The Amazon: Welcome to the Jungle

At last the morning came to fly out of Cusco and into the jungle. Our check-in luggage was searched manually at the airport, the scanning equipment having gone bust. That's quality airport security right there. Soaked through as soon as we stepped off the plane, we were shortly off on a boat ride down the Tambopata River. Unlike in Paracas, our life vests actually appeared semi-functional. They also did a great job at keeping the humidity in.

We spent the next two hours speeding through rain and river spray with flooded banks to either side. The river, swollen to its widest in twenty years, had been causing chaos in local plantations and communities for a good few weeks. Tufts of leaves stood out of the water, the only sign of submerged trees below. Our boat engine kept choking on debris and enforcing brief stops in the middle of the river's countless intersecting currents. Thankfully the driver knew his stuff.

Upon reaching Tambopata Lodge, we found that the dock had been entirely swallowed by the river. This meant that we were forced to climb up or under the wooden railing. The first person who tried almost dislodged the railing, which greatly increased everyone's confidence in their chances of survival, but ultimately even Kathy - dressed for the jungle in short dress plus thongs - managed to crawl through with the rest of us.

The ecolodge was surprisingly luxurious. There was a lounge area complete with a bar, a dining room, a series of thatched cabins with open fly-netted roofs and walls, hot and cold water in the bathrooms, and an optional fly-net curtain over the beds. Additionally, as our guide told us girls, there was even a big mirror in the communal bathroom so we could do our makeup. "For the monkeys!"

After settling in and exploring our hammock, Kathy and I went for a short walk around the lodge. As it got darker, the buzzing and chirping of insects and frogs grew louder. How peaceful the sound of approaching malaria! We took daily DEET baths. We were very excited to catch sight of one bouncy creature with a marsupial's head and rabbit's hindquarters. It wasn't quite a puma, but it was excitingly unfamiliar and Amazonian. Back outside the lounge area, a handsome green parrot said hola to Kathy.

We followed dinner with a night walk along a path by the dock. Borrowed gumboots combated the thick brown mud. Niki was a natural at the spider-spotting game, though she walked right past the first massive tarantula along with the rest of us. I wish we'd kept walking, really. Before heading back to the lodge, we turned off our torches and listened to the night sounds of the jungle.

We slept like logs beneath the mozzie nets until our 6:30am breakfast call. The menu featured sweet and juicy jungle pineapple. We climbed into our gumboots and onto a motorized canoe, which took us fifteen minutes upstream to the approximate location of water-vanished stairs. Not to worry; out hopped our jungle guide, "Mancho" the machete in hand, and started hacking makeshift steps into the mud and the plants. He then proceeded to lead us through the jungle machete-first. Talk about bush bashing.

The jungle was everything I'd imagined it to be minus the singing bears and lions. Everything was green.

There were fruits shaped like frightened hedgehogs, alien seed pods, jewel-bright berries, and tree trunks studded with razer-sharp spikes. We slopped along in knee-deep mud as our guide pointed out things of interest: socialist spiders in their mammoth web city, red ants, leaf carrier ants, a lizard perfectly camouflaged to its tree trunk lodging, another tarantula, etc etc.

Our flooded path led to Lake Condenado, where we wobbled aboard yet another canoe. The first lake wildlife spotted was a tarantula resting on the face of the guide's paddle: cue screaming and general panic, while I quietly tried to calculate the odds that further tarantulas were located under our seats. (I did not look. I didn't want to have to dive off the canoe and into a lake purportedly teeming with piranhas.)

Once the tarantula had swum safely away from the boat, we picked out several hoatzins (also known as mohawk or asthmatic birds), which wheezed and fluttered between branches by the shore. We also caught sight of parrots overhead, alerted by their telltale strangled squawk. In quieter moments, the guide rapped his paddle on the bottom of the canoe. You could hear the echo punch out over the trees in the distance.

We clambered out onto the opposite side of the lake and went for a quick splosh towards two massive trees. Six or seven of us climbed inside the hollow trunk of the first one, which had been killed by a strangler fig. Once holed up in the tree, we discovered we had company. Presumably these were the rabid vampire bats described in Lonely Planet. But still more disconcerting was the jungle guide's next suggestion, pointing to a narrow tree nearby: "There's a pole if you ladies want to dance for the monkeys!" How tempting.

Damp with humidity and face-painted with red berry dye, we started our multi-canoe journey back to the lodge. While walking, we crossed paths with a poison-green race-striped frog. 

