It was 2:30 am on Monday 2 April and we were both wide awake - a sure sign that we were back at altitude (about 4000m.) To make things worse it was freezing cold, even with two thick blankets and a duvet we were struggling to keep warm. After a bit of a sleep-in, we strolled down to the lake for lunch. The lake is really big btw - it feels like you are at the sea only without any waves. We were also surprised at how many tourists there were :-/ - it looked liked we outnumbered the locals easily.

After lunch we wandered up and down the main street and bought a few things - mainly warm clothes for our next leg in North America. We stopped in at a restaurant with a nice sunny courtyard for a drink and then headed back to the hostel for a nap, picking up a few snacks for the bus trip along the way.

That evening, we almost killed ourselves walking up the nearby hill to watch the sunset. It's pretty steep and we were in a rush to get there before the sun dissapeared - the altitude didn't help either. Walking up the path you pass by 14 huge crosses, and at the top there is a fairly elaborate shrine to some catholic saint. Once we had caught our breath, we sat down with a cup of wine to enjoy the view, which was amazing! This was also where we met our first fellow South African traveller! From Cape Town too :-) We didn't hang around too long after the sun went down, and hurried back to the hostel to pack.

Tuesday morning we were up pretty early to catch our bus. We had a quick breakfast of bread and jam and coffee (like just about every other day in South America...) at a restaurant next to the bus station. After clearing up the double-booking of our seats issue, we settled down for our "direct bus" trip to Cusco.