Dad's Birthday

About a week ago, I asked Dad what he wanted to do for his birthday and when he wanted to have it.  His birthday fell on a weekday this year so that makes it tough to have it on the day of when people work and stuff.  I suggested that we have it during the weekend after this birthday when we have more time and no one works.  I asked him what kind of food he wanted and he said chicken, salad, potato salad, chocolate chip cookies and ice cream.  I also asked when he wanted to do it and he said on Sunday after the football game around 4 p.m.  I told him I will make that happen.

I emailed everyone to let them know when, where and what kind of food we were going to have so they could plan for it.  A few days later I heard back from Tracy, stating that she wasn't going to come, Kevin and Karla emailed me saying to have fun and Erika thought she was getting sick so she and Zach weren't going to come.  It was going to be a small group of people.

On Friday afternoon, I washed the Escape and headed into town to purchase the food I needed.  I had to get most of the stuff at Costco because Walmart always seemed to be out of chicken every time I went grocery shopping.  It was frustrating.

When the day came, Sunday I got up and started cleaning the house and getting everything ready to go because I knew it would take a while with several breaks in between.  I spent some time watching some of the football games and the Seahawks played like absolute garbage against the Vikings and lost.  This was only week three and we have almost half as many losses as we had the entire season last year.  Did we finally hit our bad year? 

Ben and I had the house all cleaned up and started cooking the food about an hour before everyone was suppose to arrive.  Everyone who was suppose to come all got hear just after 4, when the chicken got done.  I put it all on the table and everyone dished up.

We ate, chatted about random things, we talked about the Puyallup Fair (Doug and Jenn went to the fair on Saturday), Dad opened his presents, he got a poo hat, a sign about chickens, a thermal shirt from Grandma and I got him a Harley shirt with a motorcycle on it.  I figured Dad needed some new shirts since all of his were worn out and have holes in them.

I got the ice cream out and Ben helped me scoop some ice cream in a bowl and handed everyone a cookie or two.  We didn't make the cookies because we didn't have enough time to so I got them at Safeway.  Everyone who wanted dessert enjoyed it.  I started cleaning up the kitchen and putting stuff away.  I did get some containers out and loaded up two of them so Erika and Zach could have some food too.  I even put some cookies in a container as well.

Everyone grabbed their stuff and went home for the evening.  I knew people had stuff to do before the new work week.  I cleaned as much as I could and then Ben and I left to take the food over to Erika and Zach's place.  We dropped off the food, saw the dogs and chatted for a few minutes.  Erika appreciated the food.  I told her to bring the containers back over when they were done with them.  We left and stopped by a few hardware stores to get the right screws for the Sceptre TV we had so we could mount it on the wall where the other one was.  A few weeks back our Samsung took a poop.  Luckily, we had this back up TV that we got from Willmarth in 2016 as a house warming gift.  I wanted it off the little stand we had so the cats and dogs wouldn't bump into it and knock it on the floor.  We also picked up some safety glasses for Ben since he lost his.

We finished cleaning the house when we got home, put everything away and then got ready for the next week with laundry, showers, etc.  The screws would have to wait for another day since we ran out of time.  We headed to bed shortly after.

Happy Birthday Dad!

Next Adventure:  Paint Night:  More Flow Art

Peru: Traveling from Lima to Florida to Seattle: A Very Long Travel Day (Day 12)

Mom's phone went off at 3:30 a.m. local time...that's 1:30 a.m. at home.  Ughhh.  We all struggled to get out of bed but we had to.  Amy's flight left earlier than ours so we all decided to go together this early.  Amy had called to change the pick up time from almost 5 a.m. to around 4 a.m. but it wasn't confirmed.  Mom took a quick shower and I washed my face and then put my bathroom stuff away in my suitcase and made sure I had everything packed up that needed to go into it.  I grabbed my cords, earphones and other stuff that needed to go into my back pack away.

Mom cleaned up her stuff, got dressed and ready to go.  She packed up her random things and we both made sure we had everything and knocked on Amy and Rhonda's door to see if they were ready.  They were and they were getting the last of their things together in their bags.  

We all went downstairs together and checked out.  We put our bags aside and one of the front desk clerks handed each of us a paper bag with breakfast items inside.