Lunch back at the ecolodge featured yucca chips (a potato-type vegetable) and avocado. I asked if the white cucumber was special jungle cucumber, and was told that everything on the table was special and from the jungle. Our guide then advised that I ought to have kissed the poison frog in order to procure a nice jungle husband "with lots of bananas".

Later that afternoon we took a cautious walk around a brazil nut plantation. Brazil nuts are as big as coconuts and possess similar skull-squishing potential, so we skirted most of the trees and hurried beneath the unavoidable ones. We returned to the lodge loaded up with gathered nuts. The guide handed his machete to Kathy and told her to have a crack at opening one. Challenge accepted. Kathy went at it like a lumberjack competitor at the Royal Melbourne Show, or that guy from Psycho, in a terrifying ten minute display of machete-wielding determination. She couldn't get past the first layers. I took the next go and didn't even manage to make a dent. It was like trying to crack open a cannonball with a butter knife. And then, of course, one of the boys gave it a shot and hacked the shell apart first go.

Mid-machete, we were called over to the dock to take a look at a group of saddle-backed tamarins, the second-smallest monkeys in the jungle. They raced between the trees using branches as bridges. Ever keen to educate us, our guide explained that the tamarins are polygamous, just like Germans and Danes - but not, looking to Niki, Kathy and I, like koalas.

When our scheduled caiman-spotting canoe ride was cancelled due to river flooding, we elected to take another night walk. The first half of our trip was fairly uneventful, but on the way back to the lodge our guide shone his torch on a baby lancet snake. 

The men crowded forward; the cameras came out; and here began a half-hour photo shoot of the second most poisonous snake in the jungle. Kathy was entrusted with Mancho while this went on. And on, and on. Boys.

Our jungle experience ended early the next morning when we set off on our long journey to Lima. And then it was just two more lomo saltado dinners and a cooking class until the end of our adventures in Peru. Mozzie bite count: zero. Poison frogs kissed: zero. Ongoing stomach infections: undetermined. We came, we saw, we survived, we conquered.

Cusco, Ollantaytambo and the Inca Trail: Surviving The Stairs

Things got a little crazy during our seven-hour bus trip to Cusco. Sugar-fueled and overheated, our travel group bounced off the walls until we finally crash-landed in the centre of the Incan Empire at 3pm. Lunch was way overdue. Fearing mutiny, our guide Pablo took us straight to Jack's Cafe, of the Western-style menu and llama mugs. Starved of trendy cafe foods, I ordered a hummus-filled roasted eggplant sandwich and a mango-lime frappe. It was a little piece of beautiful. 

Next up was a short walk around the city centre, which contained all the usual cathedrals and statues as well as a stack of outdoor equipment shops. Kathy, Niki and I dropped into one of these to stock up on rainproof pants for the Inca Trail. We tried them out earlier than expected as it started to pelt down while we were handing our cash over. The streets were ankle-deep in water and we were soaked in seconds. Rainy season indeed. 

We flung ourselves through the hotel door only to find that the foyer was in the process of flooding. Dodging puddles, I made my way to my room, and what do you know? Flooded. Fantastic, I cheered, my stomach having taken a turn for the worse after ten days of not-rightness. Overcome, I holed up in Kathy and Niki's room while those two beautiful girls moved all my stuff - hidden socks included - to the room next to theirs. 

After Nasca's unbeatable awfulness, this was the lowlight of the trip. While Niki scoped out brownies for us, Kathy and I stayed at the hotel and waited for the doctor's diagnosis. Apparently I was housing a parasite paired with a bacterial infection, so he loaded me up with meds and took his leave. South America really lived up to its reputation in my stomach. 

I felt almost normal the next day, which did much to reinforce my stupidity at delaying treatment for half our trip. All packed up for the next day's Inca Trail, we drove out of Cusco in the direction of the Sacred Valley. Our lunch stop was chiefly notable for its luxurious bathroom and the Amazonian parrots out front. One sprawling set of Incan agricultural terraces later, we arrived in the small, tourist-laden town we'd call home for the night. This part of the Sacred Valley is dominated by Ollantaytambo, a striking Incan site which shares a lot in common with Egyptian pyramids in terms of mysterious construction methods. Having heard a bit about Ollantaytambo's history - Incas started building the site until interrupted by the Spanish whereupon they fled to the jungle - we took a brief hike up to the Incan storage buildings at the back of the town. We stopped halfway for a panoramic display of Ollantaytambo, and also because our lungs were exploding. Good sign for the Inca Trail. 

