Travelling 101; #9: Change

Another one to baffle first time travellers is the inability of shop owners to provide change to customers.
Now, I'm not talking about paying for a pack of chewing gum with a 100 dollar note, i'm talking purchasing products totalling 4 spondulux and handing over a 10 spondulux note. The look of pure fear that passes over a shopkeep's face is a delight. They will first ask you if you have nothing smaller, you reply "no". They will then look even more worried and start to fluster, perhaps rooting in a drawer underneath the counter. They will then check their pockets, shout into the backroom where granny is watching the TV and perhaps shout at a friend on the street. Eventually after a massive combined effort and perhaps a 10 minute wait (when all you wanted was a bottle of water) you will receive your correct change. Actually sometimes you will not be allowed purchase a product due to lack of correct funds. In Ecuador I once tried to buy a bar of chocolate in a supermarket (no less) with a 10 dollar note. She had no change and wasn't budging, so I left the supermarket sans chocolate.

On a mildly related note mathematical ability is quite lacking in most of latin america. You buy an apple for 2.5 thingemebobs and a pear for 1.5 thingemebobs and the shopkeep will normally get the calculator out. Any more than 2 items and it is for certain. You then hand over a 10 thingemebob note and the calculator is once more called for to work out the correct change.

One boat ticket vendor in Brazil was also a shooting star in the maths realm. Although all the man sold on a day to day basis was a single boat ticket to the value of 170 reals he would still have to break out the calculator for more than one ticket. I mean honestly could he not have learned his 170 times tables?? Worse still is when the people in front of me ordered 4 tickets. He typed in 170 + 170 = + 170 = + 170 =... I nearly rammed the calculator down his throat. Maybe his multiply key was broken...

And GOD help you if you decide to aid a shopkeeper by providing them with an amount which will ensure a single note of change. If the bill comes to 6 whatchamacallits and you hand them a 10 whatchamacallit note and a 1 whatchamacallit coin they will look at you like you have 42 heads and have just eaten their new born grandchild. I once had a girl in Colombia almost in tears by doing such a nasty thing. Once her lip started to quiver I had to tell her it was OK and to just give me 5000 pesos.

Jericoacoara

Getting to Jericoacoara (or just simply "Jeri" as all the cool kids call it) proved to be one last slog. The final part of the journey being in a open sided truck with benches on it. We made our way down dusty tracks, which decreased in width until we were eventually driving along the beach. It was like sitting on a washing machine and I lost count the number of times I bashed my head off the roof while suspended in mid air. Just as sunset was kicking in we rounded a corner and Jeri appeared oasis like before us. I'd heard lots of good things about the place and they all proved to be true minutes after clambering out of the truck. There were no real streets, just paths covered in sand. Horses roamed the main "street" which was littered with restaurants, bars and little Caipirinha stands which sold cachaca or vodka mixed with every imaginable fruit. Just out of the truck I was approached by a tout offering a place to stay in a pousada. Being tired and easy going I just said "sure" and followed him. This proved to be an extremely wise decision as the tout in question was called Itamar and from what I have seen and heard since, owns the best pousada in Jeri. A small house with a big communal dinner table, 2 comfy sofas, loads of board games, a big TV with lots of DVDs and hammocks were liberally sprinkled everywhere to ensure you didn't have to walk too far before falling into one.

I stayed 10 days with Itamar and various Slovenians, Estonians, Canadians, Italians, Germans & Americans and must say that it was definitely the most relaxing time since perhaps the Little Corn Islands. My days consisted of getting up late, having some coffee (made by Itamar), retiring to my hammock for a read and a snooze, down to the beach, sunset from atop the massive sand dune, followed by dinner (also normally made by Itamar or one of his friends) and Cocktails (once again served up by Itamar before we hit the town. His favourite being cachaca, pineapple and mint).