We thanked her and went to go sit down in the lobby and wait to see when our driver showed up.  It was too early to eat so I just sat there and used their internet for a while, mostly Instagramming to keep up with all of my pictures I took.  Amy kept calling to find out if our driver was coming at the correct time, which was an our sooner than our original time.  We sat there in the lobby waiting to hear back from someone or a driver to show up.  Amy finally did get a call back and she told us that someone had canceled our pick up and that they had to call someone to come get us.  We all sorta panicked.  Was Amy going to make it to her flight on time?  Were we?  We sure hoped so because we were ready to go home.

It was after 4:30 when our driver's van approached the front of the hotel.  Amy rejoiced, we got our luggage and got into the van as quick as we could.  We had no time to spare.  Since it was so early there wasn't a whole lot of traffic so getting to the airport took no time at all.  There are perks for being up at this ungodly hour.  We approached the airport around 5:00 a.m. and it wasn't that busy.  He grabbed a ticket and took us right to the front of the departures.  We gathered our luggage, handed him a tip, thanked him profusely and handed him our bagged breakfasts since we didn't open any of the items inside.  We couldn't take them with us into the airport anyway.  

The first thing we did was get to the ticket counter with our luggage and got ourselves checked in as well as dumped off our luggage.  Since Amy was in more of a hurry than we were, we said our goodbyes and she rushed to go through security.  Rhonda, Mom and I had a while to wait so we sauntered over to the gift shop since we had some Sols to spend still.  We found a couple things including two T-shirts, a mask and some snacks for Mom.  Then we saw the Dunkin Donuts across the way and decided we were going to have one.  We each got a donut, mine was a chocolate one since they didn't have any maple ones, and we all savored every morsel of them.  

We looked at the time and saw it was about 6:00 a.m. so we should go through security and start walking to our gate just to see where it was.  We didn't board until about 7:30 a.m. so yes, we had a lot of time to kill.  We got through security without any trouble, gathered our belongings and walked to the gate.  We were at gate 24 and our flight left for Miami around 8:30 a.m.  Once we found our gate, Mom and Rhonda found a place to camp for the next couple hours while I did some walking around.  I wanted a drink after eating that donut so I found a place to purchase a few things.  I asked Mom if she needed anything and she wanted some Pringles, lol.  I piled my stuff onto the counter and the cashier asked me if I had my passport.  I need my passport to purchase stuff at an airport convenience store?  Since when?  None of the other places needed to see it.  I walked all the way back to our seats and all the way back...it wasn't a short walk by the way, showed him my passport and purchased my things.  I walked back to the seats at our gate.

We all hung out for a while and each of us got up to use the bathroom a couple times.  I was on my phone most of the time using the free airport internet.  No one at home was up yet so I couldn't call anyone to pass the time.  I wasn't in the mood to write in my journal or read my book I brought...my attention span wasn't quite awake just yet.  We hung out and chatted with each other until it was time to board.  

It took a while to board because each group had to put their carry on luggage and bags onto tables while the airline workers rummaged through them.  At first, we weren't sure what they were looking for.  Then when it was our group's turn they told us in broken English that they were looking for sodas, waters and other liquids.  I had just bought a brand new bottle of water to drink on the plane and I had to toss it out.  I always thought if you bought it inside the airport after security you could take it with you.  Apparently, not from Lima to Miami...which was weird.  I've never had this problem before (even on international flights in the past) and I've always made sure I had water with me on the plane.  Oh well.  I tossed it, grabbed my back pack and boarded the plane.

Rhonda still had her tickets in her hand when we were getting on the plane.  You know where the tunnel you walk down meets the entrance to the plane?  Yeah, she dropped her ticket and it literally fell through the crack and on to the ground below the plane.  I could not believe I saw that happen.  Rhonda frantically asked the plane crew if she needed the ticket and they said that she shouldn't since she was already through the ticket scanner and on the plane.  

