OUT OF OUR COMFORT ZONE IN VENEZUELA

The border crossing out of Brazil & into Venezuela took much longer than anticipated. Usually when we exit a country we merely hand in the temporary import vehicle licence and get our passports stamped. This time Brazil decided they needed to produce a whole new lot of paperwork, requiring lots of copies! Crazy, but who can argue with Aduana. This took ages. So instead of waiting in the queue in No Man’s Land for diesel we went straight to do our Venezuelan paperwork. They certainly looked the part, but were equally slow. It was nearly dark when we were finished, not the best way to enter a new country. So instead of a lovely campspot near a waterfall, we had to park in a hotel carpark. We woke early and headed off, deciding not to fill up with diesel here as the queues are huge (we had also heard that foreigners cannot buy fuel here)- naturally we were fairly low, as who would buy fuel in Brazil when it is so cheap here!

The first thing we notice is the magnificent tarseal road, then the glorious scenery of the Gran Sabana with Mt Roraima in the distance. Wow, wow, wow! Then of course many waterfalls - most a short walk off the main road. At our first army/police checkpoint (and there are many) we ask where the next diesel is. About 25km on. Phew, we are getting low so we should just make it. Only there is no diesel, only petrol. Oh no. Another 50km to the next diesel, so we carry on, crossing our fingers and hoping for the best. Oh no!! The fuel is inside an army complex and most certainly not for us. We have another 50km to get to diesel. Fortunately most of these kms are down a windy road through some magnificent forest. Sadly we don’t really appreciate the beauty of the place, as John coasts as much as he can to save fuel. We have never been so glad to see such a grubby little town. There are long queues, but these are for petrol. Before you know it John has managed to change some money for the local stuff and we get some sorely needed diesel. They will only give us 50litres, but it is free. We will need to find more soon. The next station gives us 200litres, again at no cost. It has been a huge day. We are relieved to find a nice quite spot off the road & have a BBQ for dinner.

After a long drive we finally reach Cuidad Bolivar. We see another petrol station and get another 100 litres for the tiny cost of $1. Our GPS map is pretty useless so we enter coordinates for Posada La Casita & hope for the best. We are getting closer when a 4x4 sees us & beckons us to follow. He leads us there….it would have been rather hard to find. We are here to arrange a trip to Angel Falls, the worlds highest waterfall. We can do a fly in on a 1 day trip, or longboat in & walk on a 3 day trip. John suggests maybe we should “get out of our comfort zone” and do 3 days. So the next day we are off.

We fly out in a little Cessna. We are the only 2 passengers; the rest of the space is packed full with boxes, one of which is leaking onto my seat. These we drop off at a little gold mining village. Finally on to Canaima where we see some magnificent falls as we circle & land. We are picked up by our “very dynamic” (NOT) guide Tony and taken to our very basic accommodation, and given instructions for the day. We are the only tourists there! After lunch, exploring & generally filling in time we get taken by long boat to walk behind the waterfalls. It certainly is magical – and we have it all to ourselves (if you forget about Tony). Afterwards we stay on the beach & discover a much nicer hotel with bar & restaurant overlooking the magical view. We stay there till dark, then head back to our more modest quarters for dinner. Actually the meals are pretty good. The next day we are due to boat up the river. But there is a problem! As there are only 2 of us they want us to wait another day! No way! Finally at 11am, when another group of 3 have arrived, they take us to our long boat. And by 11.30 we leave. YAY!! The other bonus is that Tony has been replaced by Daniel…a much more enthusiastic18 year old.

We are here at the beginning of the dry season so the water is getting lower. That of course means that we have to go up countless rapids. But before I get into that story I need to tell you about the gun. We are only an hr into the trip when our boat driver decides he needs his gun. Why the heck he didn’t load it at the beginning who knows! So we are all offloaded onto some rocks & told to have our lunch. An hr & a half later he returns with the gun, and again we set off.  Every time we get to some rapids the driver has to judge the best spot to cross with his helper & our guide paddling for all they are worth. If we don’t make it the 2 guys hop out of the boat & push. At times John & the other male passenger jump out to help too. Then of course they have to leap back in as we start moving. Every now & then we stop to change propellers, spark plugs or just top up with fuel. It is a very long trip – the scenery is staggering. But it is getting late. Then we stop again….they have spied some caprybaras and haul out the gun. Fortunately they miss, but by now it is  dark. The next hour is pretty scary as we maneuver rapids and huge rocks in the dark, still at full speed. Just to add to the fun it rains.

