Lakes and volcanoes

Posted on December 23, 2014 by Andy

Osorno – Puerto Varas

Osorno is not a very pleasant town. We only stayed here to get new tires and to get our steering fixed. Motoaventura is a BMW dealer and rents motorbikes as well. They had the spare parts ready, the tires we wanted on stock and they made a good and quick job.

We waited a few hours till everything was done, but the time flew by as a lot of other travellers (most from Argentina) stopped by and so we had a great time there. We were served coffee as well and had a fantastic lunch on a restaurant nearby.

We were glad that we did not have to stay another night though as the town has nothing to offer and so we continued to the Lago Llangquihue which is close by. The lake is incredible. It is pretty big and a fantastic snow covered volcano is towering on its eastern side. This whole region has been settled by Germans and they keep their traditions. So you find Bavarian restaurants, coffee shops offering “kuchen”, and a lot of names are German. We had a short stop in the town of Frutillar for a coffee in a theatre built directly at the water. It is a great building and it seems to be a fantastic theatre, offering room for 1600 people. We wondered how this little village would look like when 1600 people arrive there for the evening event.

The town of Puerto Varas has a fantastic view on the volcano as well. We stayed there and made a daytrip to the volcano and some neat waterfalls nearby.

We took advantage of the German influence and enjoyed an “Erdinger Weissbier” in the evening.

Great riding in the sun along the lakes on our way to Puerto Varas.

Volcanoes everywhere.

Sunset in Puerto Varas.

The volcano Osorno is a fantastic view, from all perspectives.

Fantastic mountains surround this area.

Short break on the riverside.

A stunning road led up the volcano.

We rode up to the volcano. There is a skiing area there and it is pretty busy in winter times.

Sunset from the volcano

Big fat cows on green meadows

Posted on December 21, 2014 by Andy

Salto de Laja – Villarica-Osorno

Just a week ago we had passed the Atacama desert, on of the driest areas on this planet. And now this: all shades of green. Big trees, high grass, thick bushes.

And all among it: cows. Lots of them. Big fat cows. And sheep.

This is cow paradise. We drove along a nice road, the sun was shining, it was warm, almost hot.

The road passes fantastic lakes with high snow covered mountains sorrounding it. This looks like picture book Switzerland except you won’t find a perferctly shaped volcano there.

We rode the bikes along the shores of Lago Villarica and Lago Ronco. The lake district of Chile is a fantastic area. And after all the desert that we have seen on our trip this is exactly what we our souls were thirsting for: lots of green and lots of water. We had sunshine all these days as well and the roads were in perfect condition. And so Christy came to the conclusion that if you could ride a bike in heaven, it would be just like here.

Lago Villarica with a nice volcano

What a view from our nice hostel.

We enjoyed the great view and sunset

Green meadows dominated by one of the many volcanos there.

Looks like Switzerland

Coffeebreak on our enjoyable ride that day.

Great rivers.

The ride was super relaxed in the sun, warm and no wind.

A lot of cows here.

They are quite big here and they have a lot of grass.

Lago Ranco with its crystal clear water.

Nice spot for a short break.

Funny birds.

The ferry is driven by a rope that the passengers pull to move the ferry from one side of the river to the other.

A little bit gravel brought us to Osorno where we stayed for the night.

Waterfalls

Posted on December 20, 2014 by Andy

NP 7 tazas – Salto del Laja

We arrived at a very nice campsite just outside the NP “Siete tazas”. The name translates as “seven cups” describing the river as it falls in several spectacular waterfalls into little bowls that the river had carved out of the hard rock here.

We camped and had a nice evening with 2 guys from Israel before we took our bike to the entry of the national park. A little hike brought us to a canyon. A small trail led through a colorful forest and down the canyon, offering fantastic views on the waterfalls.

We continued south and after a stretch on the PanAm we found a nice hotel close to another great waterfall, the “Salto de Laja”. Our hotel happened to be right at the edge of one side of the waterfall and we had a view on it directly from our room.

The next day we wanted to have a better look at it.

It was closed though. As we approached the gates we could see a lot of people with tired and sad expressions. A police officer stood in the entrance of a little path that led to the waterfalls. A rescue vehicle stood aside.

A little girl of 13 years age fell into the water underneath the waterfall and had been pulled into a powerful undertow the day before. She was still trapped there and we could hardly imagine what the poor parents went through, sitting there and waiting for the officials and rescuer to bring them the body of their daughter.

