Isla del Sol
I could write pages and pages about the Sun Island, but to keep it short I will just say it was amazing! I had planned to stay a night on the island and ended up staying for 3! This was partially to do with the beauty of the island, but also was because of where I stayed and who I was with.
The north and south ends of the island are the most populated with tourists, and many just go for the say. The south is much more touristy and the North is significantly quieter with less restaurants and hotels. I stayed in the north at an amazing placed owned by the sweetest couple. They made you feel at home despite the basic accommodations and allowed us to cook on the super authentic wood burning ‘stove’ which we took advantage of every night. It was basically a fire pit with a dome overtop that had circular holes in it that acted as a stovetop.
The place was perched on the side of the mountain with the best views of the lake.The island has no cars so it was amazing to only hear birds and crashing waves (and donkeys!). Throughout the 4 says there I hung out with 7 other solo female travelers – we always manage to find each other! I have actually met significantly more solo female travelers than male throughout my trip so far. We had tons of fun just talking and hanging out. One of the days we did a hike across the island to the south. It was 3 hours there and 3 back. Although the hike was nice and we enjoyed the meal, it confirmed that staying in the north was the right choice!
Unfortunately I had to leave the girls behind because I had to continue moving to make it to Cusco in time for when my mom arrives. A side note about Island mentality…it was widely advertised the ferries leave at 8:30am, 10:30am and 1:30pm daily, so i packed up and was ready to catch the 10:30 ferry. Well they let me know after I purchased my ticket that it would only leave once there were 15 people. I ended up sitting around by the harbour until 1:30 since there never ended up being enough people for the earlier one!