When the others returned to the hotel, I decided to tackle Ollantaytambo itself, buoyed up by my stomach's sudden neutrality. Up the decorative terraces I went, stopping every three steps for high altitude wheezing. It was painful stuff, but worth it once in view of the three intersecting valleys.

And then came the morning of the Inca Trail and all the accompanying antrepidation. I dressed in my hiking uniform of cream zip-off pants, explorer socks, hiking boots, a t-shirt and polarfleece vest: hot stuff coming through! Time to put those years of scouting to use. One good luck hug from Pablo later, we were packed onto the bus and leaving Ollantaytambo armed only with day packs, duffel bags and Luis, our hike guide. 

Oh, Luis. What a character. He teased Niki mercilessly throughout the four days of the trail, trying to set her up with Rudi the chef to ensure good quality meals. This was to be Luis' final job on the Inca Trail, only 600 hikes into his career. We were charged with making it memorable. 

Our bus raced around the narrow riverside road, stopping only for the occasional game of chicken with oncoming vehicles. When we reached the starting point, we met our team of 14 - yes, 14! - porters. This was glamping, not camping. The porters carried the vast majority of our equipment, put our tents up, rolled out our sleeping mats, left basins of hot water outside our tents so we could freshen up, woke us with coco tea in our tents each morning, clapped our arrival to the campsite each and every day, and, most importantly, cooked us some of the best food I ate in Peru. They also ran past us all the way along the trek as we sweated and flailed behind them. 

The first day of the hike was a relatively easy series of ups and downs, though the altitude definitely added its own challenge. We took several breaks along the way, including a stop by an administrative Incan site. In the early afternoon, we took a turn from the main path and found our lunch tent already set up by the porters. We were fed soup and fried trout, most of which Kathy gave to a passing cat. The afternoon featured lots of walking by the hugely gushing river. 

We arrived at our mountain-surrounded campsite in the late afternoon and collapsed onto the soft green grass. The tents were already set up and dinner was cooking. Remind me to bring porters to my next camping trip. The food was fantastic: obligatory soup and chicken with tasty green sauce. The rest of the evening was spent navigating the feral squat toilets, becoming outraged, and determining the best 'natural baño' locations. Everyone was slightly anxious about the infamous second day of the trek but we all got to sleep without much trouble.

Our trepidation wasn't wasted. I'm not sure there are adequate words to describe Day 2. (Niki tried 'difficult' and 'tiring', while Kathy offered 'horrifying'. I prefer 'barely survivable'.) I suffered an inauspicious beginning when woken in the night by a fever coupled with hideous stomach cramps. I dealt with this by stumble-crouching around in the dark, delirious, trying to decide whether or not to demand an airlift home. This little episode, combined with a rainy wake-up call at 5:30am, meant that Day 2 was set to be a blast. 

But quinoa porridge plus personalized pancakes - mine said 'llama' - did a lot to improve spirits, especially since my stomach had calmed down by breakfast. The first part of the actual hike was a bearable constant climb. It eventually stopped raining but the stair-heavy struggle continued for a further two hours before we took a proper break. Somewhere along the way, my energy levels plummeted. I couldn't even manage to unzip my own pocket. I've honestly no idea how my body heaved itself up those steps, but I'm pretty sure it had a lot to do with my two amazing friends. Kathy slapped half a protein bar into my hands when we reached the rest point, and it saved my life. 

Momentarily. After several precious minutes of newfound energy, the final stage of the climb - supposedly easier than the previous leg - almost destroyed me. I love hiking but the high altitude and previous night completely screwed me over. My lungs and legs weren't doing much to cooperate. Trouble was, each time we stopped to breathe, I felt like I was going to faint right off the side of the mountain.

It took us a good forty minutes to climb the final 200m to the peak. A couple of lovely Kiwis gave us a handful of lifesaving skittles when we passed by, right before they leapfrogged us. Our Danish friend Mads had been waving at us from the peak for a long, long time before we reached him. But we got there. We sat down and sucked in air at 4200m above sea level, which was a very special sort of triumph. We'd spent five hours climbing a vertical distance of 1.2km. The spectacular snow-capped mountain view was a decent reward.  

On the other side of the peak we found steep stairs half-swallowed by blanketing cloud. Down we went for an hour and a half until we hit upon our campsite. Knees shook. Muscles screamed. I planted myself on the stony ground in front of my tent until the rest of the group joined us, at which point only our 2:30pm lunch could hoist me to my feet. And then we returned to the dining tent for an afternoon tea of saladas with jam, and stayed there right through to dinner. Nobody wanted to move. It was all congratulating each other and wincing at movement and eating whatever the porters placed before us. Bedtime was 8:30pm sharp.

