The Maple Crew Visits Peru (Part 3)

The Maple crew is currently in Peru, embarking on some land travel while Maple sits out the hurricane season in the Rio Dulce, Guatemala.  Here are some more thoughts from Ella (11 year old, Grade 7) about her trip to Peru.

Uros Islands, Lake Titicaca, Peru

Q:  In your last post you wrote about what you’d seen in Arequipa.  Your sister shared some details about the Colca Canyon, hiking and seeing Andean Condors.  What have you been doing since then?

A: Since then my family and I went to Puno to see Lake Titicaca. The word Titicaca means “stone puma”. Lake Titicaca is at an altitude of 3800 meters. While at Lake Titicaca we went on a cultural exchange which included a trip to the Uros Islands which are floating islands made of reeds, an overnight stay with a local family on Amantani Island, and a brief stop at Taquile Island.

Q:  What was the most memorable part of your visit to Lake Titicaca?

A: The most memorable part of Lake Titicaca was seeing the floating reed islands. The reed islands have to be anchored or else they might float into the Bolivian part of Lake Titicaca.

Reed Island supporting 3 families, Lake Titicaca, Peru

Q:  Why do the reed islands exist?  Can you tell us a bit more about how the islands are made and what life is like on the islands?

A: The reed islands exist because the Uros people were trying to escape war between tribes in pre-Incan Peru. The islands are made by stacking layers reeds on top of floating root blocks. In the beginning there are five layers of reeds but as time goes on the reeds rot and more layers need to be added to keep the island from sinking. The reed islands can last up to 45 years if they are well cared for. A big island can house up to 10 family’s while a small island can only house 2. The houses on the reed islands are entirely made of reeds. On the island they have to cook out in the open, they use the reeds as their fire source. The clothes on the reed island are very similar to the clothes on Amantani Island. For a bathroom they build separate islands to use as bathrooms. When you go to the bathroom the reeds will soak up your waste.

Q:  You stayed overnight with a family on Amantani Island, that must have been an interesting experience.  Can you tell me a bit about what that was like?

A: Staying over night in some ones house was an interesting experience. We got a bedroom to ourselves but the bathroom was outside and you had to dump a bucket of water into the toilet to flush it. The kitchen was small and did not have a sink or many counters.  The meals at the house were very tasty and filling.

Ella grinding quinoa to make flour.

Q:  Can you tell me a bit more about the culture of people on Amantani Island?

A:  On Amantani Island the people all wear very beautiful outfits. The men wear very colourful ponchos. The women all wear plain green skirts and a very colourful  blouse with an elaborate design on it. They also wear a thick belt that overlaps the blouse and the skirt. then they wear a shawl over top of all their other clothes. On Amantani Island they found a way to preserve potatoes for 60 years. The way that they preserve the potatoes is they put them on top of a mountain in the winter. then when the potatoes are frozen they stomp on them until all of the water has been squeezed out of them the potatoes. To eat the dehydrated potatoes all you have to do is rehydrate them. Another interesting fact about Amantani Island is that the husband in the family makes all the clothes for the girls and the wife makes all the clothes for the boys.

Dressed in traditional clothing for welcome party.

Ella dancing with our host family.

The Maple Crew Visits Peru (Part 2)

The Maple crew is still in Peru, enjoying some land travel while Maple sits out the hurricane season in the Rio Dulce, Guatemala.  Next up to share some thoughts on Peru is Iris (8 years old, Grade 3).

Suri Alpaca

Q:  What kinds of things have you done in the last few days?
A: We went hiking in the Colca Canyon it was 10.5 km downhill then we took the bus back the next day. The Colca Canyon is the second deepest canyon in the world.  It is twice as deep as the Grand Canyon. We also went to an Alpaca museum. We got to feed the alpacas and llamas. We also got to pet the alpacas. Yesterday we went to see some condors.  We saw some condors but not many. The Andean condor is the largest bird in the world.

On the trail...

About 1/3 of the way.  That's our trail stretching out around the mountain.

Andean Condor in flight.

Q:  What was the most interesting to you?  Why was it the most interesting?
A: The Alpaca museum because I love alpacas and llamas, they are cute.  Do you know there are four different types of Llamas: vicuna, guanaco, suri alpaca and huacaya  alpaca. I like the suri because it has long hair.

Llamas, Alpacas & kids - oh my!

Baby Llama!

Q:  What did you not enjoy and why?
A: The hike because it was long and tiring.  My feet and legs hurt A LOT at the end.  The hot springs at the hostel at the end of the hike felt great.

Hot springs apres hiking.

Q:  What are you most looking forward to next and why?
A: Lake Titicaca with the floating reed islands because it will be cool to see.

The Maple Crew visits Peru

The Maple crew is currently in Peru, embarking on some land travel while Maple sits out the hurricane season in the Rio Dulce Guatemala.  After a long hiatus from posting, we’re kicking thigs off with some thoughts from Ella (11 year old, Grade 7) about Peru.



Q:  Where are you right now?
A: Right now I am in Arequipa, Peru.  Peru is in South America.d

Q:  What was your first impression of Peru?
A; When we first arrived in Peru it didn’t feel very different from any other country that we’d been in. I think that because we travel to so many different places, nothing seems too weird, every city feels pretty normal.  We had arrived in a city so it looked and smelled like a city.

Q:  What kinds of things have you seen so far in Peru?
A: So far we have seen a catacomb that was underneath a church in Lima, we didn’t have an English tour guide so we didn’t learn all the details. We also went on a small 6 seater plane and got to look a the Nazca lines. The Nazca lines are pictures in the sand that were made by the Nazca people between 500 B.C and 500 C.E. To make the Nazca lines the Nazca people would scrape the red sand and rock off of the surface to expose the gray rocks and clay underneath. The Nazca lines can only be seen from the sky so you couldn’t take a car to see them. Today we went to a museum about the Incan people and we learned about the sacrifices and how they only sacrificed children because they were innocent and pure.

On the Flight Line

Monkey

Spider

Tree

Q:  What was the most interesting to you?  Why was it the most interesting?
A: The most interesting thing that we have done so far was going to the Incan museum because I learned that to the Incans being sacrificed was an honor since they believed that you would be living with the gods. I also learned that to sacrifice them they would climb to the top of their sacred mountain and give the children and alcoholic drink that would make them sleepy, then the would club them on the head so that the skull would break and that is what killed them.  The first child that they found was a 12-14 years old. They decided to name her Juanita after the archeologist that found her. We got to see her skeleton and it wasn’t what I expected.  She was as big as a 5 year old even though she was fourteen. Two other children were found on the same mountain and all of them had gifts around them.

Library - Monastery of St. Francis of Assisi

Catacombs - Monastery of St. Francis of Assisi

Q:  What do you have planned for the rest of your trip?
A: For the rest of our trip we plan on going to Machu Picchu to see the ruins at the top. We are also going to see Lake Titicaca which has floating reed islands on it.

Q:  What are you most looking forward to and why?
A: I am really looking forward to going to Machu Picchu because there are some ruins of a city at the top which were only discovered in 1911.

So far the crew from Maple are holding up well, and enjoying the sights, smells, sounds and history of our first South American stop.