When we finally arrive the 2 ladies and I hug & scream with relief. Up to our hammock camp in the bush. The rain continues, so we don’t venture out of camp. Dinner & an early night.

Daniel wants us to get up at 4am to walk to the falls lookout before breakfast in the dark. He has a mutiny on hand. We agree on 5am. The next morning is an early start. The walk is pretty strenuous with rocks, roots and all sorts of obstacles. It would have been awful in the dark. We are rewarded by a magic view at the top. It was pretty awesome having only 6 of us up there. Some days there are up to 150 people at the camp. A quicker trip down & finally breakfast (that was really out of my comfort zone – I had to resort to crackers on the walk up!)

Before 9am we are back in our boat & motoring down the river. It is oh so much easier going this way & the scenery looks even more amazing. I truly think the ride is better than the falls. We see 6 very full boatloads, each with 10 or 12 tourists heading up, so we were truly blessed to have so few people on our trip. After a quick lunch we are back to the airport & flying home. We are really pleased to be back with GR2 and back in our comfort zone.  

Coming soon: beaches & snorkeling….we hope

BORDERS & BARGES - PHOTOS

Our friendly Brazilian hosts

Loading onto the barge - at the sandy beach at Opaique

GR2 at the rocket launch - French Guyana

One of the lovely old houses in French Guyana

The largest wooden church in the world in Surinam

Colonial dutch style in Surinam

We are pleased to see this sign

Zeelandia Fort

Local cars in British Guyana

Water everywhere

Pontoon bridge in Guyana

Tallest wooden church in world in Georgetown

Chaos at the markets - Georgetown

The streets of Georgtown - not really my kinda place!!

Just out of Letham - we later heard that there had been a huge strike here mid October - the road was closed for a few weeks with factories & trucks burnt - people got shot!!!

Police entry to the only road through to Brazil

The jungle meets the road

Crossing the Essquino River

One of the many wooden bridges

BORDERS & BARGES

 

Our weekend at Rio Grande just outside of Oiapoque ended up being very enjoyable. Our host family looked after us and I think they were sad to see us leave. But the barge was beckoning. First we had to finish checking out of Brazil. We had to get some more paperwork for the ferry captain to take to French Guyana. As a result we were late for our ferry. Fortunately there were now 3 other vehicles also crossing and one hadn’t arrived yet. Phew! And as a bonus the price was reduced from $125 to $80.  Our ride was about 45min, going under the lovely new bridge that no one can use yet! Then more paper stamping for GR2 & our passports – in 2 different locations of course. We are now technically in France & everyone is speaking French & using Euros.

The road is tarseal and there is hardly any traffic, so before you know it we have reached Cayenne. We head straight to the Surinam embassy because we need to organize visas. It has already closed for the day, so we explore town before heading out to the beach for the night. We find a nice spot, but the locals think it may not be safe, so we ask at the Novotel if we can use their carpark. No sorry! Oh well we continue hunting. When we see some police I ask them. After much discussion they take us back to the Novotel to camp outside.

 

The embassy opens at 9am, giving us time to find chocolate croissants & coffee (remember we are in France). John is hoping to sweet talk the lady at the embassy into getting our visas in 1 day. Not a hope there!!! She won’t even accept our photos. We have to get more done – very grim ones with no smiles! She is much happier with these & takes our 80Euros. Tomorrow we can collect our passports.

During this time we have been trying to book into a tour of the Guyanese Space Station, but have not been able to navigate the French website. So we head back to the info office. We ring from there. No we cannot get a tour – all tours are cancelled this week because there is a launch on Friday. I decide I would really like to wait & watch the launch at 11pm. Tonight we head into a national park for the night returning to collect our visas the next morning. Time to head to Koura to see the Space Centre.

