Copacabana (no not Brazil) and Isla del Sol

So, after somehow occupying 5 nights in La Paz we took an early morning bus to Lake Titicaca, often wrongly quoted as the world´s highest navigable lake. The views of La Paz, as we headed up to the Altiplano, were amazing. The journey was a nice short 3 hours or so, and after a couple of hours we all had to get off the bus so we (and it) could cross the Strait of Tiquina, a narrow stretch of water that seperates the 2 parts of the lake. We headed over in a small ferry boat and the bus crossed over it what has to be the most interesting vehicle ferry we have ever seen.

Vehicle ferry, Lake Titicaca

We soon arrived in the lakeside town of Copacabana and checked into another nice and cheap hotel, this one chilly but not as cold as the one in La Paz. Copacabana is even higher than La Paz, at an altitude of 3841m. The days were sunny and fairly warm but as soon as the sunset we could feel the temperature plummet. It felt weird to be at Lake Titicaca because it is so big (118 miles by 50 miles) that it feels more like the sea than a lake. Most nights we would wander down to the lakeside to enjoy the extremely beautiful sunsets...

Sunset over Lake Titicaca

...and then head into one of the many restaurants to warm up around the fire. Again we bumped into some old friends, this time 3 English girls we had done the Uyuni Salt Flats tour with.
Being only a small town, there wasn´t too much to keep us here for too long. We had a wander around the famous cathedral and lit a candle to the memory of our Grandads.

Cathedral, Copacabana

After a couple of days we took a ferry across the lake to Isla del Sol, the birth place of the Inca religion. We only spent a night here and it was like a journey back in time...the kind of place that you get the impression hasn´t changed in centuries (apart from the addition of Gringos). We took a stroll that evening and it wasn´t just the altitude (over 4000m)that took our breath away, the views of the mountains across the lake were amazing, as was the sunset.

Jon on Isla del Sol

Sunset from Isla del Sol

The following morning we got up extremely early to enjoy an even more amazing sunrise (check those mountains !!)...

Sunrise, Isla del Sol

...and after breakfast set off to walk the 3 hours to the top of the island to see the Inca ruins of Challapampa and catch the afternoon ferry back to Copacabana. The walk was generally fairly flat but where it did undulate it was really hard to walk uphill and the sun was strong, really strong.

Main road, Isla del Sol

We just about made it in time to catch the ferry and were back in Copacabana in time teatime and another cold Lake Titicaca night. The following day we were booked on the bus to Arequipa in Peru.

written by

jonnik on April 7, 2008 from Copacabana, Bolivia

from the travel blog: Jon & Kenty's Grrrrrand Tour

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