Backpacking South America

We made a little visit to Copacabana, just for two days, in order to catch an early morning boat to Isla del Sol, where, according to the Incas, life began with the birth of the sun and the moon. It was both a very long bus ride to Copacabana and a seemingly longer boat ride across Lake Titicaca to the island for an afternoon. But, we made it.

Our trip to Copacabana happened to take 3 hours longer than we had anticipated because, apparently, there was a national celebration going on in this tiny little port town (one of the only naval bases in Bolivia) where we had to catch a little boat across the bay in order to continue on in our bus. It just so happened that this celebration lasted 3 hours and we were stuck in the hot intense sun at 14,000 feet above sea level.

So, there we sat on the dock, along with all the other tourists, waiting for a boat to take us across the bay (I think I could have swam faster than the amount of time it took for us to get across). Perhaps the greatest irony was finding out that they were actually celebrating/commemorating the loss of the Pacific Coastline to Chile in the Pacific War.

Once they finally stopped celebrating and the boats started running again, we crossed the lake on one boat and our bus crossed on another.

We finally made it to Copacabana and were very thankful that we had made a reservation at this cute little hotel overlooking the lake, La Cupula.

We bought our tickets for the next morning and prepared ourselves for a 2.5 hour boat ride to the island. It just so happened that we got on the slowest of the slow boats and watched all the other tour boats idle by at a slightly faster speed. No boat ever went fast enough to have a wake.

We took the afternoon exploring the island and decided to take a stroll across the island from the north part to the south part. It was a slow stroll, given the fact that we were over 14,000 feet high, but we had amazing views across the lake.

We had to pay fees at several parts of the islands. First, it was 10 bolivianos at the north end, then 10 for the middle section, and finally 5 to enter the south end. Why they just don’t have a set fee when you step onto the island is beyond me. It’s not like we had an option…we had to pass through. Our boat already left the dock on the northern part and we needed to arrive on the southern side by a specific time in order to catch our boat back to the mainland.

One thing is certain, Bolivia always keeps life interesting.