We felt very bad, standing there with our cameras, excited tourists that hoped to see a great natural site… and there the poor family going through the most unimaginable pain.

We turned our bikes around and left.

It was a quite ride and we both wished the best for the poor family.

Our little campsite, directly at the little river.

You know what to expect after sunset ….

It was hot …

… we were thirsty…

…very thirsty!

Friendly neighbour…

Fantastic waterfall on the way to 7 tazas

The canyon of the 7 tazas…

The water is crystal clear

It looks like a great place to take a swim… but it is not. It is freezing cold.

The hike was fantastic and offered a lot of nice views.

Sunset

From our hotel room we saw the Salto de Laja.

We wanted to have a little walk to the falls the next morning. But the excitement was soon replaced by sadness.

Fruits, vineyards and a nail

Posted on December 20, 2014 by Andy

Valparaiso to Santa Cruz

We left Valparaiso and followed the route “Ruta fruta”, as they call it since all kind of fruits are grown here. Momentarily there is strawberry time. And everywhere they offered big baskets of these bright red fruits. We did not buy any though (I guess we thought we would buy them later till we finally had left the area… a mistake I keep doing repeatedly on my travels).

Instead we got into an area, which was full of vineyards. Grape vines everywhere. It was steaming hot, even though we had been freezing just a few hours before on the coast where the wind blows from the icy cold pacific.

But inland the Heat.Was.On.

It was not far to our destination when we passed this fantastic house in the middle of the vineyards. We stopped and quickly decided to stay here for the night.

The owners grow and sell grapes to the surrounding vineries. We had a fantastic view on the fields. A short swim in the nice little pool cooled us down.

After my swim I realized I had a flat tire. I located a 3cm nail sticking out of my rear tire. I decided that this would be a quick fix and disassembled the rear wheel. But when it came to take the tire off the rim it just wouldn’t work how I expected.

I used all the tricks I knew and had heard of. But it was too tight. Even with the help off the receptionist, a massive 1,5m crow-bar, mother gravity and his weight of approximately-pretty-much we didn’t get the tire off the rim. The whole action was accompanied by a wide variety of German and dialect curses (such as “godverdamminomool”), intranslatable …). But then I was told there is a vulcanizador just around the corner and so I brought the wheel there the next morning and with the right machines it was off in not time. In South America a lot of tires get repaired, other than in Germany. The profession is called vulcanizador, so this was the right guy to go to. He got everything fixed within a few minutes and we were off the road again.

Lots of vineyards

Our view from our hotel, not bad, with a good red wine in our glasses….

A nice little pool to cool down

A flat tyre is never fun. But fortunately it was on a nice hotel and not at the side of the road in the middle of nowhere..

quickly get the wheel off

… and then the tyre off the rim… thank god there was a vulcanizador around the corner…

on the road again…

Big waves and into Santiago

Posted on December 15, 2014 by Andy

NP Pan de Azucar to Santiago

We left the national park Pan de Azucar and continued along the coast for a few kilometers before we got on the PanAm again and just flew down the 4 lane highway with a short stopover in Vallenar, where we found a really nice hotel.

La Serena is a really nice colonian style town and again we found safe parking and a real nice hotel just around the corner of the central plaza where we stayed for the night.

We continued our long stretch of days on the PanAm. Riding was very relaxed. Not too much traffic, the broad lane of the PanAm, an enjoyable landscape. Nothing to get overly excited about, but after all these eventful days in Bolivia we almost enjoyed not to “have to stop and look at something”. We just rode. You can let your mind fly away, think about the journey, about the country, about friends, family or just keep your mind busy by calculating how much time you would need to the next exit/town/gasstation when riding at different speeds (something I did a lot and I can proudly announce that I became the master of “I-will-be-at-the-next-exit-in-X.XX-minutes-at-the-momentary-average-speed-of-Y-km/h-sort-of-calculation”).

After we had enough of long straight roads, we decided to make a little detour via Monte Patria. It turned out to be a pretty road with some lakes, lots of curves and very little traffic.

We did not want to arrive late in Santiago and so we decided to find a place somewhere at the coast for the night.

And we found a pretty one: Pichidangui turned out to be a little village on a fantastic rocky coast. The deep blue ocean breaks its waves powerful on the black rocks of the coast. The setting sun added some warm color to the scene. And the birds contributed their squawking noises to the thundering sound of the breaking waves. It was a mind-blowing scenery.

