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Isla de Sol – The Island of the Sun

This morning was another boat ride, this time a 1 ½ hour ride to the Isla de Sol the ancestral home of the Incas. The boat ride seemed to take forever but we did finally arrive in the bay where the trail would start.

First we had to stop at the Bano, boy will we be glad when we won’t have to search our pockets for small change to use the bathrooms!!!! From there we headed toward a beautiful bay, the water azure blue!! Here there was the first sandy beach we have seen in a very long time. We proceeded to the start of the Inca trail which would lead us up to another Inca alter and the Inca kind of the times summer palace. Bob figured the pre-Inca people who originally built the sacred areas should have taken into consideration the people who 1200 years later would be taking a pilgrimage to the sacred land of Titikaka and built it closer to town!!!

We hiked to the just about the top of the mountain, elevation about 3900 meters. It was a very hard climb which took 1 ½ hours. We could most likely have walked the trail in about an hour at sea level but the lack of oxygen sure slows you down. As we walked we , at some points, right beside some of the mountain people’s homes. The children of our first world country should be required to visit places like these!!! The views out over the lake were fabulous, the water looks so clear and the colour is unbelievable.

At the sacred site we first viewed the God Titikaka – titi means puma and kaka means blue so the green puma. This is a rock formation that as soon as you see it you can see the image. We have been hearing about the Pacha Mama which is Mother Earth and the main God worshiped from Ecuador to Peru and onto Bolivia and I am sure other South American countries. When you hear our local guides talk you can see fleeting similarities to Christianity. The peoples have only three rules: don’t lie, don’t steal and don’t be lazy. If you are lazy you are kicked out of your community, then it becomes very hard to find another community to take a lazy person.
It was about 12:30 when we arrived at the top so we each pulled out our picnic, sat in the summer resort of the Inca kings and had our lunch. The hotel had made us sandwiches which without mayo were very dry. Pablo has told us not to have mayo here ever so that is why there was not any on our sandwich. I hadn’t thought we could have bought an avocado, mashed it up and added to our meal. I should mention here that the avocados you buy here are huge, one would fit into your palm and could be larger, and they are delicious also.

We had the most fantastic sunset tonight!