We wile away a few hours at the beach, then head to the Space Centre. The museum is excellent –in French & English and bonus, bonus – it’s free. We still have to fill in 2 more days, and there really is nothing else to do. So I decide NO let’s carry on – we have a lot of bad road to cover and the wet season is very close. John is relieved!

Back on the road again to yet another border. We reach the town of St Laurent do Maroni where a local policeman backs into us with minimal damage, luckily John is in a good mood. We have enough time to explore the Transportation Camp where the prisoners were brought to from France, & drive around the lovely old buildings. We want to get to the ferry early to get our paperwork done & get in line. There are only 2 ferries this afternoon. Paperwork takes all of 5 minutes and so we wait. There is a truck in front of us and the barge is very small. Once the truck is loaded there is no room for us, just 2 small cars. We wait. Eventually he returns and we have our 30min ride for the sum of $75. Another set of customs. Passports stamped, but now we have a problem. They will NOT accept our insurance and so after much arguing from John we are forced to buy some, probably useless, insurance (minimum 1 mth for $37 – the price started at $217). Finally we are let loose in Surinam.

We now have to drive on the LHS and the locals speak Dutch. There are no signs to remind us to keep left, or for that matter any signs at all, and our GPS is totally useless. We have to rely on a very basic paper map & asking locals. We head out of town. Parts of the road are brand new seal, parts are red dirt & parts are potholed. It is getting late & the countryside is like a huge marshland. Not suitable for camping at all. Eventually we pull over near a police checkpoint and stop for the night. There is lightening & some very heavy rain. The wet season has arrived. We need to keep moving. We have heard that the road from Guyana to Boa Vista in Brazil is bad.

The next day we reach Paramaribo during morning rush hour. There is no parking so we find the Info office. They suggest a few spots, so we park & set off to explore. There are gorgeous old black & white wooden buildings from the Dutch era. By midday we are hot & pooped, so we decide to find the Isuzu dealer in town. What a pleasure to finally find Fernandes Motors. They have the parts we need and will fit them. We only have to pay for the parts, they will fit them for free in the evening, so John and 2 mechanics set to work, not finishing until nearly midnight. It is the night of the rocket launch, so I stand outside looking…nothing! Oh well. We head off to camp beside Fort Zeelandia, and return the next morning to do a newspaper & TV interview. Fernandes Mtrs are hoping for a bit of free advertising. Sadly it is not to be, the interview is edited heavily. We watch it on the national TV at a local bar that night and instantly become heroes even signing their wall of fame. The next day after exploring the fort we head out of town.

During our time in town we have been trying to get our email address back up & running. Bigpond closed it down!!! After over an hour on the phone, and speaking to 7 different people, our phone cut out. All of our $50 credit was used up. Back to square one. Thank goodness for Stacey. She rung Bigpond for us and spent another hour on the phone, speaking to 8 different people. Finally we have emails again, although a weeks worth have completely vanished.

Out of town there are lots of waterways, canals, dykes & masses of rice growing. Finally we find our next border ferry. There is one crossing tomorrow morning so we camp on the terminal overnight to make sure we get on. By the time the gates open at 9am there are queues of people & cars. We think we have saved the correct amount of local currency, but when they see us the price goes up. We simply have no more money and they don’t take credit cards. Stalemate! Many of the passengers are on our side and complain to the authorities on our behalf. Eventually they accept all the money we have (which is the list price -the locals don’t have to pay a new price!!) We board the ferry & cross to Guyana. There is a massive queue here so we have coffee and fill up with water while we wait.

In Guyana they speak English & also drive on the LHS of the road. We drive on to Georgetown passing village after village with quaint names such as: Good Faith, Now or Never, Experiment, Content, Fellowship, Profit, Rebecca’s Lust etc etc. The land is flat and wet. Everywhere there is rice, sugar cane & coconuts growing.