So as not to atrophy I decided to learn to Kitesurf. With my Slovenian sidekick we persuaded Cale, a chilled Canadian to show us the ropes. So for 3 days we sat in a lagoon and let ourselves be dragged around by a 7 meter square kite which would fly around the place like a banshee due to the extremely high winds found in Jeri from August to January. In all other "extreme" sports (I hate that expression, but let's face it there is an inherent difference between badminton and snowboarding) you can drop the method of propulsion (windsurfing, wakeboarding) or just fall over (snowboarding, mountain biking, surfing), but in Kitesurfing you are actually physically attached to the kite and letting go won't do too much good (depending on the kite). Controlling the kite is easy enough - pull the bar right, kite goes right. The only tricky part is if you turn right and the kite goes from being on your left side to your right side, you will effectively be putting the kite in the full force of the wind for a couple of seconds. This lead to hillarious (for the bystander) and decidely painful consequences as Slovenian and I did 3 meter backflips in the air as the kite yanked us out of the water and tossed us into the air. After 3 days of battering and brusing we finally managed to get the hang of it and I was up on the board for at least half a second. This is not a sport for instant successes.

But after all this excitement and relaxation it was time for something else, so one afternoon slightly bored I booked a flight to Rio for the next day. Nothing like improvising.

Travel madness: Cayenne - St George - Oiapoque - Macapa

The trip from Cayenne to St. George on the border with Brazil was quick, or at least seemed to be as I spent most of it asleep, banging my head against the window of the Hiace like a death metal fan. I arrived with a headache and jumped in another canoe to get the hell of dodge. Across the river I landed in Oiapoque and was extremely happy to be back in Brazil, even if being able to communicate more or less fluently was one of the highlights of the Guianas.

Oiapoque is a typical border town - dusty, dishevelled and a bit seedy, but I managed to get a bus ticket for 6pm that night, meaning that it would be yet another night without a bed. After a fantastic lunch at a by-the-kilo restaurant (oh how I love these places) I settled in for an afternoon nap before taking the night bus to Macapa.

The bus arrived right on time (quite a change from the Guianas) and we set off down the unpaved road to Macapa, which meant that for most of the trip we were all hopping up and down like kids in a bouncy castle. I managed to get a couple of minutes sleep here & there and we arrived into Macapa just before 4am. A motorcycle taxi took me to a hotel, which I was never so happy to see. Finally a shower and a bed, but my delight was soon to be dispelled by the night porter telling me it was full. He was kind enough to recommend another place so I hiked through the deserted streets of Macapa before finally being successful and checking in to the Hollyday Inn (sic). I showered, shaved and delighted at the creamy airconditioned goodness of it all. But my 10 second revellery was soon interrupted by the arms of morpheus.

The next day I rambled around Macapa, which has 2 exiting things. A fort and a football stadium where the equator forms the halfway line. So the games there are like the northern hemisphere against the southern. Macapa has also no roads anywhere, well except back to Oiapoque which was not high on my list of priorities. In fact the only route out was a 24 hr boat ride to Belem. At this stage long rides are non negotiable, so I got myself a flight to Fortaleza, with the intention of learning to Kitesurf and getting some serious beach time in Jericoacoara...

Cayenne: Just one of those days

Departing from Parbo I had no inkling that this day would be slightly different. The taxi journey to the river forming the border between Suriname and French Guyana went swimmingly, taking only 2 hours in a comfy Japanese import. The driver was obviously so chuffed with his new acquistion that he was trying all the buttons out. He even had the a/c on full blast even though all the windows were open.

Stamp out of Suriname, hop in a waiting canoe and over we go to French Guyana. My first footstep on dry land is accompanied by a little whoop, as now I have been to every country in the continental Americas. So it is Bonjour St. Laurence and another hike to the gendarme. The first impression of F.G. was amusing - posh new cars on dirt roads, black natives speaking accented French and a can of coke costing 2 Euros... Yes, we were back in Europe with prices to match. The police didn't endear themselves to me either, their first words being "Aha, oho, baguette, biciclette, fawfefawfe [insert supercilious French accent here], from le Irlande! We beat you in football!". The chap that said it had as much in common with France as I have with Germany. Another hot hike back to town and I find the bus stop after much asking around town. The natives all seem to have cars and public transport seems to be more or less non existent. The shared hiace already had 4 passengers waiting - 2 Brazilians, a chap from Haiti and a woman from Guyana. Obviously all us lowly foreigners were the only ones having to resort to busses. We still needed 2 people for the driver to set off, so we all lounged about the sweltering bus stop trying to get comfy on round park benches, something which proved rather impossible.