On the road the day before we had to stop on a construction site. I chatted with the guy standing in his car behind me and he told me his friend owns a hostel where lots of motorbikers go. He marked the position of the hostel in my navigation (Case Matte 33° 26’22” S ;70° 37’43” W). So we looked for the hostel and drove up and down the road in Santiago until a young guy put his head out of the fence and asked if we where looking for a hostel. It turned out to be Christian, the owner. A motorcyclist himself he decided to start this hostel. For whatever reason it does not have a sign outside, but it is a fantastic place. Safe parking, a kitchen for use, a fantastic roof terrace, fast internet… everything we wanted to have.

He made some phone calls for us so we could get our bikes serviced at BMW.

The next two days we walked around the city, had fantastic meals, even a german Weissbier, had our bikes serviced (it turned out though they did not check the bearings on the steering, so we had to get this done a few days later in Osorno; grrrr).

It was a relaxing time there and a little break from all the riding we did in the past week.

Leaving the NP Pan de Azucar

Rising right from the sea…

We took a detour for 200kmto see some curves… here we found them..

Coffee break in Monte Patria

Christy flying by…

The curves where much fun after the long straight streches.

Our little detour led into the backcountry where the landscape was nice and the road curvy.

The long stretches on the PanAm are sort of boring. But in a nice way…

The sea… so impressive when calm

The sea… so impressive when roaring.

Running around taking pictures…

Powerful waves hit the shore

Sunset in Pichidangui

The breaking waves on the coastline.

The seagulls are just impressive flying artists

View on Santiago

This little cutie entertained himself and us with this bottle that he tried to open… some street dogs are just so adorable

The financial district of the town.

We had a great walk to a little hill in the city.

…with interesting details

Huge plants

Our hostel in Santiago Case Matte

Campsite at the beach

Posted on December 14, 2014 by Andy

San Pedro to NP Pan de Azucar

The copper mine made a great impression on us and so we continued the road to Antofagasta. We crossed the Atacama desert, one of the driest deserts on earth. It wasn’t a very pleasant ride. The landscape became less attractive and everywhere there were little mining cabins and trucks.

Every second car was a red pick-up truck from the national mining company Codelco. A lot of watertrucks passed us on their way to the big mining sites near Calama.

We stayed in a good hotel in Antofagasta and even the car-park there told you that all there is going on in this region is about mining. Beside our motorbikes there were only pick-ups from mining companies.

We continued our way south and the PanAm gets really boring as it gets more inland. Not that the landscape is ugly, but it gets quite repetitive. The only interruption was a sculpture that an artist put up in the desert. The hand of the desert is right next to the PanAm and so we took a short break there in the shadowless boiling heat of the desert.

After 300km of heat and desert the landscape becomes more hilly and nicer. We finally turned off the PanAm to get to the coast to a nice little national park. The NP Pan de Azucar offers a lot of plants (mainly little cactus) that only life in this little area. It is a wonderful landscape as well. The area doesnt get any rain at all. But it gets humid with clouds and fog that rolls in from the coast. We had blue sky and sun all day long, but as we approach the national park the sky gets cloudy. We arrived at the coast on a campsite.

It is a quite little bay with a perfect sand beach, rocks on both ends of the 1km beach.

There are little shelters for cooking set up. All very nicely. We are the only guests. The owners live in a couple of little huts where fishermen have their boats. So we make our dinner and enjoying the beach and the stars all by ourselves. It is beautiful.

Antofagasta at night

Sunset in Antofagasta

From our Hotel we had a nice view on the fishermen’s work. The pelicans watched them as well, hoping there would be an easy breakfast

The monument is pretty nice in this environment…

I didn’t really make it in time for our selfie…

Now this time I almost made it…

I got tired of running around in the heat, so I put the camera a bit closer and finally made in time…

Looong streches of nothing

The black PanAm winding through desert mountains

A small motorbiker in the vast country

It became more hilly as we kept going south.

The last bit was quite nice

On the way to the Azucar NP

The road there was beautiful.

Our campsite… all alone

These are no billiard balls, but a special cactus that is only growing in this NP

After dark we played around with the camera and Christy wrote my name with her flashlight really nicely. She had to write in reverse and it turned out she is a natural talent to as it is not as easy.

Chisties first attempt. Pretty neat.

My attempts were less flattering. These are my best tries (out of many, many, many).

That went well… oh there is a letter missing…

…. and another one missing, and why can’t I get the Y right?

