Reed Islands

Today saw us get up early, have a final breakfast with our host family before heading back down to our boat and leaving the island.

We were headed back to Puno, but had one stop to make before we did, the reed islands. These are truly fascinating as they are exactly what they sound like, man made islands made entirely from reeds. The people who live on them make them by cutting out big cubes of the roots from the reeds, which float, and then attach these cubes together until they eventually fuse together creating their island. They then chop of the top of the reeds and lay down several layers all over the island to give it a floor, with these reeds continuously being replaced as the ones below start to rot.

It's amazing, and started when the Spaniards invaded and the local people wanted to hide from them, which they did out on to the lake by making these islands. Furthermore, all the structures on the islands, homes, boats, hats etc are also make with the reeds! You can see one of the boats in today's blip. These islands aren't small either, although there is many of them, and the population living across them all is around three thousand! The islands can also be separated and there have been cases of neighbours not getting along that result with them simply cutting the island in half!

Once we were back in Puno we had lunch and then headed back to the mixology bar we had been to a few nights earlier. This was followed by dinner which was followed by a night of vomiting for me as it had turned out to be my turn to get gastro.

- Damian