Isla Taquile (Mulsina Pata)

July 14, 2022

4074m

Lake Titicaca, Perú

Isla Taquile is one of the two popular islands in Lake Titicaca accessed via boats from Puno. This one isn’t as big as Isla Amantaní and most visits take only one day. The high point of this island is named “Mulsina Pata” according to some references but I haven’t seen this name being commonly used. Nonetheless the high point rises over 200 m above the lake’s surface so it’s a legitimate summit. This was the second day of the 2-day tour in Lake Titicaca and earlier in the tour we had visited Islas Uros, Isla Amantaní and on Amantaní island we also hiked two small peaks.

A traverse of Isla Taquile with ascent to Mulsina Pata

The lake was quite choppy in the morning of the second day but the boat driver was experienced enough to get us from Amantaní to Taquile. I wasn’t sure the exact plan but then I learnt that the plan was not to hike to the top of this island. I told the director that I needed to go there regardless and he said it’s fine. We hiked up from the east side of the island to a major square or something like that in the middle where the director gave me 30 minutes to complete my quest for the summit. Lily and Sophia also went ahead to join. It turned out that we really had to rush the ascent and the descent but we did make back in time. They also didn’t leave until at least 20 minutes later so in retrospect we didn’t really have to rush that much. We even had time to join the dance in that square…

Heading towards Isla Taquile in the distance in the choppy waves

Despite the choppy ride Sophia was still having some fun time

Onto the island we ascended from the east side

Lily and Sophia plodding past the masses, following me towards the top

Isla Amantaní from the summit of Isla Taquile

Lily and Sophia approaching the island’s high point

Sophia walking into the summit square thing

Me on Mulsina Pata, the summit of Isla Taquile

After a brief celebration we must rush our way down

We descended as fast as we humanly could do…

Sophia back at the square and they were still dancing

We even earned some time to join the dance

We then walked across the middle part of the island and descended a very steep trail down to the west side where the boat was waiting. This trip turned out to be a traverse of this island and that was very cool. On the ride back to Puno we stopped at Luquina for lunch (at least 1.5 hours of stop) and another hour later we were back to Puno.