….almost…

After many other triesI finally gave up and just gave her a kiss instead.

“Damn” I gave up

Copper

Posted on November 30, 2014 by Andy

Calama – Chile

I remember seeing a picture of that monster the first time.

And now it is crawling up the hill right in front of me. Slow. Roaring. Heavy.

The truck carries 400t of rock. It is an incredible sight. It slowly passes us on its way out of the mine. After it passed us all you see from behind is 4 gigantic wheels. They are more than 4m in diameter. 40.000$ worth each. And they only last 8 months.

I turn around to have another look into the mine. It is mindblowing. More than 1000m deep. 5km long. 3km wide. It is a day of unbelievable numbers. It is a place of superlatives.

We are visiting Chuquicamata, the largest copper mine in the world.

Almost 100 years ago they started this mine. Not knowing how big the place would become. In the meantime they started 2 other mines, digging in the same geological site. They dig for copper here, and for Molybdenum.

Only one percent of the rock is copper and they have exported more than a million tons of copper last year. Easy to understand how much earth had to been moved for that.

Now the mine is slowly getting to its end and so the output has lowered to about half this year. But they have found more copper. Another 1000m deeper. They will change this now to a subterranean mine in the future. This will also reduce the impact on the environment. The huge hole in the surface is only the most visible impact. The dust, dirt and not least the exhausts contribute to a pretty bad impact the mine has on the environment. Each truck consumes more than 3L/min. They have 100 trucks moving around the clock; they soon will be replaced by conveyer belts.

The trucks are impressive. These are the largest truck that have ever been built. Everything on them is on an almost ridiculous scale. They are more than 8m wide. The tires are just incredible. And they move, slow but constant. The huge caterpillars use only 3 shovels to fill them. So they stand less than 30 seconds to get filled. There is a lane down and one up, so it is a constant movement of huge piles of rocks.

We made a short stopover at the mine. And it is a very exciting time we spend there. These are machines like from another world. Everything is big here. The huge pick-up trucks look like small toys next to the lorries.

And it is big business here. Before Salvador Allende took over the government, this was a big North American business. Ever since the mining is governmental owned. Making 1/3rd of the annual governmental income of Chile.

Hugely depending on the copper price of course.

And so every new source is welcome. A new mine has been started just last year, offering resources of copper for another 50 years. In order to get to these sources, parts the old town of Chuquicamate has been buried under a huge pile of rocks. Even a complete clinic (one of the most modern of the country) is covered by hundreds of meters of rocks.

The rest of the town can be visited. It is a well conserved ghost town. Our guide has studied here. “Lots of good memories” he said, when talking about the stadium of the high school. He tries to smile while he says it.

The old town gets covered by the rubble of the mine. The town was built by the mining company, who owned everything here, including the houses.

They conserve whats left of the town.

The old main centre of the town.

Somewhere underneath here is the clinic.

The impressive mine itself. 1000m deep.

Somewhere deep down the trucks get loaded. With 3 shovels in less than 25 seconds.

Steaming up the hill. Heavy loaded. The truck drivers belong to the elite of the 15.000 people working here. They make 7000$ a month.

Each of the wheels is more than 4m in diameter, worth 40.000$ and has to be replaced every 8 months.

This is the largest truck in the world. With the most powerful engine (3700 HP, 20 cylinders, 90L Volume).

Quite impressed couple.

On the way out we find this: a replacement part 🙂

The truck underneath looks like a toy.

Dust and colored lakes

Posted on November 30, 2014 by Andy

Bolivias Southwest

The south of Bolivia is a wonderland for off-roading and landscapes. And of course we wouldn’t want to miss that.

I wrote a long report about this part of the trip. But I just realized I can’t express this in words.

We saw the most amazing places, rode fantastic dirt roads. The landscape was dusty, colorful, vast.

We suffered from the intense sun and the dust. We hit some sandy roads and got our feet wet in river crossings. We crossed the border at over 5000m.

We saw red, white and green lakes with flamingos. We saw mountains of green, red and yellow. We had chilly nights and strong winds.

We had a fantastic time.

Take a look at the pictures and enjoy.

Leaving Uyuni direction San Christobal

Most of the road is in good condition

Very little traffic

A first lagoon

Vast country

The coloured mountains

To get an idea of the distances: find the 4x4

To get an idea of the distances: find the 4×4

A little great in the middle of nowhere

The Laguna Colorada

To get to a nice viewpoint we rigged ourselves through deep sand

Flamingos, thousands.

