J: After our overnight bus we got to the next hostel early, Sam had a quick nap and I chilled out. We did some admin, then popped out for lunch and organised the next few days. Sam was still tired and slept the rest of the day away, I don't think she was over Machu Picchu yet, although she had a dodgy tummy again..... It's like she's after some attention keeping it going this long!

S: I've had enough of these stomach bugs. I thought eating all the local food was meant to make you hardy to the bugs lol. And as you can see, I got lots of sympathy from James!! We were up early again (travelling is not a holiday guys) and we had no hot water to shower but with our best Spanish we eventually got some hot water. We arrived at the port Lake Titikaka ready to board the boat. We were on our way to Uros a manmade floating island. We stepped off the boat onto just reeds, it's a strange feeling to know it's just reeds below you. The guide explained that the root is about a metre high and then another 2m of reeds on top just anchored at 8 points. People live on these islands - not sure if I want to be there all the time. Back on to the boat to another island called Amantani to spend the night with a local family. The scenery was gorgeous, 60% of the lake is on the Peruvian side and 40% on the Bolivian.

J: Sam forgot to say she slept the journey to Amantani. But just saying the lake was big doesn't cover it, the lake is huge; 160km long, 60km wide and 280 meters at its deepest. We met with our "mama" named Fotonada, she was a tiny lady that has always lived on the island. She prepared us a traditional lunch which was soup followed by boiled veg. Then we hiked up the hill on the island to one of the religious places to watch the sun set. Our guide told us how the island operates as a large communist community of 4500 people and it works well for everyone on the island. Each year they change responsibilities between the 20 smaller communities, they all share produce and only deal with money from tourists to buy items to better the community such as solar panels. I thought it was interesting how a communist group can work so well, considering that usually communism is associated with negative rulers.

S: After all our hiking, I had said to James no more for at least a week, that lasted all of one day lol. We headed back down and watch the local girl's vs boys play volleyball, and I've got to admit those girls are pretty good players. We waited and we waited, and I think our "mama" forgot about us as we had to follow another group home. She was apologetic and had cooked us another meal that consisted of soup and then potatoes fried with egg and onion. It was delicious and then next thing I know she's telling me to strip off my jumpers. This island is freezing, and I wasn't too keen on stripping but nevertheless I did, and I'm then dressed as a traditional Peruvian woman. I had two massive skirts on with a belt, a top and a shawl. James got off lightly and he only had to put a poncho on - didn't seem quite fair to me. We wandered in the dark to the community centre where there was a band with drums, pan pipes and guitars of all sorts. They began to play and next thing we know "mama" has dragged us both up to dance and then the whole room is dancing crazy. Great fun but hard work as we are at about 3800m altitude still. Our mama might have been on the older side, but she loved to dance with James, and I think even he was worn out after.

J: The dancing on that island is fast and furious, it was extra hard when the small mama wanted to spin me and I struggled to crouch low enough, but we bought her a beer and she thankfully sat still for a minute. After dancing to a couple more songs we headed back to her home, the island obviously doesn't have street lights and Sam stepped into a muddy stream as she forgot her head torch lol. Mama's house was quaint, it had a couple bedrooms, a kitchen, toilet and a couple other outbuildings. It was all built with handmade bricks on the island and just had a tin roof, although the doors were only 5 feet high which made for a lot of ducking about the place.
After a good night sleep, a pancake breakfast and saying good bye to mama (we left her some chocolate bars which made her really happy), we got back on the boat and set off to the island; Taquile.

S: Soon after we arrived, the guide broke the news we had to climb another mountain to get to the market square. We visited a textile museum, which had belts, jumpers and hats made on the island. They were crazy expensive even if we weren't on a budget - 100 U.S. dollars for a belt, we kindly declined and moved on to the picture museum which was full of beautiful pictures taken of the locals at work and play.
Our guide then educated us the way people wore hats corresponded with whether they were single, courting or married. I supposed it makes things easy to understand.
Lunch arrived and it was lovely, afterwards we started our descent to the lake which was a beautiful walk. We had a long journey back to the mainland, so I decided to catch up on more some zzzz's.

J: I've decided the last trek to Machu Picchu really took it out of Sam as she sleeps whenever she has had the chance.... It's that or she's lazy.
Once back to Puno we decided to treat ourselves to the traditional Peru delicacy, it was our last night, so we splashed out a little and had Cuy, which in English is guinea pig! The whole guinea pig was butterflied then roasted, and arrives on a plate, head looking up at us. So we went for it and it was really tasty, somewhere between pork belly and dark chicken meat. I just wished there was more meat on those little things.

J: Peru has been an amazing place to visit, it's hard work in terms of language as on top of Spanish, there are many local languages and they don't all speak Spanish let alone English! But we have had the pleasure of some great treks here and Machu Picchu will always be a highlight. We met some lovely people, it's the same, people in poverty aren't unhappy, they make the best of what they have.
We loved the local traditions which are very different to elsewhere so far and the local patterns on clothes are great.