We walked down the aisle, found out seats, stuffed our back packs under the seat in front of us, got comfortable and awaited our 6ish hour flight to Miami.  Mom and I sat next to each other and Rhonda sat in the row behind us.  We took off a little late but we were still going to have enough time during our layover in Miami.  About an hour into our flight, the flight attendants started handing our food and drinks.  That is one one thing about international flights vs. domestic flights, we got food no matter how long or short the plane ride was.  We got ham and cheese wraps, a bag of Lay's potato chips, I had water and our dessert was a brownie.  I ate part of my food because a lot of it was carbs and I was trying to cut back on them.  

The rest of our flight I watched Pitch Perfect, Easy A and Booksmart.  I've seen them all before but they are pretty entertaining.  I did a little bit of journaling while I watched these movies.  When it was time to descend into Miami, I put my stuff away in my back pack and closed my eyes for a little while.  When we landed, we turned our phones on, waited our turn to get off once we made it to the gate, grabbed our stuff and immediately went through customs.  We tried doing the mobile passport, got it all filled out and then waited and insane amount of time in line.  We had no idea why the line was so slow.  It turns out we really didn't need to do our mobile passport because they checked our physical passport anyway.  Lame.   We answered the necessary questions and then went down stairs to get our luggage and take it to the connecting flight area.  I'm glad that was a quick grab, dump and go.

We walked to our gate and found a place to camp out for about three hours.  I said to Mom and Rhonda that we should find something to eat while we were here for a couple hours and they agreed.  I asked them what we wanted to eat and Mom said she wanted French fries.  I saw a Nathan's hotdog place on the way to our gate and asked if that was okay with everyone.  They all agreed.  Mom stayed with our stuff and Rhonda and I walked to Nathan's.  She also just wanted French fries and a sweet tea.  According to the menu we could get two hot dogs, two fries and a sweet tea for a great deal so that is what I went with.  Rhonda told me if I paid for her tea that she would get me a soda from one of the stores.  That is what we went with.  We ordered, paid and then waited for a few minutes for our food.  We found a store and bought at Cherry Coke Zero and started heading back to our gate.

We ran into the Oklahoma couple that was on the Puno tour with us.  We chatted with them a few times through the trip and got to know them a little bit.  They like to travel a lot and were pretty bummed when Covid hit.  It made it really difficult since that's what they did together for fun.  We chatted for a little bit with them.  They asked how long of a layover we had and we told them it was a couple hours so we were trying to find some food before our 6 hour flight.  They said they were trying to find stuff to do as well but their flight left for Oklahoma sometime after 8 p.m. so they had a while to hang out.  We chatted about football because it was Saturday and he was a Sooner's fan and I told him I was a WSU Cougar.  He thought that was pretty cool.  We told each other safe flights and they went to go sit in a bar for a while and Rhonda and I went back to our gate to eat our food.

The food definitely hit the spot even though it was a hotdog and fries.  I spent the rest of the time before we boarded Instagramming and chatting with Ben on the phone.  I was so ready to get home, shower and take a coma.  We finally boarded the plane, found our seats, got comfortable and we were finally on our way to Seattle.  

Since Mom didn't bring her wireless headphones, I let her borrow mine so she could watch a movie or two on the way home.  I spent that time writing in my journal, making notes and looking out the window when there wasn't any cloud cover.  I did get up once to use the restroom...which is always a pain in the butt on an airplane. 

Somewhere over Colorado/Utah she wanted to shut her eyes for a while so she gave me the headphones.  I ended up watching Coach Carter for the remainder of the flight.  I was getting tired and could not wait to be home and in my bed.  I went through four time zones that day and we were done traveling for a while.  We got close to Seattle and was clear enough that you could see the city down below.  The lights looked pretty cool.  

We finally touched down at SeaTac, we had to wait a few minutes to get off the plane and immediately went to baggage claim.  

We had to wait a few minutes to get our luggage so I walked over to buy some water because I really needed some water.  The luggage started to circle through and we grabbed the ones we needed.  I really need to get a new suitcase.  Rhonda gave her husband a call since he was in the cell phone lot and asked him to meet us outside at the arrivals near the American Airlines sign.  We didn't have to wait long but sadly, it was raining.  He threw our luggage into the back of the truck and I hoped that my stuff didn't get too wet.  We hopped into the truck and got to know her husband as we drove south on I-5.  That man definitely loved to hunt. 

