Arequipa to Puno, Peru 18 - 19 Jan 2006

Save the Yavari steamer!

Afterwards, we asked our boatman to drop us off at the Yavari steamship. This is one of the old 19th century steamships that were built in England of iron parts and shipped around Cape Horn to Arica (now Chilean). The parts were then moved by train to Tacna, before being hauled by mule over the Andes to Puno – an undertaking that took six years. The Yavari was assembled in Puno and was finally launched in 1870. It had a coal-powered steam engine but, due to a shortage of coal, they used dried llama dung instead! After many years of service the ship was decommissioned by the Peruvian Navy and the hull was left to rust on the lakeshore. But, in 1982, Englishwoman Meriel Larken visited the forgotten boat and decided it was a piece of history that should be saved. She formed the Yavari Project to buy and restore the vessel and found the perfect captain in the enthusiastic Carlos Saavedra, formerly of the Peruvian Navy. Interestingly for us, Meriel Larken is a relative of Peggy Larken who is a friend of my mother. We received an email from my brother Richard to tell us this just in time – in fact we only read it on our arrival in Puno.
We met Carlos, the captain, who was busy finalizing the restoration work on the deck. He told us that the Yavari is practically ready to sail now, but they would like to install some cabins so it can be used to transport tourists across the lake.
When I visited Lake Titicaca 28 years ago, at least one of the old steamships was still in service and I had the pleasure of sailing across the lake to Bolivia in it. My memory of it is rather vague but I do remember using the old Sheffield knives with bone handles. I asked Carlos which boat would still have been in service at that time, and he thought it might have been the Inca.