It was still raining when we were woken at 5:30am by the coco tea-bearing porters. No pancakes today, but we did get savory French toast and eggs with potato. Hot chocolate featured. The plan for Day 3 involved steady hiking from 6:30am until 5pm; it was going to be another big day. We started with one final burst of stairs - a paltry 300m vertical climb - which took a pretty painful two hours. Once we'd gotten that out of the way, a whole lot of downhill steps said hi. For the next two hours, our group was a line of rainbow ponchos using hiking sticks to navigate slippery stairs.

We were all soggy knees and sorry joints by the time we paused for a snack break, but all too soon it was time to continue. Up and down and around the mountain we went, faster and faster as we got hungrier and hungrier for lunch, Niki heading the group at breakneck speed. Our efforts weren't wasted. In came Rudi the chef bearing a surprise cake - a cake! on Day 3 of a hike! - that said 'Welcome to the Inca Trail' in icing. We were more than happy to devour half the cake in five minutes flat. 

Post-cake, we shiver-hurried back to the trail in the hopes of defrosting. Within five minutes we reached the Town of Clouds, a magnificent Incan site encased in billowing white, surrounded by high jungle greenery. It was straight out of Indiana Jones, as was the next set of steep, narrow, rain-slick Incan stairs. 

Things grew gradually warmer as we descended one kilometre into mosquito territory. It stopped raining. The jungle started looking as I'd imagined, with huge leaves and cartoon-colour flowers.

Next thing we knew, we were emerging at the top of Wyñay Wayna, the towering Incan stack of agricultural terraces right near the final campsite. Mountains loomed in front of us, Machu Picchu amongst them, and the brown river roared between them all. We stood up straight in our disgusting rumpled hiking outfits and wrapped our arms around each other, triumphant and achy and enjoying the sun. Fifteen minutes walk later, we found our tents pitched right on the edge of a narrow stone path. And there the views continued. 

That night we said thank you to our incredible porters, whose average age turned out to be around 40. Aside from our possessions and tents, these men had carried silverware and silver napkin holders, glass jam jars and full-size margarine containers, plastic seats and juice boxes and fresh fruit. They made jelly for us. Jelly! Using cold river water to set it. And let's not forget the Day 3 lunch cake. 

A couple of amusing incidents later - headtorch plus natural baño, oh dear - we got up at 3:45am to prepare for the final morning's hike up to the Sun Gate and Machu Picchu. It was pitch-black and drizzly, but the earliness of the wake- up call was unavoidable; the porters had a train to catch. Queued up behind fellow hikers, we waited for a torchlit hour outside the checkpoint until it opened at 5:30am and the mad rush began. There were cheers; we were off! 

We hustled down the path like champions - no breaks for an hour and a half of up-down path with beautiful mountain dawn views. Several prize idiots kept trying to shove their way past on particularly narrow bits of path. For the safety of everyone, I let this go on until the final flight of stairs below the Sun Gate - some of the scariest, narrowest, most sadistic steps the Incas built in Peru. I let two people pass, saw that about twenty more were set to follow, and just cracked it. No way.

Then we finally burst out at the Sun Gate. Although Machu Picchu was almost entirely shrouded in cloud, the landscape before us was still something beyond belief, with mountains piercing through like great hulking spears. The Sun Gate isn't just a viewing platform for hikers; it performs a special function during the Summer and Winter Solstices. On these two days of the year, sunlight shines from the Gate directly into the Temple of the Sun. How Raiders of the Lost Ark is that?

We stayed at the Sun Gate for about twenty minutes, hoping the dense mist would lift. No such luck, so we made our way down the long path to  Machu Picchu. The arsehat hikers from earlier reappeared and started singing love song karaoke. We let them pass. We also managed to find a bush-absorbing tarantula web complete with enormous dead beetles and tarantula.

There wasn't any cheering once we were stood right on top of Machu Picchu. I could barely tell we'd arrived due to the visual white noise. As there wasn't much point waiting about in the mist, we continued down way too many steps to the cafeteria to reunite with Pablo and flushable toilets. 

Luis eventually lured us away from the cafeteria so we could begin our tour of Machu Picchu. We limped out to find scorching sunlight and - thank goodness - clear views. It was like the postcard pictures, but so much bigger and more fantastic. But even with those terraces, towers and temples laid out in front of me, my eyes were still drawn first and foremost to those incredible mountains in the backdrop. 

