Floating Islands

The best-known of the islands dotting Titicaca's surface are the Uros, floating islands of reed named after the Indians who inhabited them. Legend has it the Uro Indians had black blood that helped them survive the frigid nights on the water and safeguarded them from drowning.

The last full-blooded Uro was a woman who died in 1959. Other Uros had left the group of islands in earlier years owing to a drought that worsened their poverty - and intermarried with Aymará and Quechua-speaking Indians. But the Indians who now inhabit this island - a mix of Uro, Aymara and Inca descendants - follow the Uro ways.

The Uros' poverty has prompted more and more of them to move to Puno. That same poverty has caused those who remain to take a hard-sell approach to tourists and, besides pressing visitors to buy their handicrafts, they frequently demand "tips" for having their photographs taken.

Some tourists suggest that bartering with fresh fruit is better than money exchanges. However, there is continued criticism that tourism has not only opened the Uros Islands to the stares of insensitive tourists but has destroyed much of the culture as the Indians modified their handicrafts to appeal to outsiders or abandoned traditional practices to dedicate more time to the influx of outsiders.

The Uros islanders fish, hunt birds and live off lake plants, with ... 7 --- the - important element in their life being elake reeds they use for their houses, boats and even as the base of their five islands - the largest of which are Toranipata, Huaca Huacani and Santa Maria. The bottoms of the reed islands decay in the water and are replaced from the top with new layers, making a spongy surface that is a bit difficult to walk on.

Even the walls of the schools on the bigger islands are made of totora. The soft roots of the reed are eaten, making it a pretty handy thing to have around.

Another island that lures tourists is Taquile, the home of skilled weavers and a spot where travelers can buy wellmade woolen and alpaca goods as well as colorful garments whose patterns and designs bear hidden messages about the wearer's social standing or marital status. The residents of this island run their own tourism operations in the hope that visits of outsiders will not destroy their delicate culture. There are no hotels on Taquile but the islanders generously open their homes to tourists interested in an overnight stay.

Handicrafts also play an important role in life on Amantani, a lovely and peaceful island even further away from Puno than Taquile. Amantani was once part of the Inca empire, as attested to by local ruins, before the Spanish invaded and slaughtered the islanders. The Spaniard who was granted a concession to the island used the Indians in forced labor and his descendants were still in control after Peru's independence from Spain. But eventually an island fiesta turned violent and the Indians attacked their landlord with hoes and consequently split up the island into communally-held fields.

Amantani has opened its doors to outsiders who are willing to live for a few days as the Aymará-speaking islanders do -and that means sleeping on beds made of long hard reeds and eating potatoes for every meal. There is no running water or electricity and nighttime temperatures drop to freezing even in the summer. But those happy to rough it catch a glimpse of an Andean agricultural community that has maintained the same traditions for centuries. Some Amantaní residents live and die without ever leaving the island.

Journeys to Amantaní begin at the Puno docks aboard sputtering wooden motorboats operated by the islanders. At the end of the four-hour trip, visitors are registered as guests and assigned to a host family. The family, usually led by a shy patriarch, shows the way to its mud-brick home set around an open courtyard decorated with white pebbles spelling out the family's name.

Prepared visitors usually bring gifts of fruit -a rarity on the isolated island and the socializing begins when a family member who speaks English offers a guided walk around the island, from where the views are something spectacular. Women wearing traditional black and white lace dresses pass by with Islingshots in their hands to kill scavenging birds.

Another island, Esteves is connected to Puno by a bridge and is best known for Turistas Isla Esteves This luxury hotel is a far cry from what used to be the main construction on the island - a prison that accommodated the patriots captured by the Spanish during Peru's war for independence.

James Orton, a naturalist and explorer who died crossing Titicaca on a steamship in 1877, is buried on Isla Esteves; his memorial sits beside one honoring the liberation fighters who perished in the war with Spain. Orton, a natural history professor from Vassar University, was on his third expedition to explore the Beni river in the Amazon area. The Beni's link to the Mamore river both crucial conduits during the jungle's rubber boom - was named the Orton river in his honor.