We finally got to my house, just before midnight, where he and Rhonda dropped Mom and I off.  We thanked him for picking us up from the airport and dropping us off at the house.  Mom told Rhonda she would see her at work.  We put Mom's luggage into her Expedition and we went inside the house with my suitcase.  Mom grabbed the stuff she left here, used the restroom and drove home.  I told her to call or text me when she gets home so I know she got there safe and sound. Ben was on a 24 hour shift in Tenino so I wouldn't see him until the next day when he got home.  I immediately took a shower and went to bed.  I was so tired.

A quick recap:  

This was our first time to Florida and Peru.
I found 14 caches, one in Florida and 13 in various place we went to in Peru.
We had to wait 18 months to go on this trip because of Covid.
We traveled over 12,000 miles in 12 days.
We should have gotten five new stamps in our passports but for some reason they didn't stamp them for anything.  We think it was because of Covid.
We met the film crew for the new Transformers movie at Machu Picchu.
Go through a travel agency if you or anyone you know will be traveling to Peru.  It will save you money, time and headaches.  
You can not prepare for the high altitude but you can make it less intense for you by buying cans of air, drinking or chewing coca leaves, light meals, no alcohol, drink lots of water and sleep.  By the second or third day the headache should go away but you will always feel like your out of breath or your heart is racing.

Next Adventure:  Dad's Birthday

Peru: Traveling From Puno to Lima and Visiting Mira Flores (Day 11)

We got up early, around 6:00 a.m., got ready, got our stuff packed up, went downstairs and dropped our luggage off at the front desk for safe keeping while we went to the dining room for some breakfast.  It was buffet style again but this time the main course was small pancakes and chicken strips.  I had fruit, some small pancakes, pineapple juice and decided on no bread today because of the pancakes.  We ate and chatted about random things.  When we got done, we went into the lobby, used the restroom and waited for our driver at 7:30 a.m.

While we waited for him to arrive, we sat on the comfy couches in the lobby looking at our phones while we have WiFi, so I did some Instagramming, Amy used her oxishot and our driver was late.  He finally arrived around 7:40 a.m. but we should have plenty of time to get to the Juliaca Airport, about an hour away.

The drive was pretty uneventful except that we got to see what the area looked like in the daylight since the last time we went through here it was dark.  The highway had several speed bumps on it which was unusual for a highway.  We noticed it the other night and maybe it's normal for highways in South America to reduce speeds and prevent accidents?  Anyway, we got closer to Juliaca and the place was just as busy as it was the night before and just as scary looking.  I would not want to be lost in this city, especially with a language barrier.  There was so much traffic that our driver bumped into one of the tuk tuks just before we got to the airport.  Apparently, it wasn't a big deal because everyone carried on.

We arrived at the small airport with plenty of time to spare.  He helped us take our luggage out, he was given and tip and we wheeled our suitcases up to the front doors.  We got inside and looked for our domestic LATAM ticket/luggage area but didn't want to stand in the line so we went to the kiosk and printed our boarding passes and luggage tags.  We ended up having to wait in the line but it wasn't as long as when we first arrived to drop off our luggage and to show our passports.  

We walked to security, went through it easily, I didn't have to take anything out of my bag (which was nice because it's a pain in the butt), gathered our stuff, found each other since we went through different lines and walked to our gate.  This airport was pretty small, just like the Cusco one, so there were only two gates and minimal places to sit unless you got there first.  We had about an hour before take off so we used the restrooms and ten sat for about a half hour until it was time to board.  There was no public WiFi so that made sitting there pretty boring.  I sat in a seat behind Mom, Amy and Rhonda and we chatted about the rest of the day's activities and tomorrow's long crazy day of traveling.

Our plane started to board and we had to walk to the plan on the tarmac.  I haven't done this since Ben and I went to Boise in the winter of 2019.  We got to our seats and had to sit with a kid, probably a teenager, who was on his phone the entire time.  Mom was in the middle seat and I was in the aisle.  Rhonda and Amy were in a similar seat pattern nearby.  The plane ride was about two hours to Lima.

I spent most of the time on the plane writing in my journal and trying to keep up on it.  I was several days behind but I was getting there.  I tried to make a lot of mental notes, written notes and took some pictures so I would remember what we did and saw.  A little bit of my time was spent with my eyes closed.