Back before its scientific rediscovery in July 1911 by an American, Hiram Bingham, the local farmers used to call Machu Picchu a pile of rocks. That's kind of what it is. Except it's also a miracle of human achievement and a spectacular place of sun, mountain and Mother Earth worship. Machu Picchu means 'Old Mountain' and refers to the mammoth spear of sacred mountain that the temple faces. When Bingham came along in 1911, attracted by stories of a lost Incan city, he spoke to some locals and got their young son to act as guide around the rock piles. He then took the Inca Trail backwards, which would take superhuman determination in view of the crazy Day 3 stairs. 

It was a bit depressing to learn that, post-construction, the Incas would probably only have been able to use and live in Machu Picchu for about 50 years, as they fled into the jungle when the Spanish got to Cusco. The place isn't actually finished. They started building the terraces at the bottom and worked their way up, so there are still massive stone blocks scattered around the top section.

After our tour we all went and took a million photos at the classic Machu Picchu overlook. Dear god, the stairs; the knee pain! Then I made a quick circuit of the sundial and temples before fighting past swarms of tourists to get back to the others. We caught a bus for all of five minutes until we reached the site of a colossal landslide. Out of (slightly horrifying) necessity, we swapped to a second bus which took us all the way down to the town at the foot of the mountain. 

Into the restaurant we went, looking and smelling like roses. And then we proceeded to eat and drink and get a bit delirious for a few hours. A train and a bus ride later, we were back in Cusco, then out to dinner, then out on the town. Until we collapsed. 

The next day was all about Cusco. Niki, Kathy, Mads and I headed straight to Jack's Cafe for a post-trail triumph breakfast of pancakes, porridge, muesli and delicious coffee. Afterwards, when the others headed out to shop, I hit up the Convento de Santo Domingo, a gallery-church that used to be the Incan temple Qorikancha until it passed into Spanish hands in 1532. 

I filled time people-watching in the main square while waiting to meet the others. In the sunshine, Cusco could easily pass for some town in Italy or Spain with its terracotta roofing and high green hills. All that's missing from the Florence-style scene are the iconic dark green pipe-cleaner conifers. 

The others arrived, we skirted an amazing poofy 80s-style wedding dress, and into the cathedral we went. Gold and glass eyes shone from every corner. The main attraction was a painting of the Last Supper featuring tasty guinea pig so as best to woo the conquered to the Catholic side. We then headed over to the Choco Museum for something a little more suited to our Australian palates. Cocoa tea: incredible. We spent our final night in Cusco drinking, dancing and avoiding the local dog gangs. We had a lot to celebrate. 

Lake Titicaca: The Great Sheep Chase

This time, when we drove back up the winding mountain highway, the entire landscape was coated in snow. We were entirely enclosed in cloud. The snow was getting heavier when we passed an abandoned tourist van - identical to our own - which appeared to have plunged nose-first from the road. What a lovely summer day in the Andes!

Puno, our home for the night, sits right on the edge of Lake Titicaca. Our bus turned a corner in the road and there it was: a red-roofed stack of city and our first glimpse of the 21st biggest lake in the world. '21st biggest' doesn't sound all that impressive, but there are loads of lakes in the world, and when I looked out across this one, I couldn't even see Bolivia. (It apparently takes 12 to 14 hours to smuggle goods from Bolivia to Peru by boat. That's the kind of lake-scale we're talking.)

It's also pretty grimy and algae-coated down by the dock. Following an open-air 'limo' ride in three-wheeled bike-driven wagons, we hopped on a private boat and zoomed off into the reed-filled harbour. Suddenly the reeds transformed into houses on floating islands - an astonishing sight. 

Here we made our first stop. At the edge of a floating platform made entirely of stacked-up reeds stood several of the island's inhabitants, all dressed in magnificent colour. Unos is one of the 100 or so floating island communities on Lake Titicaca, 80 of which have embraced tourism as a means of making money and gaining some modern benefits like solar powered televisions. 

After I climbed an extremely wobbly wooden watchtower for a view of the surrounding islands, a catamaran made entirely of reeds (the 'Mercedes Benz') rowed us away from Unos and back to our boat. 

Two and a half hours of clear, reflective, glorious lake water later, we reached Tequile, aka Lunch Island. Reaching the restaurant required a strenuous hike up what felt like the Cliffs of Insanity, but was actually a steepish hill littered with sheep and gum leaves. The high altitude huffing was completely worth it, as lunch - quinoa soup and fried trout with veggies - was to die for. From our table, we could see Bolivia way out across the lake. 

