On the trail of the Incas

Finally somewhat fit again, we started our journey to Copacabana, a small town on Lake Titicaca and on the border with Peru. The bus journey there was already a little adventure, as you have to cross a small part of Lake Titicaca on the way to Copacabana. This is done with the help of a huge motorized raft onto which the bus can drive.

When we arrived in Copacabana, we were first relieved to be in a warm, summery environment again and to have found a dreamlike hostel. The garden with a view of Copacabana and Lake Titicaca, with hammocks and llamas, was particularly impressive. It was the perfect place to watch the sunset!

The dreamy garden of our hostel!

The dreamy sunset with the alpacas in the garden.

Right in front of our room, we also had a nice little garden!

In addition, we got a nice double room very cheaply, even with our own bathroom, which is not exactly a matter of course. The next morning we set off relatively early to Isla de Sol. We took a boat for 2 hours across Lake Titicaca, which is the largest freshwater lake in South America and the birthplace of the Inca culture. By chance, we met three old acquaintances on the boat, whom we knew from the hostel in San Pedro de Atacama (Chile), the three New Zealanders Chelsea, Mark, and Moe.

We then spent a very nice day with them on this unique and beautiful island, which exudes a very own and spiritual energy. We also met a French woman on this island, who told us that she travels at the expense of the state for 4 months, namely with unemployment benefits. Not bad either.

Panorama over Isla de Sol - fantastic!

The mountain landscape behind Lake Titicaca, a unique picture

The fields of the island's inhabitants

We were also greeted by baby cats on the island.

From left to right: two French women (the right one is named Jessica, unfortunately we forgot the name of the left one), Mark, Andi, and Jorge, a Spaniard

In any case, we continued our journey to Cusco, the city of the Incas, after this successful day by night bus. We arrived there very early in the morning, to be precise at 5 o'clock, and by chance we met Mark again at the bus station, who then took us to his hostel. Actually, we had a Couchsurfing host there, but he was in Machu Picchu all day and could only meet us in the evening. So we spent the whole day in Mark's quite relaxed hostel, which would also become our second home in the next few days. Nice people, cheap good food, and a very cheap bar made an impression on us. In the evening at 10 o'clock we finally met our Couchsurfing host and after we went to eat something, it turned out that the 15-hour wait was completely in vain. He used to work in Cusco and his company had booked him a room in a hotel, where there were two free beds, and he wanted to host us there. Actually not a problem, but unfortunately the hotel staff did not agree with it, so we had to look for a hostel after this very long day, but luckily it didn't take long. At least we had the 8-bed dormitory there all to ourselves!

Cusco sits at an altitude of 3,400m and has been built in a basin between the mountains. From the hamlets above the city, you have a fantastic view over the charming, relatively small city (350,000 inhabitants). However, the next day we just wanted to go to a football field first to finally do some exercise. We found it relatively quickly, but unfortunately it was closed. After a funny conversation with a few Peruvians, we spontaneously decided to walk up the rest of the hill (the football field was relatively high) and see what was there. As luck would have it, we reached a statue of Jesus that towered over Cusco after a few minutes and had a fantastic view of the city there!

View over Cusco

Directly behind it was Sacsayhuaman, a ruin of an important Inca fortress. As luck would have it, a woman came up to us there and offered us a horse riding trip with her horses around the nearby Inca ruins. The fun would only cost us 5 euros, so we thought why not and did not regret it at all. It was wonderful to ride through this green, hilly landscape from Inca ruin to Inca ruin and enjoy the view.

We are ready

Something else that we also enjoyed very much was the extremely good and cheap food in Cusco. Especially at lunchtime. Most of the time we got an excellent lunch menu practically everywhere for 8 soles (equivalent to 2 euros), which consisted of a soup, a large main course, and as much juice as we wanted. Sometimes there was even a small starter and a dessert. It was also filling and varied. Usually, the meat was served with rice, fries, fried egg, and fried bananas. It may sound like a strange mix, but it really tastes excellent. We would come to appreciate this food especially in the next few days on our Salkantay Trek and miss it very much..

But before that, we spent 2 fun evenings in our "second home," Mark's hostel. Actually, we always just wanted to go there for dinner, but in the end we were always invited to so many drinks, played beer bong, and didn't come home until late at night. The funny thing about the hostel was that we were usually the only guests there. Everyone else who was there worked at the hostel, and the main source of income for the hostel is probably the money that the employees spend in the bar every evening... an interesting recipe for success!

Author: Gabriel

Edit: Andreas