Rare Adventures

Tag: floating islands

  • Puno, Lake Titicaca and Altitude Sickness

    Puno, Lake Titicaca and Altitude Sickness

    Our altitude strategy was to prepare for the Inca Trail trek was to spend 4 days at high altitude on Lake Titicaca, at 3800m to adjust, and then travel down to Cusco at 2500m and we should have been ready to go.

    Unfortunately Wooksie had picked up a tummy bug on the way back from Nazca so wasn’t on top form. We flew from Lima to Juliaco, all the guidebooks said avoid Juliaco unless you want to be mugged, which we didn’t so we got a taxi direct to Puno.

    The lack of oxygen at high altitude hits you really fast, when I got out at Juliaco it was like having a weight on my chest. During the taxi ride Wooksie said she was feeling really sleepy, I felt drowsy as well as my body adjusted to the lack of oxygen. I was particularly concerned because I suffer from asthma, so expected a tricky transition.

    We booked a lovely hotel on the banks of Lake Titicaca, on the basis we could sit around, enjoy the view, not do much and adapt. We pottered around for a bit and Wooksie decided she wanted a nap, this was exactly what every guide to high altitude said would happen, so I wasn’t particularly concerned and went for a walk to push my lungs and push my transition.

    That night we had dinner in the hotel and an early night, next day we went for a walk around Puno, which I have to say isn’t a very exciting place.

    Unexciting unless you are in the fruit market when the train comes through, at that point all the stalls are dragged off the tracks until it has gone.

    We strolled around the port, bought some medicine for the stomach bug, but Wooksie was tired again and went back to bed in the afternoon, while I got in a 10km walk without much trouble so I was doing fine.

    We then did a 2 day tour of the islands on Lake Titicaca and I became increasingly concerned about Wooksie as she was deteriorating rather than improving. She made the climb from the dock to the square, a climb of about 100m un altitude over maybe a kilometre, so steep but nothing terrible.

    It was obvious something was wrong, she gritted her teeth and climbed up, literally 1 step at a time. After a rest at the top, she perked up and made it back to the boat, but within minutes she was fast asleep again for the trip back.

    The walk from the cab to the hotel was painful, she was hardly moving and it suddenly hit me that we were supposed to be doing the Inca Trek in 4 days’ time. Surely this couldn’t just be just altitude sickness, so I got the hotel to call out the doctor to check her out.

    In simple terms, we normally have an oxygen level of about 95 in our blood. During Covid, if your oxygen level dropped below 80 you were admitted to hospital, and the human brain shuts down when oxygen level drops below 70.

    Wooksie had an oxygen rating of 72, she was on the verge of being critically ill, the sleeping was her body shutting down. Her body had been busy fighting the stomach bug she picked up in Nazca, it couldn’t cope with the shock of the altitude and her body was losing the fight.

    The doctor rushed her to the emergency clinic, wired her up to drip,  oxygen, antibiotics, hydration and anything else they could think of to help her survive and get her back up to speed. The solution was quite simple, we had to get down to lower altitude to help her recover.

    So, a mad panic to put our transport plans back 24 hours so she could have time in the clinic on oxygen and then it was on to a bus downhill to Cusco.

    I was fully expecting her to come out of hospital the next day full of beans and jumping around but it was nothing like that, her oxygen count was still only about 84 after 24 hours, so she still had no energy – this wasn’t the fix we were hoping for but it was the best we could do, and Wooksie took it easy as the bus wasn’t until the next morning.

    Meanwhile, not to waste and opportunity, I went out in search of a pizza to bring back to the hotel and found myself in this amazing little bar, luckily it did takeaway pizzas too. I took the opportunity to test their beer while I was waiting for the pizza. As the bar was empty, I couldn’t resist the temptation to fiddle with the music playlist and before i knew it I was on my second beer whilst choosing the music and listening to Blue Monday. If only Wooksie could enjoy this too, and they did a great pizza.

    I had been carrying a couple of spare Argyle scarves to donate to a bar somewhere, that was hosting the travelling football fan tradition of dropping your scarf off in a foreign country. I wasn’t going to get much further from Plymouth than Puno, so I donated my first scarf to their very small collection and I hopefully it is still there, the Green Army now owns Puno.

