Just six hours of sleep separated our Macchu Picchu outing from a bus ride out of Cusco to Puno, Peru. We are entering the top of the Altiplano, the "high plain", the widest part of the Andes and the second highest plain in the world, outside of Tibet. On average, it's over 12,000 feet above sea level and spans Peru, Bolivia, Chile and Argentina. Rain from the eastern and western Andes collects in the plain, and with no outlet, feeds lake Titicaca in the north and evaporates to leave behind the large salt flats of Uyuni in the south. We are on our way to see both, we'll be spending close to a week traversing the Altiplano.
