We were all up and eating breakfast at 7am. There wasn't as much choice at the buffet but it was fine. We weren't expecting much. Puno has proven itself not to be a culinary hotspot, but there was enough stuff to fill a bread roll and a cup of coca tea to wash it down, so I survived.  

At 8am a minibus turned up to collect us and take us down to the lake. It wasn't far, about a mile away to the harbour from where we were going to take a boat ride to the reed islands.

We were dropped us off as close as possible, a barrier stopped us from getting any further. As we continued on foot we walked past some peddaloes, one had a big Stuart Little jutting out the front, another looked like Tom, from Tom & Jerry.

"Perhaps we're on these" joked Julie. 

At the end there was a sign "LAGO TITICACA Destino Turistico PUNO" in one metre tall letters. There was a guy there videoing himself with his selfie stick, pretending he was an important travel influencer on instagram or Tik-Tok.

He asked me if I could take a few photos of him with the sign, which I duly obliged but when he checked them he wasn't happy. He then he began bossing me around like some lackie, demanding a full photo shoot. My patience wore thin. "We need to go" said Julie.

We followed Ali Jei down the jetty to wait for our boat. The smell of diesel was overpowering as we stood at the back of a dozen boats preparing to leave. Eventually we were give the nod and we followed this guy across the backs of all the boats, up and down and up again, then down again, all along the bobbing vessels to reach the fourth one from the end.

We sat inside, we were asked to do so by our guide for the day. It was already full and there wasn't a seat for Julie and I to sit together.

Ali Jei did ask someone if he didn't mind moving but he refused. I can appreciate that he was sat by the window and we were asking him to move to an aisle seat but it was the way he refused that really wound me up. He was very dismissive and rude.

I called him a "coc oen" under my breath, which is a purile Welsh slur that translates as "lamb's penis".

Around 8:30am we set off. The guide spoke in Spanish and then in English about Lake Titicaca and the people who lived on the lake, building floating reed islands, giving us all the facts and figures. He also taught us a few words of not only Quechua but also Aymara, another language commonly spoken in this region, especially amongst the islanders, the Uros people.

Almost half an hour later he was still talking.

Once he finished Julie and I moved outside to the back of the boat. Sonya and Garry joined us a little later.

Despite it being noisy (because the engine was located at the back) it was much better than being sat inside. The fresh air was a relief and we could see a lot more.

Thankfully the 3 metre tall exhaust pipe was doing a great job of expelling most of the diesel fumes.

The boat chugged along slowly. We were sailing along a navigation channel cut through the reeds. The encroaching marshland created a natural barrier to what's known as the Inner Bay of Puno.

We saw a few reed huts amongst the tall grass, shelter for someone looking after the livestock. There was even an occassional cow sighted!  

I climbed to the top of the boat to check if it offered a better view but there wasn't much to see. So I sat down on a bench for a while, and just looked out to the horizon.

We were never far from land; we were technically still in the Bay of Puno, a section of Lake Titicaca almost enclosed by the two peninsulas of Capachica to the North and Chucuito to the South. As such, the water was relatively calm. It was also surprisingly shallow in parts, as little as two metres deep.    

It felt quite cold up top, with a considerable breeze, so I didn't spend long up there.

We briefly came to a stop. At first Julie thought we had broken down but a small boat came along side and someone came onboard. He had a little of the Jack Black about him.

I got chatting to him. I should have asked him why did he arrive about an hour into the journey from the middle of nowhere? But I didn't. He did tell me he was from San Francisco, although he was born in Arequipa, Peru.

Two hours after setting off from Puno we got our first sighting of a reed island in the Uros Tintos region. It was quite exciting.

We saw a surprisingly busy place, with two tourist boats already moored. They had a single golden arch, through which visitors would enter the village. Most of the of the huts on this island had a simple reed mat covering them but one hut had this beautiful ornate thatched roof.