After we ate, our guide told us a bit about the island's culture, which is largely wound up in Unesco-protected knitting practices. Knitting is men's work on Taquile. In fact, if a man fails to hone his knitting skills, he'll have next to no chance of finding a wife. The prospective wife in question, when hit on, will ask to inspect the man's knitted hat. If she isn't satisfied with the quality, better luck next time. 

Hats are used to indicate relationship status on the island. Singletons are denied suffrage, so the colour of a man's hat either confers or denies authority. Even the side to which you wear your brightly coloured woollen bauble tells the world whether you're single and uninterested, single and looking, or taken. 

Our final destination for the day was our homestay community, where we had the chance to engage with a traditional Peruvian farming lifestyle for a few short hours. Our arrival was met with a small marching band that drummed and panpiped behind us all the way up a hill to the community meeting place: a concrete sports pitch. 

We were then introduced to our 'mamas' for the night. Niki and I were to stay with Belinda, a 22 year old woman with one year old Andre strapped to her back. But before heading off to our houses, an important cultural exchange was to take place. Time for an intense - and brutal! - soccer match against some local boys. (Note my unbroken legs, Mel). 

And then came the chance to get dressed in traditional clothes - skirt upon skirt upon colourful skirt - and join the locals in a dance. Swooshy skirts and manly pink ponchos: fabulous. 

Still traditionally costumed on top of our polarfleeces and pants, Niki and I grabbed our heavy, heavy bags and almost died following Belinda up the Mount Doom of grassy green hills. Loaded up with several kilos of fruits and vegetables - a gift for Belinda - as well as our backpacks and coats, we hobbled along to what must have been the furthest away house in the community. Eventually we reached our big pink-walled room and dumped the bags on the bright bedspreads. When we went to inspect the (thankfully flushable) outdoor toilet, all my Peruvian travel fears and expectations were realized when I was attacked by a dog. Bitten! Three times! On the calves! Take that, doubters! There was no skin damage or rabies, and the dog turned out to be a naughty puppy, but still. I feel vindicated for carrying on about bitey dogs over the past few months. 

An awkwardly silent but delicious dinner followed, featuring all vegetarian food (no guinea pigs): vegetable soup with noodles, then omelette rice with a side of potato-heavy veggies. And then to bed. At 6:45pm. These guys have got to get their solar-powered TVs installed. 

We woke up in our comfortable multi-blanketed beds to the sound of pouring rain. Excellent weather for shepherding, we did not think. After a breakfast of fried bread and a boiled egg, we pulled on our coats and watched as Belinda uprooted the tethered sheep and started chasing them up the hill behind the house. This isn't so bad, we thought, drenched to the skin and skidding through poo, lungs about to explode.  Then Belinda pointed to the distant sheep. "Catch their ropes and bring them back to me," she said. So off we went, staggering up the hill after the darting sheep, catching one mud-slicked rope just in time to watch five more slither past. Belinda calmly came and took the ropes off of our disgustingly dirty hands, getting to work on re-anchoring the sheep in greener pastures as we attempted to recover. 

Upon returning to the house, we were handed a bowl of freshly dug up potatoes and carrots. I discovered a new talent for knife-peeling, barely retaining my fingertips while Niki spider-watched. Once finished, we sat in the now sunny backyard as Belinda got to work on the washing up, using old tyres as the washing and rinsing tubs. Lunchtime was at 11am. This time we ate quinoa soup (best yet) and fried cheese, white and purple potatoes, and a cooked red onion and tomato salad. Very filling. 

That was it for our homestay. Before leaving the house, I made friends with the bitey puppy. I rubbed her tummy and all was right with the world - for a total of ten minutes. Down on the dock, the dog gave my left calf one final nip, and then we were off back to Puno. 

Kathy, Niki and I celebrated our successful homestay by hiring a taxi to take us to the giant condor statue overlooking Puno. This turned into an insane taxi sprint up 'streets' of mud puddles, loose stones, more pothole than road, barking dogs and absolutely no seatbelts. The view, once up there, showed Lake Titicaca splayed out greenly below. Definitely worth the $7 taxi fare, though possibly not the near-death ride. 

We tipped the driver out of admiration for his good humour and guilt for the damage likely sustained by his car, then headed off into town for dinner and chocolate-purchasing. We would leave Lake Titicaca the next day with a handful of adventure-filled memories and filthy trouser legs.