53.3 mi / 10.0 mph / 1500 ft. climbing
Home: Fiore’s AirBNB

Today would be the real test of the Juliaca-avoiding route that we and our temporary Italian friends were attempting. Although we’d had a big hill to climb after we left the main highway yesterday, it was a relatively-short section mileage-wise, while today the entire route would be “off the (car) beaten track”, including a 10-mile gravel section.

After a brief section on the busy highway connecting Arequipa and Juliaca, we branched off to one of our favorite types of roads in Peru, the no-centerline, effectively-one-way, paved road. Because the narrowness means that everyone needs to pay attention and pass with care, and also that there isn’t enough traffic volume to necessitate a wider road.

After the town of “Cabana” (maybe one of the three “Cabanillas’?), the day’s 10-mile gravel section began. With no street view, or other rider reports, this was a bit of a gamble since we had no indication of the quality of the road. But since it was essentially flat, I figured it would almost surely be easier than the huge mountain climbs we’d done on gravel roads in the Cordillera Blanca. And yep, it was in pretty good shape, good enough that we did a couple miles before I even lowered our tire pressure.

Even though there are several route possibilities between Lampa and Puno, Nicolo and Roberta once again independently chose the exact same path as us (Coincidence #9, and I just realized Coincidence #10: we’re both “N&R”!!) This morning they had left a bit earlier than us, and since we hadn’t caught up to them on the pavement, I figured they’d be long gone once we hit the gravel, since their front-suspension/knobby-tire mountain bikes would be much more-suited to the surface than our more “road bike” setup. So it was quite a surprise when I identified their bright yellow rack packs on the small moving dots ahead, and even more of a surprise when we quickly reeled them in. Perhaps it’s an indication that our new-for-South America 650x55B wheel setup has turned our steeds into unusually-efficient gravel bikes, with our wider-but-smoother aired-down tires seemingly outperforming their knobs and suspension. We all were at least able to take advantage of the nice tailwind to push us along.

It was the other N&R’s first exposure to gravel for their new bikes, and likely a perfect introduction as opposed to some more-challenging stuff they’ll soon be facing in Bolivia. They headed on to Tiquilaca for a lunch break, while I re-filled our tires and we picked up drinks for an earlier lunch stop. We crossed the dead-flat basin of Laguna Umayo, taking as much advantage of the continuing tailwind before stopping at a notch in the Wile-E-Coyote landscape.

After lunch the real work began, starting with a reasonable climb that became increasingly stiff as it went straight up for a few hundred feet after Tiquilaca. That’s where we unknowingly passed the other N&R, as they had entered the off-highway town. The wind had also become increasingly-gusty, driven out of dark rainclouds that had popped up to our right. There were still blue skies straight ahead, but then our left became blotted out with curtains of black rain as well. Lightning flashed and thunder rumbled, and our challenge was to shoot the gauntlet without getting dumped on. But the winds and the hills made it less “shooting” and more “grinding through” the gauntlet. At least the second steep section had switchbacks that not only eased the grade, but also provided some wind protection, though the exhausting struggle made the easy first half of the long day feel like a distant memory.

Despite our inability to “shoot”, we somehow made it through the gauntlet with only a few sprinkles slightly-dampening our sleeves, which meant that we successfully completed our Cusco-to-Puno segment without ever getting truly wet, which had been one of our main concerns when the rains had been falling regularly during our Cusco time and we debated flying or bussing. N&R #2 weren’t quite as lucky, catching a 15-minute period of rain and hail where they simply sat down and covered themselves with their ponchos.

Puno, on the shore of Lake Titicaca, is guarded by a ring of steep mountains. Our Juliaca-bypassing route brought us in from the west rather than the north, and while it required us to climb a bit higher before descending to the city, the much-lighter traffic made it the clear winner, and another advantage of our route choice.

Lake Titicaca is as famous for its funny-to-Beavis name as for its status as the world’s highest-altitude navigable lake, and while it felt like less of a “destination” to me than it seems to be for a lot of visitors (perhaps because we wouldn’t be following its shores to its shared country of Bolivia), I was surprisingly hit with a wave of emotion when I first glimpsed its flat glistening water from high above. The sight of mountains on the far shore that rise from another country was an indication of how far we’ve come in Peru, and how close our time in this country was to its end. And hey, we rode our bicycles to the highest navigable lake in the world, whose name is boob-poop!!

The suburb of “Alto Puno”, before the descent, was perhaps the most-dismal neighborhood we’ve been through in all of Peru. We passed a census worker (sightings of whom have become much more rare than they were a couple months ago) talking to a couple of people in the middle of the street, and despite all the buildings around (including a huge new out-of-place unfinished hospital complex), it felt like he could have been saying “ok, I’ve got you two, have you heard rumors of anyone else living in this wasteland?” But I was taking us through the neighborhood to stop at the prime “mirador” (viewpoint) of Titicaca. Rett was so exhausted by this point that I knew she would just want to continue on, so I ran over to grab some pictures, and was then surprised to see that the giant concrete creatures in the playground-like mirador had been enough to draw her over to explore herself.

The slope down to the city was super-steep, but we were able to take switchbacking roads (initially down rideable gravel) that kept the grades reasonable, and more-importantly, with minimal traffic. For a brief section we had to merge onto the highway coming from Juliaca (which at that point, and for its climb over the guarding mountains, had narrowed from its unprecedented 4-lane divided-highway stature into a narrow shoulderless two-lane nightmare), but we were on it for a period briefer than we had waited for a gap in the constant traffic to enter it. And from there we continued down what almost felt like a back-door into Puno, for one of our calmest entries into a Peruvian city. The push back directly up the steep hill to our AirBNB was the hardest part, but even that was just half-a-block.

For only the second time in the last six nights, we weren’t staying at the same place as Nicolo and Roberta, but we met them for dinner at their suggestion of Del Buho Pizzeria, from where a card was the only thing stuck to our AirBNB’s refrigerator (Coincidence #12!) We all congratulated ourselves on the obvious superiority of the route we had taken through Lampa, despite the day’s long and tiring ride, and celebrated the days we had been lucky to ride “together”. They were probably a little less excited than us, but from our perspective, it had been five months since we’ve had in-depth in-person interactions with anyone besides each other, much less with people who are our spiritual brethren (and so we were incredibly grateful for their ability and willingness to speak English with us!) We will be spending some nights in Puno to rest and prepare for our westward crossing of the mountains, while they will be moving south to a quieter town tomorrow, so sadly our path of incredible coincidence diverges from here.

Days 2-4

We basically did nothing during our time in Puno besides resting and planning for our tough and relatively-unknown road towards the Pacific coast and Chile. One of the main tourist activities in Puno is to take a boat ride out to the “floating islands” of Uros, but it sounded challenging to find a way to visit that wouldn’t be an hours-long pressure-campaign to get you to buy stuff, and that didn’t just sound unappealing, it felt like it would be disrespectful to all the more-genuine interactions we’ve had throughout our time in rural Peru.