Alongside the island there was a large reed boat with the head of an animal on the front. I don't know if that was a traditional or recent trashy addition to attract the tourists but it did remind me of the pedaloes we saw earlier.

Apparently there were over 40 islands home to around a 1000 floating in the Bay of Puno and whilst of course they were now mostly soley sustained for the tourist industry it shouldn't detract from the fact they still exist at all. 

Ten minutes later we came to the floating reed island we were visiting. A guy in a baseball cap beneath his woolly chullo hat caught the rope thrown from our boat and pulled us in.

We stepped onto the island and felt the ground beneath our feet move. It was a strange sensation. Despite being up to two metres thick the ground had some give. It felt soft and bouncy. I didn't know what to expect but it really felt like a floating island. 

We walked through the ceremonial arch into the centre of of the island. There were about a dozen huts, all built along the edge, forming a square.  It wasn't a very large island. I would estimate not much more than 200m² at the most. Some people have bigger gardens.

We all gathered together in the centre, sat on reed bales arranged in a semi-circle.

The young guy in the baseball cap/chullo combo (who I think was called Pedro) began explaining all about his island. The Uros people of Lake Titicaca speak mostly Aymara, so our guide translated into Spanish and then English. 

He mentioned how the totara reeds were bundled together, tied with rope made from eucalyptus. They then create essesntially an enormous raft, tying all the bundles together and then anchoring the island with more eucaplyptus rope.

"If we don't then we would drift away and be half way to Bolivia before we know it!" repeated our guide.

They constantly maintain the islands but they do have a limited life span of about 10 years before the ropes begin to fail and the island breaks apart. Then they have to build a new one.  

Whilst the briefing was taking place all of the women were sat around busy stichting, creating colourful needlepoint to sell to us tourists. 

 The finished products were vibrant and fascinating but also garish. We just couldn't bring ourselves to buy any of them.

Of course, parting with our tourist dollars was an important part of our travelling, however, we simply didn't like any of them enough to imagine them on our wall or table back home. 

Pedro then showed us the inside of one of the huts. It was small, especially with four people inside. It wasn't furnished, it was just a space to sleep.

"Juspara" I said in my best Aymara for thank you. My pronounciation must have been terrible because he didn't ackowledge me.

The wonderful smell of hay made me think of my childhood and time spent on the farm playing amongst the bales.

Whilst we were trying desperately to find something to buy when we were distracted by the tiny whirlwind that was little Elisabeth. She was a real live-wire. 

Eventually she was escorted away from the paying customers and taken to one of the huts. Only to re-emerge minutes later to create more mischief.

We had walked around the island and came to the reed boats. During the talk the guy mentioned that privacy whilst living on a reed island was difficult. So if an amorous couple wanted to get intimate they would get have to jump into a "love boat" and row themselves out into the reeds, where they could not be seen or heard.

We had the opporunity to have a ride in the reed boats. Not just Julie and I, but the whole group. There was an extra charge of course, but one we were all happy to pay.

Each boat could carry a dozen people, so we all climbed onboard the two boats.

We were given a send off as they all came to sing a song, although it was quite a shambolic performance, to be honest. They certainly wouldn't qualify out of the prelims for the Llangollen International Eisteddfod.

Only two or three of them knew the words, the two males clapped enthusiastically but didn't utter a note, and the lady in the middle seriously didn't want to be there. 

At least the one at the end gave it some gusto and carried the group.

We sat on the boat, which felt surprisingly solid, like a whicker basket, and smelt wonderful. waited patiently for them to finish. We only knew it had come to an end when they stopped clapping and began waving.

We set off, not by rowing but by punting. It was shallow enough here to push the boat along with a very long stick.

Our punter (for want of a better word), another guy in a baseball cap and chullo, made it look easy but I'm sure it wasn't. It was a full boat, with possibly almost a tonne of weight to push.