Some time later (time is now irrelevant) 2 dudes show up and we set off seconds later at 400 miles an hour. My plan was to fly out of Cayenne that evening or at latest the next day, so I needed to be in Cayenne early enough to catch a travel agency still open. But with only 200km to go and the sun still shining brightly over head, it seemed it would be no problem. F.G. rolled by, the roads being up the standards of mainland France.

We eventually arrive into Cayenne a couple of minutes before 6. So I jog to main travel agency to find they already have the shutters down. It is 6.01. Oh my fucking god, they are worse than the Germans for time keeping. Try another agency, closed since 5.30. In my short time in Cayenne I come to discover that F.G. has the shortest opening hours known to mankind. It is a wonder they even open at all. They have adopted the South American siesta but have retained old world early closing times. Typical opening hours were something like 8-11.30 and 15.00-17.30. The country is already starting to annoy me. Also in part due to the fact that in the 5 hours I have been in the country all I have done is hydrated, had a schwarma, treated myself to an ice cream, taken a bus and I am already 60 Euros lighter.

So, plan B is to look for a hotel. The first recommendation I have (45 EUR, nearly twice as expensive as the most expensive place I have stayed in the last 8 months) is a bit of a walk out of town. Arrive very sweaty and tired only to find "Complet" written on the door. That is "full" for all you Francophobes. Second recommendation (60 EUR, ouch) is basically where I started out from, so hike all the way back to the town centre. Ask for a "chambre" and the chap actually laughs at me... Was it my bad French? No, it was the fact that his place was also full and he thought finding a room in Cayenne tonight would be "pratiquement impossible" (I'll leave the translation as an exercise for the reader). Damn you I thought and stormed out. Actually I didn't so much storm as trickle out the door in a river of sweat.

OK, nothing for it, I have seen a Best Western and fuck it, I'll treat myself (I never thought I'd utter the words "treat" and "Best Western" in the same sentence but they say travel changes you). Stroll in proudly like I own the place, HSBC credit card in hand. I look at the rates - 90 bloody Euros?? Oh well, I am knackered, sweaty, smell like a yak and need a bed. I ask the receptionist for a room and he too laughs at me. "Full, right?" I ask. "Oui, Oui, the whole town is full because of a biomechanics conference.". I don't actually know what biomechanics is, but I suddenly hate anyone involved with it.

Never a man to be disheartened I look around for more hotels. Rien, nada, zilch. The entire capital citytown of Cayenne has 4 hotels. What a bag of shite. The airport has about 3 flights a day, so no point heading out. There is no long distance bus terminal, so that's a no-no too. Gradually it dawns on me that there are two possiblities - a) find a nice local girl, who despite my unshaven, unwashed appearance will want to take me home or b) find a comfy park bench. Decide that the chances of option A happening are so slim that I might as well go for the bench. Nothing to do with my charm mind, it was just that there was one bar in town and it had 4 people in it. All men.

It is now 7pm. The first bus out of town is at 7am.
T-12: First two hours are pleasant enough, spent in an air conditioned internet cafe. My T-shirt gradually dries out as I write some emails and read the news (Come on America, is Obama bowing to the Japanese Emperor really such a deal? It's called statesmanship and doesn't mean that you don't rule the world any more...).

T-10: Dinner time. Seen as how I am saving on accomodation I plump for a nice pizza joint, where pizza is "only" 12 Euros. A price that would buy you the pizzeria in Peru. The pizza was good though and the lady serving it was quite an eye opener. Her dress seemed to consist of purple crepe paper that just about reached her upper thighs, exposed her rather ample clevage and left her back completely open down to what seemed like her coccyx. Added to that she was mounted on high heels which made her look about 6ft4. I ordered one too many Kronembourg just for the pleasure of watching her teeter over to me. I think the French proprietor was aware of her effect on the male clientele as he sat with a vague grin on his face behind the bar. I throw in a [rather fantastic] coffee for good measure and am out on the streets again by 10pm.

