Moquegua

Friday May 10th

Before leaving Puno we drove to the dock on Lake Titacaca. The lake is 135 miles long and at 12325 feet is the highest navigational lake in the world. We boarded a boat to take us to the floating islands. This is the big attraction in Puno. About 10 miles off shore is a group of islands that float. They are made of straw. Natives live on them permanently all year round. We got off on one. They told us how they are built and maintained. The natives also sell crafts.

After returning to town we filled the bikes with gas and headed south. We were on a high plateau at about 14000 feet. It looked like parts of Arizona or Wyoming with high flat meadows and sweeping curves. There were few villages and little traffic. We were driving about 70 MPH and every few miles we would go up and over a pass with some great high speed and low speed curves. We went over 3 passes at over 15,000 feet.

As we approached Moquegua we suddenly dropped in elevation into the city. We had over an hour of tight switchbacks winding down the hill. The city is at only out 4,000 feet. Everyone was really relived to be back where there is enough air to breath. Last night half the people, including Jan, had bad headaches and no one slept well. We are looking forward to a good nights sleep tonight. Jan and I went out for Pizza. It tasted great.