We made our descent into Lima and it was overcast from the marine layer just as it was when we arrived over a week ago.  We waited to get off because they do it orderly.  Three rows in front, three rows in back and so on.  It was our turn, so we grabbed our stuff and exited the plane.  We walked through the airport and down the escalator to get our luggage from the carousel. We had to wait a few minutes while we gathered all four of our suitcases.  We walked out of the airport and saw our driver holding up the Peru For Less sign with the Larson x4 on it.  We walked our luggage to the van and we drove us to Miraflores, a section of Lima, south of the airport in Callao. 

He took us along the Circuito de Playas de la Costa Verde, the freeway along the Pacific Ocean.  It reminded me of the coastline of California.  This area of Lima was very modern, full of hotels, restaurants and fast food, clothes outlets and other random businesses sprinkled around the district.  We all looked out the window wondering if our hotel was going to have an ocean view.  Haha, yeah right!

He turned and drove up the hill away from the ocean and.  We drove down a main road and noticed all the restaurants and which one our hotel will recommend once dinner time hit.  We made a few more turns and stopped in front of our last hotel of our trip, Tierra Viva Miraflores Centro.  We checked in and saw behind us were the people from Florida on our Lake Titicaca boat trip were also staying here.  We were given rooms 405 and 406.

We settled into our rooms and relaxed before our dreaded Covid tests in the lobby in about an hour and a half.  I spent time on my computer and posted some pictures on Instagram.  I also had some time to write in my journal since I was behind a few days.  Amy and Rhonda knocked on our door around 2:45 p.m. and said, it was time.  I was not thrilled.  This is why I got vaccinated so I didn't have to have something shoved up my nose but we had to, because it was a requirement, so we could return to the US.  This is probably what we're going to have to do now until Covid is better under control.

We sat down in the lobby and I was nervous.  Not that I had Covid, but I was still nervous about the swab that was going to be shoved up my nose.  Ughhhh.  The medical tech showed up and he was a few minutes late, which added to the anxiety.  He set up his equipment and asked us who was going first?  Rhonda said she would go first so she could get it over with.  She was all squirmy and Amy asked if she could hold her hand so she wouldn't hit the guy.  Rhonda said yes and Amy grabbed her hand.  I didn't want to watch so I looked away.  It was quick, Rhonda was done and he asked for her passport and processed her stuff.  He added that her results would be done in about fifteen minutes or so.

Then Mom went next and it was pretty uneventful.  You could tell she didn't want to do it but she had to.  Hers was very quick and I still looked away.  He got her passport and processed her swab.  Next, was my turn and I had so much anxiety my legs were bouncing.  I actually had to sit on my hands or I probably would have pushed the swab away.  Amy asked to take my picture.  I didn't care and neither did the med tech.  It seemed like it took forever for the tech to do what he needed to do when it was your turn.  I was so done after the first few seconds of the swab being up there.  I tried so hard to pretend it wasn't happening but it was.  He was finally done and I was so relieved it was over.  I hope I never have to do it again.  It depends on the public though.  The longer people refuse to get vaccinated and wear a mask around groups of people, the longer this is going to stick around.  Those people are actively taking away their own freedom.  I gave him my passport and he went and processed my swab.

Amy decided to go last and we got a photo of her and she looked uncomfortable as well.  She is the only one out of all of us who has had Covid (she had it last winter with her husband) and she said it was horrible and still feels the adverse affects from it at times, especially walking around a town above 10,000 feet in elevation.  

After he was done, he asked for her passport so he could process her swab.  We sat there after blowing our noses and wiping our watery eyes to find out our final results.  After about fifteen minutes, he told us all we were negative and he would email Mom the results so we could print them at the hotel tonight for tomorrow's flight back home.  We thanked him and he continued onto his next appointment.

Since we were all ready to go to dinner, Amy and Rhonda ask the hotel front desk staff if they would recommend a place to eat.  They grabbed a Miraflores map and circled a few places on the map of some decent places.  We set off to find a place called Tanta.  We followed the main road, Jose Larco, looking at all the places along the way.  