We are at over 4000m here.

The colours are pretty intense. And so is the sun.

Unreal.

Enjoying the view. But it was cold and windy.

More currogoations and sand. Christy is a quick learner and eventually got pretty good along the sandy bits

2 spanish daredevils cycling here at over 5000m and on soft and corrugated roads. Hard fellows. But with a great spirit and great sense of humor.

Christy learned to ride on all kind of mean road conditions here.

Some geysers close to the Bolivian customs (which is at 5000m)

Another nice lagoon.

The Disierto de Salvador Dali.

Vast, vast, vast….

These mountains are incredible.

The Laguna Verde. The strong and cold wind stirred up the colourful lagoon.

The little border crossing to Chile.

Chile or Argentina? We decided to go to Chile…

A 40km descent. The road is straight as a line and descending from 5000m down to 2500m.

View from San Pedro de Atacama on the closely volcano.

Salt

Posted on November 24, 2014 by Andy

It is unreal! I can feel the wind. I can feel the engine working hard underneath me. I feel the vibrations of the wheels spinning at 80km/h. I know I am riding a motorbike and I have it all cranked up. I go as fast as this 400ccm Honda dirt bike runs.

And still: I don’t seem to move.

I see the hexagonal shaped salt structures fly by and I know I am moving.

But the vast, completely flat, white and endless surface of the Salar doesn’t give my brain the usual information that we usually combine with moving. Everything that I can see except the ground seems to stand still. This place really plays tricks on your mind.

I am on the Salar de Uyuni.

It is the largest salt lake in the world and it is a magic place.

Originally we wanted to ride our bikes to one of the islands there and camp overnight. But we were unlucky with the weather. The evening before we wanted to go heavy rain softened the surface of the Salar. That is not a problem in terms of riding. But the salty water would get everywhere on the bike, causing problems everywhere, especially on the electronics.

We decided instead to rent some small 400ccm dirt bikes.

So the day after we rode our bike to MTB where Juan, our guide, was already waiting for us.

They have a really nice workshop there and a couple of different bikes.

We chose 400ccm Hondas and took off. We made a nice little loop on sandy roads to the eastern entrance of the salt lake.

Other than one would expect, you cannot enter the salt lake everywhere. There are only few entrances to the salt lake. Close to the land the salt surface gets very soft. Only few parts are solid. It is actually quite dangerous in some areas and a lot of people had to leave their bikes out there.

As we entered the Salar, we could see that large areas were covered in water. The salty water splashed over the bike, leaving a very thick rust of salt. You had to know the way very well. Once I got maybe 5m off the track and sank into the salt surface. I got out of the situation luckily by opening the throttle all the way.

On one of the little islands we had lunch. There are dozens of 4×4 standing around pouring hundreds of tourist on the little island. But that doesn’t reduce the magic of the place in any way.

In all directions it is white and flat. In the far distance you can see volcanoes that circle the salt lake.

The volcanoes are also one of the reasons why this is an important place for bolivian industry: the salt of the lake contains 70% of the worldwide lithium resources.

The surface is not entirely flat. When the salt had dried out some 20.000 years ago, it grew in hexagonal crystals which grew until the edges met each other. Water from underneath the salt lake moves up through these border lines, leaving salt crystals on the surface as the water vaporizes in the sun. The crystals stand out as high as 10cm, showing a pattern of hexagonal little walls as far as the eye can see.

Riding on the salt lake is like on tarmac. Not slippery as one could imagine. And it is great fun.

But we are happy we didn’t bring our own bikes. The small Hondas were covered in a thick salt layer.

We return to our little hotel after dark.

It was a perfect day and we need some time to allow the brain to accept that this place is real.

Juan, our guide from MTB

part of the Salar was covered in water.

You had to know where to go. A few meters off the track and you can sink your bike.

Flat, white, endless. The Salar de Uyuni.

Everything gets salty.

The hexagonal patterns is everywhere.

A 4×4 in the far distance.

A “eye” in the salt lake. Little potholes where the water breaks through the solid surface.

salt crystals as they grow in the water.

The Island in the centre of the lake.

A lot of tourist are brought here by the organised tours.

The island is full of cactus

Happy couple

The dimensions are incredible

surrounded by volcanoes far away.

Our three little bikes.

When the lake is whet (in ourcaseonly the first few hundret meters) the salt really gets everywhere.

