Cont. from below.

However, in Peru in general, I have never felt unsafe, just dirty and a little curious about particular procedures. For example, our bus ride involved switching buses at 4:30 a.m. in a sketch, unnamed town. To add to the confusion, I was still sleepy-eyed, but the blur remains in my memory. Young children and babies were shuffling around. We ran off the bus, back on, back off, and seconds later, we were 80% sure we were on the correct bus headed to Puno. This one smelled significant grades worse, but I tried to sleep it off, I failed.

We arrived in Puno at 6 a.m. and crazed from another restless night. A few blocks from the bus station, we attracted some Peruvian hostel owners near the train tracks. Peruvians love to hustle. We should have known then that we were in the ghetto of Puno, but we followed the man in a daze. Without question he agreed to rent us a room for an hour of sleep and another pan (bread) and marmalade desayuno (breakfast.) Later we discovered when we returned from our island tour of Lago Titikaka that the place is known for its one hour rentals, but different reasons than ours. The giggly couple that rented a room after us signified this to us. As did the two couples following the first pair. Awesome.

It's all part of the Peru experience.

Cont.