Feeling a little the worse for our 85 miles yesterday, we had a bit of a late start from Juliaca. It's just under 30 miles to Puno, and the road is fairly flat and arrow straight for the majority of the time, so we started just after 10am after a filling breakfast in the hotel restaurant.
Getting out of Juliaca was easy. Out the door of the hotel and head south. We ended up running out of town on a 6 lane highway with big no cycling signs up.... which we continued to ignore until the road reverted to two lane type. There were no police to witness our law breaking thankfully, although after a while I got the feeling that it may not be strictly enforced anyhow as we over took yet another pedal rickshaw.
Had our fifth puncture of this leg of the trip just a few miles later. The Specialized tyres that came on Den's bike just aren't made for touring. A small piece of wire had punctured the carcass of the tyre and given her a slow flat on the rear wheel. As the tire had been wearing quickly we swapped it with my front tyre and hopefully we'll have fewer punctures for a while - there is less weight over the front wheels, so thorns etc. won't be forced through the tyre quite as easily.
On the road to Puno...
As we neared Puno the road climbed for a 150 metres (vertical) over a few miles, before allowing us to coast into town, just ahead of the afternoon rain. We checked out a few hotels and ended up plumping for the Hotel Sillustani. A bit on the pricey side compared to some of the places we've stayed, but hey, welcome to Puno, tourist-tastic Gringo-ville. Luckily it's the low season so we wangled a discount.
Lake Titicaca....
Puno and around...
Just been out for an authentic Peruvian pizza.... mmm yum, oh and Den bought some Alpaca socks... mmm, questionable.
What an amazing sky and I adore the socks! Bitterly cold and dark here and we are so jelous of your blue sky and amazing scenery. Looks great from the comfort of the sofa with the fire going!
ReplyDeleteTh and Al xxx