We followed the first boat towards the totora reeds, where their punter, who was the one who gave the talk earlier, demonstrated how they would harvest the reeds using a long stick with a blade set at a square angle at the end.

After which we turned around and made our way slowly back.

When we looked back at the island we realised we had travelled quite some distance in a short amount of time. We also noticed a neighbouring island floating a few hundred meters away.

It was so peaceful. No one was talking. I think we were all in awe of our surroundings.

Our reed boat experience lasted no more than 20 minutes. Despite being uneventful it was memorable. 

Back on the island our time was up and we returned to our motorboat. Elisabeth came to wave us off, which was so sweet.

The boat continued its course away from Puno, heading towards the Capachica peninsula. 

After half an hour we reached a ramshackled jetty made from a pile of rocks. It was at a place called San Pedro near the villages of Collpa and Llachon. Waiting for us was our host for our homestay tonight. Dressed in her finest, she waved at us and beemed a big smile.

The boat pulled alongside the best it could, then Ali Jei and the four of us got off. It was just our stop. Everyone else were staying on the boat.

Getting off wasn't easy. It wasn't a case of simply stepping off onto solid ground. There was some distance between the boat and the uneven rocks. We threw our bags onto the pier, then helped each other in almost clambering off and scrambling up the rubble.

Ali Jei introduced us to Flora, who found it all very amusing. We then followed her off the jetty and onto dry land.

There was a small sandy beach before we walked up through a field and then through what felt like someone's garden. Eventually we arrived at a gate deep in a hedge. 

Entering through the gate we walked into an enclosed garden. Flora showed us to our rooms for the night. The single level tin roofed buidling was set apart from the rest of the property. On the wall outside there was a interesting painting of an eagle feeding a snake to its chick. It reminded me a little of the Mexican flag.

The inside of the rooms were simple but nice. The wall murials continued with a pair of swans behind one bed, then a vine with a few red flowers running across one side of the room and a large image of red lupin flowers on the opposite side.

It turned a very basic room into something quite pretty.

What made it even better was that we had an en-suite with a proper sit-down toilet. It can never be under estimated the joy of having a comfortable toilet brings.

The beds were a little firm. It wasn't so much the mattress fault but more the fact the beds were actually solid concrete!

We had some spare time whilst we waited for Flora to prepare lunch so Julie brought out her knitting. She hadn't had much time on this trip to just sit and knit.

Lunch was served in the dining room. It was a large room with two long tables with enough chairs to sit about 16 people. We thought it odd Flora didn't have enough room to sleep that many.

We wondered how Intrepid facilitate large groups and came to the conclusion that they must distribute them across several homestays but perhaps all gather in one place for food.

Lunch began with a quinoa soup and it was absolutely delicious. Seriously tastier than the one I had in the restaurant last night.

For someone with a delicate touch in the kitchen she had the hands of a bricklayer (as we say back home) strong calloused fingers through years of hard work.

Encouraged by the first course I was really looking forward to my main, but what followed didn't quite reach the same heights. It was plain and simple boiled vegetables, three types of potatoes, broccoli, peas, carrots, and corn.

I don't want to sound ungrateful, but the crash of expectation was brutal.

We returned to relax in the garden for a while where we noticed a small cage filled with half a dozen kittens. Apparently they just arrived today from an unwanted home.

Miguel, Flora's son, about 10 years old, arrived home from school and was so excited to find kittens in the house. He opened the cage and immediately started playing with them. They were quite timid and didn't want to be handled much but he carried on nevertheless.

Julie asked if there was somewhere we could go for a walk, so at around 3pm Ali Jei took us out for a stroll. She also asked if Miguel wanted to join us. He decided to bring one of the kittens with him, the white one with grey stripes. He had already named it Tiger. 

From Flora's house we followed a path to the main road. Along the way we passed a village meeting. Sat in the shade were five ladies, dressed in traditional costume, including these highly decorated wavy rimmed montera hats with large colourful pom poms on either side. In the meantime the men were stood up, pacing around, debating whatever was on the agenda.

