copacabana

the blessings of the cars ----------------------- popcorn anyone?

babyfoot on the waters edge ----------- the cathedral

at the view point -------------------------- us waiting for sunset

pigs chilling in isla del sol----------------------- getting friendly with one of the many ´borros´

weed collection? ---------------------------------walking through a field on the way to the south

an incan religious site on the island ------------ our fave - the rocoto chili

the fabulously fresh lake titicaca trout

hi margs! --------------------------------------- ladies carrying water up the hill

and back down they go ----------------- sunrise on the island

the famous boats made of straw -------------------- crossing the lake titicaca

crossing the bolivian border was slighly stressful as i had suddenly discovered that i needed a visa, which cost me a whopping $50. nice surpise that was!! well, if i compare my payment to that of an americans, it's 'mickey mouse' as they have to pay over $130, but then at least they are expecting it!

so to copacabana we went, not even 30 minutes from the border. i know what you are thinking or rather singing "copa - copacabana la la la la la". a little piece of info.: copacabana beach in brazil was actually named after this town, bordering lake titicaca in bolivia. pretty interesting, no?

on arrival, we saw this kind of ¨parade¨ going on in front of the cathedral. there were women ¨installed¨ outside the church selling all kinds of decorations, flowers, booze (not only in front of the house of the lord but also on a sunday. good grief!!!!) and the other normal religious stuff like candles.

we lingered in the park to understand a bit more what was going on and it turned out that the people from the surrounding areas had come to have their cars blessed. you have not read wrong, i can assure you. the cars were adorned in all kind of decorations, plastic or paper and in all colours, with the priest and his holy water making an appearance. whilst he was doing his bit, the owners would drink the booze (for the sake of the blessing, who knows?) and off they would go. so at one time, there may have been at least four or five vehicles (of all conditions i might add) waiting it´s turn to last another day.

whilst we were there, we visited the isla del sol, located about 2 hours away by (an extremely slow) boat. we arrived in the northern part of the island and walked to the south which took us about 3 hours, passing through old incan villages, passed fields with donkeys, alpacas and pigs hanging together. it was beautiful with lovely scenery of the lake, the view of the royal cordillere (at higher than 6000m) and the surrounding land masses aka islands.

we spent the night in a sweet hostal with a room with a view of the village below and the lake...quite rare thesedays. considering the cold, we were in layers for most of the day (and night). so even though the costumes were brought along, they didn`t make an appearance once. pity as there were loads of little creeks that were just waiting to have a visitor.

when we weren´t huddled in a ball, we were endulging in the delicously fresh trout and endless cups of warm coca leaf tea (with no affects).

all in all, we spent about three days in that area before heading to chaotic la paz.

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Notre premiere etape bolivienne est Copacabana (non non nous ne sommes pas sur une plage bresilienne mais bien en bord du titicaca a 4000 m d'altitude, autant dire qu'on peut ranger le maillot de bain).

L'endroit est vraiment tranquille, les gens y viennent en pelerinage pour demander protection a la vierge de copacabana. Ainsi, ils amenent leur voiture devant la cathedrale et la benissent tout en se servant qq rasades de paceña au passage (la biere de la paz). C'est d'ici que s'organisent les excursions sur l'ile du soleil, origine du monde selon les incas. C'est en effet depuis cette ile que le soleil et la lune se seraient envoles vers le ciel et que les incas seraient nes. Le bateau nous depose au nord de l'ile ou nous visitons qq ruines incas et un musee montrant qq pieces incas en or recueillies par le commandant cousteau en 1970 lors de son exploration du lac (a la recherche d 'un tresor incas enfoui dans le lac afin que les espagnols ne le trouvent jamais). Toujours pas de nouvelles du tresor, il faut dire que le lac est immense : 8000 km2.

Il y a peu de monde et on decide de faire la randonnee de 12 kms reliant le nord au sud de l'ile. Au loin, on peut apercevoir la cordillere royale et ses sommets enneiges a plus de 6000 m. L'ile possede ses cultures en terrasses et qq lamas broutent par ci par la. Tout est tranquille et c'est sympa de se retrouver seul dans la nature durant qq heures. Ici, le plat roi, c'est la truite qui se sert sous toutes ses formes et on ne s'en lasse pas...