We stopped for a few minutes so Amy could use the ATM for some more Sols.  We got to the end of the road and had to have help finding this restaurant.  Our map wasn't very clear.  The night gentleman at the hotel told us it was located in the mall complex across the street.  We thanked him and headed across the busy street.

We walked down the stairs and saw the restaurant we were looking for.  We walked inside and were taken to a table with a view of the Pacific Ocean and given and English menu.  We browsed the menu and there were so many choice to pick from.  We all knew what kind of drinks we wanted so he came back after a few minutes and took our drink orders.  I got a Coke Zero, Amy got an Inka Kola, Mom got a water and Rhonda got a Pisco Sour.  I couldn't decide between a sandwich that sounded good or a Caesar salad.  I decided to be good and do the salad and Amy said, good for you.  I figured I should be good since this country favors a lot of carbs such as potatoes, rice and breads and that's what I've been having lately. 

Our server came by again and took our food orders.  Mom got the burger and fries, Rhonda got the soup, Amy got the beef, potatoes and veggies and I got the salad.  We chatted about our trip while we waited for our food.  Our food came and it was pretty tasty.  I was surprised that my salad came with chicken because it didn't state that on the menu.  I was glad it did because now I could get my protein for the day.  

Everyone also enjoyed their meals as well and decided to get a brownie to share.  Amy decided she would play for it if we'd help her eat it.  When it arrived, Mom was very turned off by it because it reminded her of a cheesecake instead of a brownie.  She refused to try it so we made fun of her.  After a while, she did give in and tried a small piece of the non cheese cake looking bottom part of the brownie.

I kept telling her that I can't take her anywhere and that she should try new things while we are in another country.  She kept saying, this is not a brownie! We just made fun of her harder.  We paid for our food.  I paid for Mom's as well so I could break my S/100, since we had to use up our Sols before we went home the next day.  We thanked our server and decided that we should start heading back towards our hotel before it got too dark.  We took a few pictures of the Pacific Ocean and the shoreline before we left the mall.

We got back onto the main road, we got here on, and looked for a store because I wanted some snacks.  I never found a place like that but we did find a clothes store and we went inside to browse.  Amy and Rhonda bout some stuff and Mom got a couple of things because they were having a clearance sale.  We continued down the road and found another store, this time it was a souvenir shop  I needed to get a couple more things.  We all ended up getting some stuff and I bought a couple postcards and keychains since I didn't have a lot of Sols left.  I had to borrow a few Sols from Mom.  We thanked the shop owner and were now on our way to the hotel.

We found the cross street we needed and crossed the main road, made a left and there was our hotel.  The front desk staff welcomed us back.  We asked if we could have our breakfast early tomorrow and they said they would have a small "to go" bag ready for us.  We thanked them and went up to our rooms.  I got cleaned up, packed my stuff in my suitcase a little better than it was, did some internetting, charged my phone, watch and headphones and went to bed just before 10 p.m.  Tomorrow was going to be a very long day.

Next Adventure:  Peru:  Traveling from Lima to Florida to Seattle:  A Very Long Travel Day (Day 12) 

Peru: Lake Titicaca Boat Tour, the Islands of Uros and Taquile (Day 10)

The alarms went off around 5:30 a.m. or so, we got ready, stuffed our day packs, ate breakfast, which was a buffet in the dining area, we headed down as a group and found a table to sit at.  I ate fruit, bread juice and these French toast triangles filled with jelly.  they were pretty good and I wanted to eat more but I didn't.  Our driver showed up around 6:30 a.m. to pick us up but before he got there, we had time to use the restroom and chill in the lobby for a few minutes.  The van arrived, we hopped in and on the way to the port, we stopped by another hotel to pick up two people, from Florida, joining us on the boat tour.  We got to the port, grabbed our stuff, tipped the driver and followed our tour guide, Percy, to the boat we were suppose to get on.  It was a chilly morning.

We found some open seats across the aisle from each other and waited for the rest of the passengers to get on.  While we waited, there was an entertainer playing music with his pan flute and ukulele.  He was pretty good.  We gave him a small tip as it got closer for the boat to leave.  Once all the passengers loaded up on the tour boat, Percy, gave us some info of what we were going to do, see, and the people we were going to meet.  We took a few minutes to fill out our names and other information out on the manifest.