It was fascinating to see a true and traditional part of village life and not just a show for the tourists.

Ali Jei thought they could have been debating about extending the tarmac road down to the Llachon pier.

The main road was only recently constructed. By recent, I think Ali Jei meant in the last ten years. She said there was some local resistance to it, concerns that it would bring too many people to the area. Others embraced the opportunies it would bring, like Flora and her husband Richard, who we hadn't met yet.

We walked along the road, or rather in the road. Miguel, carrying his kitten, walked to the side. I imagine his parents had strummed into him some essential road safety tips.

Ali Jei mentioned an old fort on top of the hill to our left, called Cerro Qeskapa but her assesment was "it's not worth it". So we were just going to walk to Llachon, just over half a mile away, much to Julie's relief.

Every now and then we would acquire a scruffy dog who would follow us for a while, as we walked through their patch.  

From the road we could see some excellent views across Lake Titicaca to the tip of the Chucuito peninsula. It wasn't far away, only 4 or 5 miles across. Beyond that was the great expanse of the largest lake in South America.

It's also known as the highest "navigable" lake in the world, which means its not the highest lake in the world but is the highest with commercial boats.

At the outskirts of the village of Llachon there was a ceremonial gate or at least it looked like one. It had two pillars holding up a two dimensial image of the colourful pom pom montera hat, that spanned the road. Ali Jei didn't think it had much significance, other than looking nice.

At this point we noticed the road was heading downhill slightly which surprised us.

Looking down from the road we could see how high we were relative to the lake. We hadn't noticed we had been gradually walking uphill. We seemed to have acclimatised to the altitude quite well. 

Twenty minutes after leaving Flora's we reached Llachon. The sign said it was 3820 m.s.n.m. which referred to its altitude, but checking the GPS on the phone it was showing over 3860m.

Whichever one was correct, it was still the highest we had been on this trip.

At the village shop we turned towards the plaza, passing a gate with "IEI 298 LLACHON" on the top. It was an Instituto de educación inicial  kindergarten school.

Painted on the gate was a "love boat" scene of a couple holding hands, sat on a small reed boat on the lake. The woman was wearing a type of hat we hadn't seen during our time in Peru. It was similar to a chullo but much longer, almost like a stocking.

Next we reached the Plaza Mayor. For a small village it had a sizeable main square, with a church, and a village hall. It was easy to imagine it full of celebration during a fiesta.

The only sign of life here today was a woman, sat on the church steps, sporting her finest pom pom'd wavy montera, and busy twiddling her thumbs.

We followed Ali Jei across the plaza towards the church. Tightly behind was Miguel and his kitten, keeping close for protection from a large dog that had taken an interest in the bundle of fur he was carrying.

It had a strange black and tan colouring, like a hyena and was licking its lips and drooling, which wasn't a good sign!

We shooed it away briefly. Feeling more at ease, Miguel sat on the wall behind the church. Unfortunately, moments later the hound was back and bothering him again. I sat myself between them, as a buffer zone but the dog was persistent. Thankfully he was friendly enough.

It was incredibly peaceful here. Despite the hassle from the dog we did manage to absorb some of the tranquility.

On the far side of the square there was a building, with a tin roof that looked abandoned. The door was open. Across the lintel it had the words Comedor Populares, which translated as a community kitchen or even "soup kitchen", a place where food is served to the most in need.

Below Comedor Populares it said Micaela Bastidas. Of course it meant nothing to us at the time but Micaela Bastidas was the name of an Andean heroine and martyr, wife of Tupac Amaru II who lead an uprising against the Spanish in 1780. Both of whom were captured and executed.

We left the plaza, past the love boat gate of the kindergarten, returning to the crossroads. We stood still for a little while, whilst a lady herded her sheep and a donkey down the street.

