Lake Titicaca Islands, part one: Islas Flotantes

Copacabana, Bolivia

For the past four hours at least we've had free entertainment in our hotel room on the third floor: for the end of the school year the different classes from the school across the road are celebrating with a folk dance festival. Thanks to our elevated position we can not only hear the music but watch the dancers in their colourful costumes. 

We arrived here after a short three hour bus ride from Puno earlier today. Eight kilometres before reaching Copacabana we crossed the border to Bolivia, which was the easiest and fastest border crossing we ever experienced in South America. Copacabana is on Lake Titicaca, just like Puno in Peru, but it is much smaller and very touristy: shoulder-to-shoulder shops and stands selling local handicrafts, many, many restaurants, including kiosks right on the beach serving - supposedly - the best trout. In spite of my love of fish I haven't yet dared to try, still a bit leery of 'street food' here in South America. 

We decided to stop here on our way to La Paz to explore yet another island: Isla del Sol, the biggest of the islands in Lake Titicaca. It will be interesting to see how it differs from the Peruvian islands we visited for two days from Puno. 

We boarded our motorboat with about twenty-five other people from different parts of the world early on Monday morning, accompanied by Pepe, our bi-lingual local guide. For the first half hour or so Pablo, our captain, steered the boat through the channel lined by reeds and sedges leading out of Puno bay before we hit open water. Lake Titicaca is indeed huge! 

After about an hour and a half we arrived at our first destination, the famous 'Islas Flotantes', 'Floating Islands' of Lake Titicaca with their inhabitants who still live their traditional lifestyle, fishing, creating crafts and trading. 

We moored at one of the islands and were greeted by the family group that lived on it. They speak Aymara, an indigenous language spoken throughout parts of Peru, Chile and Bolivia. The men work away for some of the time to supplement their income, so they are exposed to modern life in Puno, Cusco or Lima, but the women still largely stay on the islands. Some of the islands, like the one we visited, are very small and have just room enough for the few houses belonging to the family group, but others are big enough for a school or community centre shared by the families from the about seventy floating islands.

Oscar, the leader of this particular island, gave us a demonstration of how the islands are constructed. They have a life span of about thirty years, so they do need to be renewed from time to time. For that purpose, the men cut off clumps of the uros reeds growing in abundance in Puno bay. Not every variety of reed is usable: a thick layer of root material forms the base of the island, cut in pieces small enough to handle for the men. They are then pulled to the spot where the new island is going to be and lashed together with stakes and string. Ropes made from reeds were used for that purpose traditionally, but now they use plastic. Within a few months the roots of the plants are so intertwined that the base for a new island is secure.

Construction of a floating island: base, layers of uros, and two different types of houses

Next, the whole family – men, women and children – work together to spread layer upon layer of reeds crosswise on this base, which takes months to complete; they are cut by the men and brought back to the island. The layers must be continually renewed to maintain the base: every 15 days a new one is added because the island needs to stay dry, and the lower layers rot, of course. Finally, the houses can be constructed, also made with the uros that share their name with the people living here as well as the group of islands themselves. Traditionally the houses were cone-shaped, but, Oscar tells us, 'only the grandparents want houses like that anymore.' The younger people live in rectangular houses. Yet, they are very small and basic with one room for the whole family. The food is prepared outside in a clay oven; there is a high danger of fire, which would be desastrous, of course.

After Oscar finished his demonstration we were divided into small groups to visit families in their houses. Our family consisted of Eduardo and Emma and their three children. The older two were in school: every morning they are picked up by boat and travel for about an hour or an hour and a half to attend the school on one of the bigger islands. The only one at home was one-year-old Myriam who was quite sick with a bad cold; Eduardo was going to take her to the doctor in the afternoon. They were worried about pneumonia, which is a problem in the damp environment. When we stepped out again Emma had spread out the handicrafts she and Eduardo had made: Emma's knitted and embroidered garments and ceramics painted by Eduardo who had also made small model reed boats like the ones they use to navigate (though motor boats are now part of their 'fleet' as well). They sell these items to the tourists visiting their island, but also take them to the market in Puno.

Before we moved on we were treated to a short ride in one of the amazing boats, used for centuries by the Uros people to navigate Lake Titicaca.  They used to be made entirely of reeds, but only last about half a year. Recently the Uros have switched to fashioning the core of the boats from plastic bottles which has at least doubled the life span. Eduardo was our 'gondoliere', using a long stake to quietly move us around his island and the adjacent one.

It is hard to believe that people still live this way, without power and running water, without most amenities that make life easy for us. The tourist trade is bringing in at least some extra cash (we were asked to pay 10 PEN (about $4 Can.) per person, but fishing, catching birds and gathering water fowl eggs is the basis of their existence. For how long might the Uros be able to preserve this heritage? How long will the young men return to their islands, and the women be content not to be part of the world beyond?