At Georgetown we park at a hotel before heading off to explore. It is busy, dirty, scruffy city, but has some lovely old wooden buildings from British colonial times. It doesn’t look as if there are any British people left. We would be the only 2 whites around. Next morning we wake up surrounded by puddles of water… time to move on to the dirt road to Brazil. Again there are no signs, so we often have to stop to check we are on track to Letham. We eventually reach Linden where the tarseal ends, then it is 80km of potholes before we hit the red dirt. Finally we reach the jungle. Here there are 3 police checkpoints, 2 tolls, many wooden bridges and 1 ferry across the Essequibo River. At the first police checkpoint they tell us we have to buy ferry tickets back in Georgetown. No way are we going back. Fortunately we can buy them just before the ferry (we think it was the guy’s cash money as we got no receipt! At least we got across) We are amazed how much traffic is on this road/track. There are heaps of little bus/vans full of people, old Bedford army trucks who take over all the road & 4x4s. If the road was any wetter it would become virtually impassable. It is the only road out of Guyana to Brazil!

On the plus side the jungle is amazing. We stop for a swim in the Essequibo River….although when John reminds me of the piranhas I exit pretty quickly. We also stop to walk a treetop walkway which isn’t very exciting. Finally we reach the end of the jungle and drive through the savannah, passing many Amerindian villages. Finally we get to the border and cross back into Brazil. Then it is not long before we are at our next border….Venezuela.

Coming soon: Angel Falls.

 

 

AMAZONAS - PHOTOS

An old tiled building in Sao Luis

The lovely old church - nearly in ruins at Alacantra - note the whipping post in front. Here the slaves were whipped!

The very rare ibis - pity about the photo

Shower time on the barge - truckie style

Watching the river views

A barge load of timber

One of the many tiny native villages on the river

Children out in their canoes - the river is their playground

Another barge full of trucks

The locals come out to meet us

More village scenery! As you can image I took lots of photos!!

We have visitors

Not sure what they are collecting - maybe the bamboo shoot thingys we bought

A lovely wooden boat being built in one of the villages

We have finally arrived - not too far from Macapa

Us at Monumento Marka Zero - second time we have driven across the equator

A great camp spot - swim included

Fantastic - a tarsealed road

Oh no!! Roadworks

Life on the riverways

We met this little fellow crossing the road. Such a funny little uncoordinated thing

Who can resist such an adorable little face like this - our first sloth

We crossed 32 of these bridges. There is an old one on the other side, and an even older one this side - in the water

The red dirt road - no rain! We are told that in the wet it gets closed quite frequently

At the end of the road a bridge to French Guyana - it has been finished for a year but is still not open! Crazy crazy place!!

AMAZONAS

Our next port of call is Sao Luis, a huge city of over 1 million people sitting a massive bay. We arrive bright and early on Sunday morning. The old town is deserted and looks like it is crumbling away. Probably better to see it busy, but at the moment it looks like a dump with some pretty Portuguese tiles on some of the buildings. The only busy place is the lovely Cathedral which is filling up with people for the morning service.  We don’t stay long. There is a ferry across the bay to another old tiled town – Alcantara. It is much prettier, but goodness knows where all the people are hiding on Sundays. We overnight beside a pousada down near the mangroves, even using their Wi-Fi. The next morning we are up bright & early walking on the beach and mudflats, when we catch a glimpse of the extremely rare Scarlet Ibis/Gurana. By the time we get the tripod set up they have flown away. Again we use Wi-Fi until it drops out completely. No more internet & no more Ibis…The other reason we have stopped here is to see if we can look at Brazil’s Space Station. We drive to the entrance, but the guys with the big guns say no way so we move on back to the main road north on our long haul to Belem a  city of about 2 million sitting near the mouth of the Amazon River.

We decide to head right into the city to the info centre to find out about barges to Macapa on the other side of the Amazon Delta. Our GPS isn’t a lot of use as the map cuts out in the middle of Belem!! So we are following signs. Nearly into town we see a port area. I go to investigate. The very helpful guard googles info about barges/balsas and rings an agent, who comes to the port. Before you know it we are booked onto a balsa departing the next day (Wednesday) at 6pm and arriving in Macapa nearly 500 kms away on Friday at 10am. Enough time to get an oil change done and tyres regrooved. We even camp for the night inside the Silnave shipping compound. A nice secure spot with 2 guards, 6 dogs & a high fence. Even a waterfront view and Wi-Fi when the office opens.