T-9: The town ain't really offering much, so I head to another internet cafe to see if the world has changed in the last hour. I ask the Chinese staff what time they close - "10pm" is their answer. The clock reads 10.15. We are at a standoff. A chap finally intervenes and asks me how much time I need. "30mins" I reply. OK. So I hop on a computer and find out that the world hasn't changed. So instead I start randomly going through youtube finding various nuggets. The 30 mins is soon up and the place is still full. I ask for another 30mins, no problem, and carry on digging through the dregs of the interweb. I finally leave well after 11 and the place is still packed. God bless the enterprising Chinese and their moveable opening hours.

T-7.something: Booze time. The only bar in town has now got about 10 people in it, none of whom look like they would take me home for a cuddle. So I order a Heineken (I know... I'm sorry) for what it seemed would be a decent month's wages in Equador. I knock it back and order another. "Sorry, Ferme" came the answer. Wtf?? I ask "In the 2 minutes I have drank this beer you have closed". "Oui", he replied in a megasnooty way only the French can. Oh fuck off. Another reason Cayenne will not be featuring on any "Highlights of South America" lists any time soon.

T-7.a little bit: Head to the central park and look for a bench. Find one and lay on my backpack and rest my eyes. Shite. Not tired and too many crack heads asking for money. Roam around again and find two homeless chaps playing chess in front of a fast food caravan. Watch them play as they are quite good. Two games in they ask me if I want to play. So I jump in and play the reigning champion "Jazz" or "Jacque" or something. 10 minutes later I am defeated and relinquish the challenger's chair. Nothing like pissing on a multi-thousand pound education from one of the world's most reputable universities by being beaten in "the thinking man's game" by a chap with 2 teeth, no shoes and who sleeps under a sheet of cardboard. It is now 1.30am.

T-5.5: Sit in front of the Gendarme HQ hoping that I'll either get invited in to stay in a nice clean cell or at least that the ever present crack heads will leave me in peace. Neither. After 5 minutes another crack head (any lingering doubts as to this were dispelled by the massive tinfoil pipe he clutched in his hand) comes over and starts being annoying. Move on.

T-5.4: Whilst walking by the Best Western I notice a large group of people milling around outside and in the foyer. So I sneak in, drop my bag and plonk myself on the sofa looking like I belong. Apparently they are all part of a tour going to see the space centre. I busy myself with looking innocous and time progresses. All too soon a tour bus arrives and the assembled nerds head off to see the space centre. I am left on my own and the receptionist soon comes over to ask me if I am not going on the trip. I tell him that I am getting at taxi at 4. He seems happy with the answer and wanders off. I smile at my ability to lie on the spot. But at about 3.30 he comes over and says he has to close up shop (probably realising that my story doesn't quite add up... Why would I be in the foyer at 2 if my taxi is coming at 4?? Damn details). So I am turfed out once again on to the mean streets of Cayenne.

T-3.5: As I walk out I notice another gringo sitting down across the street. I saunter over and ask him if he's homeless too. He confirms this and we start chatting. Joel and myself get on famously and soon we are laughing our heads off at each others stories (one of his many stories was of getting stranded in Salvador as his bank cards were stolen and he had lost his passport (which he later found out he had posted back to the UK amongst other papers in a box)). Our conversation was briefly interrupted by another crack head, albeit a very peaceful one, who seemed to speak a dialect of Martian. It certainly contained no words of any language either of us understood. There was also a spell of excitement as 3 policemen and one very overweight policewoman ran out of the cop shop chasing a rasta who kept jumping in the air and laughing just like a stoned roadrunner. As the night seemed it could get no weirder 2 transvestites walked by and propositioned us. They couldn't quite seem to understand why we turned them down. "But there are 2 of you... And there are 2 of us!?!" was their flawed line of argumentation. We declined again and got back to our chats about life, travelling, work and women. It was nearly 6am.

T-1.1: We were both hungry so we decided we should hunt for a coffee shop. I wasn't optimistic, knowing the lousy opening hours in this poxy city, but I gave in and we started to walk. A couple of blocks later we both simultaneously decided to turn left and lo and behold there was "Cafe Creme", oasis like right before us. It was just being opened up and had a distinct smell of coffee and croissants coming from within. The lovely owner served up some magnificent coffee, some sex-in-the-form-of-a-bakery-product pan au chocolat & croissants and Joel and I toasted to our luck. Before I knew it it was 6.45 and I had to throw him some money, say my farewells and run for the bus.