They get really salty. We were glad not to bring our own bikes.

Juan and Christy. Like a walk on the moon…

The surface is unreal: in detail as in the large scale

Happy couple II

Happy couple III

Where is Andy?

The pattern are just incredible.

my little 400ccm Honda. A real fun bike…

Floating Islands

Posted on November 14, 2014 by Andy

Puno – Lago Titicaca

As a kid I loved to read. And I read a lot. I loved to read the adventure books of the 50’s and 60’s. Real adventures. Real people.

I still like these kinds of books from that time. Other than today adventures were not sponsored by big companies. It was not million Dollar investments in order to create a Billion Dollar worth advertising movie for example of somebody falling into the void from a balloon at 36km altitude. Not that I don’t respect the braveness of Baumgartner doing it. But the way everything is setup is to create as much attention as possible is annoying. It is advertising at the end.

How different is the approach and the style of the older adventures, like Lindemann who crossed the Atlantic in a folding boat.

Two of the books I read intensively and loved to read again and again where the books of Thor Heyerdahl. He was a researcher and saw connections between cultures of South America and Polynesia in the Pacific. The only way he could explain that, was that people crossed the Pacific. Since everybody told him that this would have been impossible at that time he build a float (which was used at ancient times in South America), found a couple of adventures guys and crossed the ocean against all odds in order to proof his theory.

He did the same thing with a papyrus boat in order to proof that Egyptian culture may have influenced South America by crossing the Atlantic with such a boat. The boat Ra II was built at the Titicaca Lake.

The book is an incredible documentary of braveness and great spirit of adventure.

I had the descriptions of how they built the boat very vividly in my mind when we approached the Lake Titicaca on our motorbikes.

We arrived pretty late, since the ride from Arequipa was so beautiful. We decided to check into a fantastic hotel since it was out of town and we didn’t like to be in the centre of the town of Puno as it didn’t look very attractive to us.

We slept in the next morning and after a fantastic breakfast with a great view on the Lago Titicaca we took a taxi to the towns harbor and looked for a boat to the floating islands. We didn’t have to look for long, the boats found us by means of a guy who dragged tourists to the ticket office and moves them on to the boats.

The floating islands are the remaining goods of the culture of the Uru. Still 2000 people live on the islands. They live on floating islands that are created from totora reeds. There are 500 small islands, each containing 5-10 houses, each house representing a small family. Each island has an elected spokesman who is responsible for the wellbeing of the island. The Urus live from tourism. But they live the very simple and hard life on the islands. It is very traditional, no TV, no Internet. They sleep and live here.

Visitors from Puno are getting put together in boats and then shipped to the islands. There they get distributed to the different islands, so that all islands can participate from the tourism.

We were only 6 people on our boat (normally it is between 10 and 20) when we arrived on “our” island.

Jose, the spokesman welcomed us and lead us around the island. There is a circle of benches, 6 little huts, a little tower. All made of totora reeds. Including the island itself of course. It is a weird feeling to walk on the soft ground. You are walking on a thick layer of these reeds. In areas which are more walked, the reeds are broken and are short. On the edge of the islands, the reeds are long. You can notice that they are spread out in one direction. Jose tells us that this is how they maintain the islands. Once a week they put on a new layer of reeds. After a while they break and you have to put on a new layer. They old layers are getting soaked by water and start to rot. And indeed, if you are moving away the top layer of the reeds you feel the moist already and only 10cm deep the ground is completely wet.

After we have seen everything each of the families put up their little stand to sell little items. This is the only income for these families. So we bought some little handcrafts from each of the families.

Later we boarded the “Mercedes-Benz” how Jose called his little reed boat to ride it across the lake to the main island where we got picked up by our motorboat to get back to Puno.

His two little daughters accompanied us and told us a little bit about their life as well. They go to a school here on the floating islands. They very rarely go to Puno and have never been anywhere else.

Even though the complete tour was fully organized and a well structured tourism event, I really enjoyed it.

These islands and the way of life of these people there is so unique, that I was able to ignore the whole system that they have set up here. Tourists get processed like in a manufacturing belt. But the life the Uuos choose to live is very hard. And to reserve the culture of their people by living this hard life gets all my respect.

To be able to ride on one of these reed boats and to get a little bit the feeling of how Heyerdahl and his daredevil friends travelled the Atlantic was priceless.

I had a great day. And the fact that this was my birthday just made it a perfect present for me.