I don’t think “off-road hiking” is even a thing, but let’s pretend it is.

After La Paz, we took a relatively pleasant bus ride to Copacabana. The name makes the town sound a lot more exciting than it is—really, the reason you come to Copacabana is to visit the islands of Lake Titicaca.

Lake Titicaca is the highest navigable lake in the world at over 12,000 feet above sea level. The lake straddles the border between Bolivia and Peru, making it a convenient spot to visit as we continued our journey northward.

The most popular island on the lake, at least from Copacabana and the Bolivian side, is Isla del Sol. According to Inca legend, the sun was created at Isla del Sol—hence its name, “Island of the Sun.” Today, many Incan ruins still exist on the island, including sacrificial tables and temples.

You can also find the Rock of the Puma, a pilgrimage site for the Incas and which our guide described as having lots of mystical energy. It is so-called because it looks like a puma … if you use a bit of your imagination. (I think the profile of the puma’s face is right in the middle of the rock, at the top.)

The ruins were definitely fun to explore, especially the buildings, because there were relatively so few tourists here.

And even without any Incan ruins, the island had a ton of natural wonder. Beautifully cut bays, quickly rising hills, and lush, fertile fields.

But back to the off-road hiking. We spent one day hiking the full length of the island and back (approximately three hours one-way). We started on the north end, where we were staying, and planned to explore the ruins and have lunch on the south end before coming back home before sunset. There are no roads or vehicles on the island, so the only option was the hiking trail, which had no lights.

Of course, our timing was flawed, largely due the potent mix of how slow a hiker I am combined with the altitude—which just makes everything harder. Walking up a flight of stairs will make you out of breath. So basically, we took several rests throughout our hike (and a very leisurely lunch), resulting in it being sunset and us still almost two hours away from our hotel.

At first it was fine—although the sun had set, there was still enough residual light to show us our path. But as the minutes passed, it got progressively darker and darker. Our path became unclear—we knew the general direction we should go, but could not see any clear path toward it. Eventually, we saw something that seemed to be the right turn, so with no other good options we took it. But the path we thought was there quickly disintegrated into just walking down rocky slopes and fields (and all this in the dark, without even any moonlight—but we did have iPhone light!)

Luckily, we both kept our cool and just followed a little creek down the hillside for the good part of an hour. (I don’t know if I read it in a novel or something, but it seemed like a good idea to follow water.) After probably stepping in tons of llama turds, we saw houselights and emerged on a real path!

Once we were back, the owner of our hostel ran out to meet us and said that he had been worried about where we went. We were like, yeah us too! But luckily we made it back safely and just collapsed into bed for a good night’s sleep.

Travel Notes

• There are several buses each day that leave from the Cemetery neighborhood in La Paz to Copacabana. It should be fine to buy tickets day of, and the trip lasts about 3-4 hours.
• Don’t expect much from Copacabana, but we found it to be a nice place to relax and watch Netflix for an afternoon. There is also a craft beer bar called Nemo’s on the main restaurant drag in town.
• From Copacabana, you can take a boat to Isla del Sol. Boats leave at 8:30 AM and 1:30 PM, and these tickets are also easy to buy shortly before you leave. Be sure to clarify if you are going to the north or south end of the island, since many boats only go to one or the other.
• There are a few hostels that you can find online to reserve ahead of time, but there are many more on the island that you can probably just book once you get there. Expect to pay more for lodging than you would pay in most other places in Bolivia. (Though you can also camp on the beach, if that’s your style.)
• You can hire a local guide to show you around the main ruins (at least on the north end of the island).
• It gets cold at night, so pack some layers!
• There are no paved roads on Isla del Sol, and therefore no vehicles or streetlights. It gets very dark at night, which makes it difficult to hike but also results in great stargazing!