Thanksgiving in Copacabana

Joe, Dylan, and I had stayed up pretty late the night before just hanging out in our room on the Isla del Sol getting to know each other better, but regardless of that, we still found ourselves up at around 6am to pack up our things and climb down to the dock to catch the first boat back to Copacabana. Our little trip had worked out almost flawlessly, and the island, like many other places we had been, had left quite an impression on us. When we were hiking down I did my best to take it all in. I tried to consider the idea that one-day I might be back again, but upon doing this I came to the conclusion that this was almost certainly the last time in my life that I would ever be on this Island.

I came to this conclusion not because I wouldn’t love to visit again, but because if I’ve gained anything since I started to travel it’s a better understanding of how much really is out there. The number of people and places that are just beyond the horizon waiting to show you their little bit of homemade magic are, in terms of a lifetime, countless. So even If I live to be an old man, If I want to be an old man who can even begin to say that he has an understanding of human beings, the entire world in general, and what it’s comprised of, then I’m already in a crunch for time.

I think this was a good thing to finally realize as someone who is seeing vastly different places every few days. I’ve started to appreciate the moments themselves a little bit more. I’m doing my best to remember how places make me feel. I’m writing more down, because while I’m traveling like this, everyday truly is a once in a lifetime experience. Everywhere I go is someone’s home, and it’s very interesting to consider the people, and how these places shaped them and made them who they are, just as my home made me who I am. I could spend the rest of my life just observing how people live.

Our trip to Copa was a short-lived example of these attempts. It was Thanksgiving morning in the states and we were taking a little ferry across Lake Titicaca for the second time. We docked in Copa Cabana around 8:30am and found some breakfast on the main drag with Dylan, two Danes, and a guy from Ecuador that we had met the night before on our way to dinner. After breakfast, Joe and I went out in search of a hostel and Dylan went looking for a bus ticket that would get him to Peru later that evening. After we found a decent place to drop our stuff and Dylan was all situated, we decided we would just walk around town and see what it was about. It was a beautiful sunny day and the town was busy with street vendors, motorbikes, and tourists. Walking around, we quickly realized that the place wasn’t very big. There was a big white church, and about 10 blocks of colorful buildings filling in the land leading up to the lakeshore. Behind the town, filling up about 4x as much area, was farmland. On either side of town were giant hills leading up to look out points over the lake, and beyond all that was a mountain range. We found cheap lunch in the local market where we were glad to be the only gringos around. We each enjoyed a plate of chicken, rice, potato, and a fried banana for a very reasonable price.

After lunch we got back to wandering, and ended up following the sound of cheering into a local soccer stadium. It was a cool little concrete structure with an indoor, adult league game going on. We stuck around for about a game in a half cheering for whomever we felt like. It was a pretty cool find for a few kids who weren’t really looking for anything. When we were all ready to go we decided we would head down to the like and see if we could rent a boat to get out on the water.

With almost no effort, we bought ourselves an hour on Lake Titicaca in a rotting old rowboat named Popeye! The work it took to get out away from town was a lot more then what it took to row back in, but the three of us took turns rowing and we still managed to have a good time despite almost most getting ran over more then once by ferries on their way in and out of port.

Once we docked the boat and headed back to the hostel to freshen up, we decided that with the hour or so we had before Dylan had to catch his bus we would climb up the hill on the edge of town to the famed lookout point. We were in a bit of a hurry to get up and down so Joe didn’t bring the camera for this part, but it was quite a view. We were in the perfect position to look down at everything in the town, our playground for the day.

After hiking down and saying goodbye to our new friend Dylan until who knows when, Joe and I set out I search of a suitable Thanksgiving dinner before we would head back to the hostel to get in contact with our family at home. We ended up finding some pretty good pasta. Mine had some type of Alfredo sauce and an entire Lake Titicaca trout in it (bones and all.) It was nothing like we would have eaten at home, but still pretty tasty.

When we got back to the hostel and tried to log onto Skype, the wifi refused to work, naturally. So after a few minutes of fooling around we decided to head down the road in search of a café or something so as not to keep our whole family waiting. We ended up Skyping in an empty bar for the fee of a couple beers. It was great to see everyone at home in such a familiar Thanksgiving setting. We got to say hello to our parents, grandparents, siblings, aunts, uncles, cousins, and our baby niece Allison, who has been doing some serious growing up since we left. It was the perfect way to end a great day, and what has so far been the most unique Thanksgiving of my life.