We started to leave the harbor and Percy told us about the smelly green algae that covered the top of the water as we left.  He confirmed that this part of Lake Titicaca was polluted unfortunately.  

The first place we were going to stop was the reed islands of Uros.  These people live on anchored islands floating on Lake Titicaca.  We got closer to the islands through the open channels on the lake.  We saw many people with scythes cutting down the reeds and throwing them in piles on their boats.  We passed the Uros sign and into an open area of water where you could see all of these little islands with houses and huts on them.

We motored towards one of the islands and got off the boat.  Walking around on top of it felt almost like waking on a soft trampoline.  We walked and sat down on the provided benches.  We listened to Percy as he gave us the history of this place.  The chief, who was in charge of his grouping of islands, demonstrated how they built the island and put houses on it as Percy talked.  It sounded like a lot of maintenance just to live out on these islands day after day.  It was also pretty amazing that this group of people were able to live out here because it was cold...everyone was bundled up including ourselves.  We ended up talking to a French kid, who was on vacation with his dad, who was wearing a Seahawks hat, he said he was a huge fan of the Seahawks.  We told him we were from the Seattle area and were huge fans as well.

After the demonstration and info, we broke up into groups to talk to some of the families on this particular island.  We were paired up with Elizabeth, she showed us her house, we asked questions and she showed us her tapestries she weaves.  Amy ended up purchasing one of her tapestries.  Then we got to ride on a reed boat that looked kinda like a Viking boat.  It had two pumas in the front and up and upper and lower deck.  We sat on top of the upper deck with a few other people from our tour group.  The children climbed up to the upper deck and sang, Row, Row, Row Your Boat in four different languages.  We gave them a few Sols each just because they did a good job and were entertaining.

The chief of the village rowed us out to the middle of the community and then came to to the main reed island where we could use the restroom, purchase food and goods if we wanted to.  We took a picture of the Lake Titikaka sign.  We got back on the boat and we had an hour and half minute ride to the other island, Taquile.  

We relaxed a bit in our seats watching the water fly by as we skimmed across the lake.  About halfway through our trip to Taquile, we went up to the top of the boat, with our life jackets, to experience the lake.  It was chilly but it was beautiful.  The lake and surrounding areas kinda reminded me of Lake Tahoe but without all the trees.  Lake Titicaca was much larger and at a higher elevation.  In fact, this is the world's most highest navigable lake.  We sat up there for a good half hour or so taking photos, enjoying the ambiance and soaking in the entire experience.  We returned back inside the boat for the remainder of the trip.  I closed my eyes a few times to pass the time because the altitude made me sleepy.  Most of the people on the boat had their eyes closed as well.

We approached the island of Taquile and watched our boat crew pull the boat to the cement slab so we could safely get off the boat.  We washed our hands in the little portable hand washing station and then the chief of the island gave us tickets, which I think acted like a stamp in our passport, since we didn't get one.  There were other tour groups there as well and we recognized some of them from the bus tour from the day before.  

We followed Percy up the short hill and just about died walk that short of a distance with the altitude we were at.  I took a few pictures because the island and the lake were very pretty.  We stopped as a large group up by the gathering area where we learned about the culture of the people who lived on this island.  We were greeted by most of the elders with fist pumps and sat on some benches to watch the festivities.

We first learned about how they make their textiles.  Their village focuses on the importance of the designs and colors of their Andean Chullo hats.  Each hat has different meanings such as if you're single, married or retired.  Everyone, including men, women and children knitted.  The knitted belts made out of their wives' hair, which is another indicator or the men who were married.  We then got a demonstration of a traditional dance.  Before we danced, I had too much water and had to use the restroom and had to pay a few Sols to use it but I was short a few coins so some guy from our tour gave me a couple Sols.  I thanked him.

I went back to the bench and they were getting ready to dance.  They showed us how they danced first and then we all got up and danced with them.  I only did it for a few minutes because I was winded after a few times around.  This altitude is no joke!  We sat down and watched the rest of the dance.  Meanwhile, Amy asked Percy where we were going to walk to next.  He said lunch and instructed her the direction where we were going to head.  She added that the altitude was getting to her and she needed a head start to the restaurant.  Rhonda, Mom and I, walked through the stands of their knitted goods just to look.  We had no intention of buying anything since we were almost out of Sols.  

