our hostel where I have managed to register for 3 more classes but another 3 still deny me. How annoying. We move on to Copacabana, Bolivia tomorrow, just a 4 hour bus ride. We hope crossing the border goes well! We are also excited for a few days to relax after all our back to back tours and hiking! Tata for now.