We have been promised a spot at the front of the balsa, but at loading time they want us practically right in the middle of all the trucks. John has a verbal encounter with the guard (my hero) and we get back off the balsa until the rest are loaded, leaving us at the front. The balsa is very full- with 7 trucks across – a total of 28. We leave on sunset & sit on our deck chairs watching the water and trying to chat to the truckies, except we are the only ones who speak English. Our biggest worry is the trucks beside us running their generators full bore. Fortunately they turn them off at 10pm and back on at 6am.

By the morning we have reached the islands where we weave through a maze of rivers. It is great to just sit and watch the very basic villages & river traffic glide by. We are surprised at the number of children who paddle out to our barge in their tiny canoes.  Others even tie up to the moving barge & come aboard to sell their prawns or produce. The truckies throw them packets of crackers. We even get fed surprisingly good meals of beans/meat/rice/noodles/fresh fruit. When we wake the next morning we are in the Rio Amazona proper. It looks like a massive brown lake. As we cross we can see Macapa & think we are arriving early. But no we continue up another river, and then have to wait for the tide to come in more before we can disembark. What an adventure!

A quick explore of Macapa’s fort & Monumento Do Marco Zero on the equator (GPS reading N 0000000) and we start heading to the border of French Guiana. We have heard a lot of scary stuff about this road & John is very concerned that if it rains it will turn into a quagmire and become impassable. There is a long stretch of nearly new tarseal, then roadworks. No signs, no directions, we have to navigate through the actual roadworks. There is very little other traffic. Then onto the red dirt road. (Fortunately dry) through some gorgeous Amazonian forest, passing heaps of Indigenous villages.

Our highlight for the day was seeing a sloth crossing the road. What a very cute, clumsy little animal. We were very tempted to pick him up, but he had some very long claws. His fur was incredibly soft. What a privilege.

After 100km of red dirt road & 32 rickety wooden bridges we reach tarseal again. At this point it chooses to rain – heavy rain. What great timing. Only 50km to Oipaque – a very scruffy border town. There are signs pointing to Francesca – we follow these to a huge bridge. They are working on the access road & it looks usable. In fact a guy in Belem told us it had just opened. But there are no border controls here and we need to check out of Brazil. So we proceed back to town to find the police. Eventually our passports are stamped, but we have to go to the other police to hand in GR2’s paperwork. We are told that the bridge is definitely NOT open. On our way we see a petrol station & decide to fill up (who can resist getting cheaper fuel), so by the time we find the police they are closed. Bummer. Perhaps we should wing it. So we go to find the balsa. We find the balsa….but it is now about 5pm on Saturday & he doesn’t want to do it so late. Then of course on Sunday they are closed. Who thought it would be so hard to get out of a country! We now have 2 nights in this God forsaken hole! We remember a swimming pool place on the river out of town. So we spend 2 nights there……it really is hard filling in time. Do housework, this blog (but there is no Wi-Fi – better in the next country). The local family adopt us & take us to town and out to dinner at a Pizza restaurant (most appreciated).

We have made a tongue in cheek list of things we will remember about our time in Brazil in descending order:

4/ The Love Motels outside every town that charge by 1 or 2 hours.

3/ The snooker tables in every little bar in every town.

2/ The hundreds of massive boom boxes in restaurants, on cars, even on motorbikes & push bikes. All going full bore of course.

1/ Top of the list. The many millions of speed bumps that bring all the traffic through towns to nearly a standstill and cause numerous nose to tails.

Tomorrow: French Guyana. We hope!!

 

OVER AMBITIOUS - PHOTOS

Loggerhead turtle at Praia do Forte

Squatter accommodation beside the cane fields

Inside the lovely church at Penedon

The locals are out in force on the holiday

More local suburbs - steps all the way - no cars

The pretty town of Olinda - Recife in the distance

The red cliffs at Canoa Quebrada

John helping to launch a boat

The lovely beach  we camped at

Being led in by a tour guide

Boom boxes going full bore

Which way do we go

On the dunes

Stuck!!!!

Help is at hand!!! YAY!!