We started the 1.2 mile (2 km) walk down the highly manicured, rock-paved trail.  The scenery was beautiful along the way.  I stopped and took many pictures as we walked.  We got to an arch and then walked down the hill.  You could see several buildings and we asked Percy which one we were going to and he pointed to the one right in the middle.  We could already tell we were going to have a great view of the lake while we ate our lunch.  

We were some of the first people inside after washing our hands at the hand washing station outside.  We chose the seats that gave the great view of the lake.  We chatted with the people around us for a while and we were served quinoa fry bread and it was delicious.  It was so good I probably shouldn't have had so many but I did.  Next, we were given soup made from quinoa and veggies and then our main course came out about fifteen minutes later and consisted of river trout, veggies, potatoes and rice--all served on a fish-shaped plate.  I ate all of the trout, a tiny bit of the rice, two of the potatoes since I had to limit my carb intake.  Mom didn't even want to try any of it even when I offered her the rest of my rice and potatoes.  She said she was good and continued sipping her water.

We chatted with the family who were sitting across the table from us.  It was a guy, his fiance, two sons (14 and 23) his older son's girlfriend and his father.  He said he's traveled all over the place, lived in Europe and is now living back in his home country and taking his family on a vacation.  We told him where we were from, how Covid ruined this trip the first time, some of our past travels and was so happy to finally come to Peru.  We told him this country was beautiful and there was a lot to see.  He said we've only seen a fraction of it.  We said that we needed to come back another time.

We finished up our food, paid for our drinks, and used the restroom one more time.  Percy told us that we had about fifteen minutes to go walk down to the beach if we wanted to.  Of course we did!  A few of us walked down and it was really hard to keep sand from getting in your shoes.  Amy met us halfway down because the altitude was kicking her butt.  

We took several pictures before Percy said we should be heading back to the boat on the opposite side of the hill.  We walked up the hill and down the path to where the tour boat was anchored to the cement dock.  We all boarded, got comfortable and pushed off for the return hour and a half trip back to the Puno harbor.  The cloudy weather started coming in and the wind was stronger than it was making the water very choppy on the way back.  Within a few minutes most of the people on the tour boat had their eyes closed, including me.

I opened up my eyes a few times to see where we were.  I asked Mom if she still wanted to go up to the top when we got near the reed islands and she said yes.  I shut my eyes again until we got closer.  When we got to that point, I woke up, we grabbed two available life jackets and we climbed to the top of the boat.  There were six other people up there enjoying the views and the chilly breeze.  We sat up there for a while taking pictures of the area and people gathering reeds for their little islands.

We made a stop at the reed islands to let two people off.  I returned to my seat because I was getting cold and my legs were falling asleep from sitting up there uncomfortably.  I wish this boat had seats or a bench up there like the other tour boats we've seen, it would have made it more comfortable.  I basically stared out the window for the remaining time on the boat.  Mom came down just before we entered the harbor.

We docked and Percy thanked us for taking his tour of Lake Titicaca.  He said we would have to walk the boardwalk to the end of the road because the access road was closed this afternoon for some reason.  We thanked him, disembarked with all of our belongings and walked to our van at the end of the street.  

Our driver took us back to the Xima Hotel, which took about fifteen minutes to get there.  He dumped us off in front, we gave him a tip and we went back to our rooms.  

We were all tired.  Mom went to their room for a little while to talk about our travels for tomorrow, I took a quick shower and spent the rest of the night writing in my journal, uploading pictures to Facebook, Instagramming, charging my stuff, repacking my suitcase and trying to figure out how to watch the Thursday Night Football game on my phone.  That night was the NY Giants and the Washington Football Team.  It was so hard to watch it because it was on so late and I was tired.  I did manage to tough it out and Washington prevailed 30-29 in a very dramatic ending to the game.  I went to bed around 11ish after using the bathroom one more time.  We had a semi-early day to get up for the next morning.  We will be starting our first leg back towards home by traveling from Puno/Juliaca back to Lima on an airplane.

Next Adventure:  Peru:  Traveling from Puno to Lima and Visiting Mira Flores (Day 11)