Cuzco -Puno - Titicaca - La Paz

1st class Train to Puno!

Another interesting but relaxing day is waiting for you. As you sink in to your first class seat, watch mountains go by as high as 20 000 feet, snow capped & majestic. As the train stops en route, glimpse out of the window and wonder how the local Indians live here. See potato fields that feed these people and which from here through the Spanish conquerors also became a mainstay for the entire world.

Please note: train schedule subject to availability by Peru Rail; alternatively transfer will be by first class tourist bus including sightseeings and lunch along the route to Lake Titicaca. This evening, check in to the Posada del Inca Hotel at the shores of lake Titicaca. (B/L/D).

Day 7: Lake Titicaca and its floating islands

You are at 3855 m above sea level! Sounds even more amazing to say you are at almost 12000 feet! See today how the Uro Indian tribe lives on floating islands in the lake as the fish, hunt birds and live of lake plants. This afternoon have a look at the astonishing pre-Columbian funeral towers of Sillustani in a beautiful setting on a peninsula in lake Umayo. Archaeologists attempt to rebuild the towers has been defeated. The engineering involved is more complex then anything the Incas built. (B).

Day 8: Along lake Titicaca to Bolivia

Alternatively it is now also possible to take a cruise over lake Titicaca, with lunch stop on the Island of the Sun! A visit to Tiahuanaco can then be done on Monday instead of the Moon valley and La Paz city tours. The ruins of Tiahuanaco prove that the Incas were not the only cultural and military power of the Andes. When the Incas came to conquer what today is Bolivia, they found a people that lived around ruins that are today around 3600 years old. But, sadly, the people can no longer explain what those ruins were for or what the meaning of them was.

Tiahuanaco was the hub for trans Andean trade, situated on fertile land. The flooding of the raised fields system destroyed the empire that stretched from Peru, Bolivia to Chile. Today this irrigation system is being successfully re-utilized in the Titicaca area. Continue on to La Paz, the highest capital in the world where you spend your last night in the Andes in the very nice Plaza Hotel in the lower part of the city, where the air is a bit thicker! (B/D).

Day 9: City Tour of La Paz & Valley of the Moon

Enjoy a city tour of the Bolivian capital, followed by a special excursion to the Valle de la Luna (Valley of the Moon). Overnight back in La Paz. (B).

Day 10: Transfer home or continue with another tour! (B).