As we travelled from La Paz to Puno, Peru we had our last two stops in Bolivia: Copacabana and Isla Del Sol. It was nice to take a bus during the day so we could see part of the Bolivian country side this time.
Our first view of Lake Titicaca was the small part of the lake closer to La Paz. We stopped at a little restaurant for breakfast and it had chairs shaped with the local reeds like they use to make their boats.
There is a narrow straight connecting the smaller southern portion of the lake to the larger northern section. There was no bridge so we had to take a ferry across. The bus was too heavy to go on the ferry with all the people on so we got shuttled across on a little motorboat while the bus got brought over on a barge like ferry.
Lake Titicaca is the highest large lake in the world at 3,812 metres (12,507 ft), so it isn’t very warm. As we drove from the ferry crossing to Copacabana, we had to go over this pass which still had snow on it. We also stopped at an overlook of Copacabana, which honestly was my favourite part of Copacabana. It is a small touristy town and the way the bus schedule was setup, we either had to kill 5 hours there, or take a 1 hour boat ride to go visit Isla del Sol (Sun Island). Isla del Sol is important in Incan mythology as it is believed that the first Incas were created there by the sun god. We opted to go.
The water was cold and calm when we left for the island. Not so much on the way back. They were explicit on needing to be at the boat launch so that the boat could catch the bus and they stated they would leave you there. However, on our return trip, we were about 20 minutes in when the boat turned around. The wind was picking up and those that could speak Spanish asked what was going on and it turns out 3 people missed the boat and had called. Another boat came with the stragglers and met us part way back to Isla del Sol. The waves were starting to white cap now and it was quite the process to get the 3 stragglers from the one boat into our boat. Finally everyone was settled and we headed out into choppy water. Unfortunately, our destination was across the waves and not into the waves, and since we were already 30 minutes behind, I think the captain felt he couldn’t tack much. You can add boat ride to one of the terrifying experiences of Bolivia transportation.
The island itself was not amazing to us but it was okay. However, it did serve as a lesson for low-context vs high-context societies. They dropped us off at one port close to an Inca Temple (which was pretty small and under restoration so not much to look at). They told us to follow the trail to the look-out and then follow the lower path to the port where they would pick us up. The upper path would go to the village. However, there were no signs and various farmer paths crossed what we thought was the hiking path.
Our best guess is that this is the mirador (look-out): a shuttered up restaurant and some farm houses. The main path went angling up the hill a bit more and the only straight path was smaller and past the farms. Others from our group had gone the angled way and we tried to ask the way to the port to some local people there trying to sell their wares, they pointed to the angled way. Turns out we headed up to the village instead and took the longer walk.
It was still a nice walk and we enjoyed the shade and smell of a eucalyptus grove as we got close to the village. The people ahead of us ended up turning up the hill when then got to the village so they must have been spending the night on the island. Also looking back, we could now see another group on a lower trail and we realized our error. We came to larger cobbled road/path that led down to the bay where we could see the boats so we decided to follow it. Still no signs.
It was quite steep and we saw lots of local carrying supplies on their backs or on donkeys up the path as well as tourists with the backpacks breathing hard trying to get up. When we finally got to docks we realized that this was the local path and not the “Inca Stairway” our guide had told us our trail would come to.
We didn’t discover the Inca Stairway until we were about to board our boat as it was 200 meters down the beach from where we had come out. It did look easier to climb and there is a natural brook that flows all year next to it which they call the Inca Fountain. This made this path much more green and with flowers along the edge. It definitely looked like the better path down! It is still a bit of a mystery to us how that lower path could have passed the downward cobbled street we were going down without us noticing, but as the boat was about to leave, we couldn’t go back up and find out.