  • Island adventures on Lake Titicaca

    Island adventures on Lake Titicaca

    After spending a couple of days adjusting to altitude in Puno, we set off on our main event, a tour of the islands on Lake Titicaca. Things didn’t get off to a good start, when there was a misunderstanding about our collection point, and we only made it to the quay  with seconds to spare.

    Wooksie was still tired but said she was feeling a bit better. We headed out into the bay in search of the floating islands, which apparently move about and after a 90 minute cruise we were ready to board.

    The guide was excellent and gave us the full run down on their lifestyles, basically they are floating gypsies or nomads. They live on floating islands of reeds so they don’t have to pay any tax, which is linked to land.

    Floating Islands and the Uros people

    Apparently, the villages rotate as the  destination for tours, and they were very geared up to extract our cash, which unfortunately we didn’t have. We saw a lot of arts and crafts but their existence was intriguing. Families build rafts, sometimes there are multiple families on a floating island so like a mini tribe, if they fall they kick the family the don’t like off the raft.

    Obviously, this is a bit inconvenient out on the lake, so they actually cut the raft up and give them their share of the island. Each island has a chief, and they seem to rotate through some process of democracy. Meanwhile Wooksies was feeling dozy again and when we got back on the boat she dozed off.

    The tour included and overnight stop so we headed further out onto the lake and when we passed a headland we started to be hit by waves. Not surprising as Lake Titicaca is not only the highest navigable lake in the world, it is also one of the biggest so it is like being out in the sea so we bounced around until we arrived at our overnight island.

    The guide told us about their subsistence lifestyle and how the occupants traced their ancestors back generations, At this point my alarm bells started to ring, where were we sleeping, I’d assumed it was a hotel when I booked but as we got closer to the shore it was clear that there we no hotels.

    Amantan Island

    On landing, we were told all about the wonderful cultural events that awaited us, but first it was time for a meal followed by a climb to the top of the island, a good altitude test as it would take me up to 4500m.

    The accommodation was actually quite nice, a bit like an Airbnb provided by natives, but it was made of stone and had beds, well in my case, the mattress was by far the worst mattress I have ever slept on, rock hard doesn’t even start to tell it.

    We found some new Italian chums from Milan, Luigi and Florence, it turned out Florence was feeling rough as well so the two ladies went to bed (separately) and left Luigi and I to our own devices, so we had a kip as well, until he came to collect me for the trek, which I was rather wishing he wouldn’t if I was honest.

    The fact the two women slept reassured me there was nothing out of the ordinary about Wooksie, it was still only 48 hours since we’d arrived so still within the recovery margins. I did the climb with Luigi and we discussed football all the way up and all the way down, I learned a lot about Inter Milan and he learned an amazing amount about Plymouth Argyle.

    By an amazing coincidence, I took a photo of the sunset over Bolivia and there were a couple of young people in the shot. On the way down we stopped for a hot chocolate in a little hut, and they were there. I offered to send them a copy of the photo and during the discussion, it turned out they were also from Bristol and lived less than 5 miles from me – what a coincidence.

    I got back to the room and Wooksie hadn’t moved, she hadn’t even touched her water either, at this point my alarm bells started to ring as this couldn’t be right.

    I didn’t bother with the cultural evening which was half back to the top of the island, and just had a good kip and kept my eye on Wooksie.

    Taquile Island

    The next day we visiting a different island about 10 miles up the coast but it’s development as a society was quite incredible, apparently there was little or no contact with the other island and their entire social and cultural development was different, it was like a commune where everything was shared.

    It was becoming obvious that there was something wrong with Wooksie, she had slept all night, hadn’t drunk any water and was looking pale. When we got to the island, it was a struggle to get off the boat, but she managed it but the climb up to the village was very painful, just one step at a time.

    They had a beautiful town square with wonderful views across the lake to Bolivia. We spent a pleasant morning watching the locals go through their dance regimes in their best dress outfits before heading back down to lake level, boarding the boat and heading back to Puno to find a doctor.