It must be something she did every day as the animals knew excatly where they were going. Although sheep are notoriously stupid, so perhaps the donkey was there to lead from the front.

We popped into the village shop to buy some bottled water before slowly making our way back to Flora's house. We did check if they had any beer but they didn't.  

Back in the garden Miguel safely returned Tiger to its siblings who had now all hidden in the bushes. They must have been petrified. We helped him round them up and put them back in the cage. He then took them all up to his bedroom.

In the meantime, Ali Jei arrived with some traditional clothes for us to try on. A poncho and a chullo for Garry and I. Then a skirt, embroidered jacket and the pom pom montera hat for Julie and Sonya.

My chullo was a tight fit. I do have a large head. "It's to fit all my brains in" is always my reasoning. All dressed up, we took photos of each other and laughed at each other. We all looked ridiculous.  

We thought the fancy dress was just for fun but we actually ended up wearing them for the rest of the afternoon.

To the past the time Flora had arranged for us to do a typical task that she would do in the afternoon, shelling dried broad (fava) beans. Ali Jei explained that they grow their own vegetables. The beans would then be harvested and dried in the sun.

A sackful arrived and opened up on the floor. We sat around it and began to seperate the dried bean from the dry shell.

 We were hard at it for over an hour, repeating the same task every thirty seconds. It was the most tedious job ever. We had to make our own amusement to survive.

 It was hard work. Simply sitting on the floor for so long was uncomfortable and then being hunched over added to our bad posture.

We weren't very proficient. I think Flora expected us to complete the whole sackfull. Although we were being meticulous with our quality control placing the darker beans in a seperate pile.  

Shortly after 5pm we asked Ali Jei if we could take some time off to photograph the sun setting over the lake. The garden she had a nice elevated seating area that had a partial view of Lake Titicaca. 

We fully intended to return to the shelling but Ali Jei gave us the rest of the day off. It was getting too dark. We took off the traditional costumes and returned to our rooms for a short siesta.

We regrouped for supper, arriving bearing gifts. Flora was busy in the kitchen and invited us in. She was grateful for all the supplies and seemed especially pleased with the turmeric.

She told Ali Jei that she had never cooked with it before but had come across it when she was helping a neighbour. She remembered feeling envious of her but now she was excited to be cooking with it herself.

Flora called Miguel down from his bedroom to receive his gifts. His eyes lit up when he saw the pencil case with Marvel heroes, like Captain America, the Hulk and Spiderman.

Waiting for us on the table for us to snack on before supper was a huge bowl of popcorn. I'm not the biggest fan of popcorn but I had a few. I was getting hungry. 

Richard joined us. He had been out all day in the fields but was dressed for supper. He was even wearing a chullo hat which I'm sure was solely for our benefit.

He was a charming man and quite the giggler.

The soup arrived. It was the same as lunch (I'm sure) but now thickened up like a chowder, just as tasty but less delicate.  

Whilst we waited for our main course Ali Jei called us over to the kitchen door. Miguel was busy frying potatoes.

"This is the first time I've seen him help out in the kitchen" she said.

She obviously knew the family very well having been coming here for several years with Intrepid. There was an older brother who had now gone to study at university. He and Miguel were very close. He even built the extension to the house which was now Miguel's bedroom.

Our main course arrived. It was rice 'n chips, what we often call "half and half", especially when ordering at a Chinese restaurant.

Miguel's chips were delicious. He had cooked them to perfection.

Then came a lovely surprise. Flora brought a cake out of the kitchen with a candle. It said "Happy Anniversary".

Ali Jei had bought it in Puno yesterday and carried it all the way across Lake Titicaca in one piece. What a beautiful kind gesture. 

We all had a good slice each.

After all the food we were all ready for bed, despite it only being 8pm. Today had been yet another epic adventure.

We retired to our room, and lay on our solid yet strangely comfortable beds. I think it was weight of the thick blankets that made us feel cozy and warm. When the lights went out we were asleep within minutes.