Hard to believe that after 12 hours of killing time I didn't actually want to leave any more...

Not sold on Suriname

My bus from Georgetown arrived at 5am and I squeezed in beside some rather jolly (OK, fat) ladies. The road toward Suriname was paved and straight and we were at the river border in no time. All the Guyanas are in fact seperated by river: Guyana - Suriname, Suriname - French Guyana & French Guyana - Brazil. The river was only a couple of hundred meters wide, but of course no bridge, so we had to wait for the ferry of which only there was only one a day.

Across the water in Suriname things started badly. The queue for immigration was massive and there was only one man (in military fatigues) letting people through. An hour later we were out and sitting in a bus screaming its way to Paramaribo. The difference to Guyana was slight but noticiable. English became a minority language as Dutch took over, the houses were built differently and the food changed from Indian to Indonesian (Lots of Indonesians came to Suriname as it too was a former Dutch colony).

We arrived in Paramaribo, or Parbo as the locals call it around 8 and I headed for the only backpackers in town. It turned out to be full, which I think was the first time I haven't got a place in the last 8 months. Down the road there was another place and with amazing bureacracy the lady checked me in. Famished at this stage I found a Chinese restaurant. The staff were crap and everyone spoke Dutch to me. It seems like the only gringos in Suriname are Dutch, so of course all the locals automatically address you in Dutch. Even after going "Sorry", "Heh", "Excuse me" and finally "Look I don't speak fucking Dutch" they still carry on speaking Dutch to you. As if the thought of a non Dutch gringo visiting Suriname was too weird. The food was decent and the beer far too pricey, but I didn't care. My plan of staying in Suriname for a couple of days was being reassessed. IN fact so much so that I did an hour of sightseeing the next day (only vaguely touristy thing is the central market and a road where there is a synagogue, a mosque and a casino all in a row - it's meant to show how diverse and interesting Suriname is, it only proved to me that they don't have any fucking planning laws) , got pissed on, had a siesta, went out for some food, bed at 10pm and was on the next bus out at 9am the day after.

Yes, we can leave Suriname to the Dutch.

Kaieteur

Probably the biggest attraction in the Guyanas (apart from the jungles) are the Kaieteur falls. Situated in a remote part of the Guyana shield forest, the only way to get there (apart from a 5 day hike which I didn't fancy) is by light aircraft. So I booked my flight, the next plane being in 3 days, and killed some time in Georgetown. The days flew by as it is a very mellow place to chill out, have some beers and generally not do anything more stressful than enter and exit a hammock (Aside: If you are to believe Lonely Planet you will be robbed, raped, disembowled 10 minutes after arriving in town AND then you will contract malaria & dengue). And so it was on on Saturday morning that I was sitting in a tiny Cessna with some Americans and we were flying over more Brocolli towards Kaieteur.

One of my fellow passengers was a vet (Americans: Vet = veterinarian, Englanders: Vet = Veteran) in his 30s. He had been travelling for the last 3 years and now had been to over 100 countries. In fact he was probably the most travelled person I have ever met. The fecker had been all through the 'stans and also through most of Africa and the Carribean. Even in my "need to get cosy in one place for a while" state, his descriptions of Ethopia made me want to hop in a plane and go. Just before touching down in Kaieteur, the captain did a shit-your-pants scary roll and gave us a full view of the falls, which were spectacular. Not nearly as high as the Angel, they were instead extremely wide and just as impressive.

We landed and headed out on a stroll through the jungle toward the falls. Our "guide" for the day was a funny rasta who wore baggy pants, pristine white Nikes and a baseball cap perfectly tilted to 45 degrees on his head. His tour consisted of many well rehearsed stops with mini-speeches. Difficult questions were not tolerated. Thank god there were no Germans on the tour asking him how many layers of sedimentary rock had been folded under how much pressure to form the tectonic rift we were standing on.

We made our way though the thicket, spotting a couple of [extremely posionous] Golden Frogs on the way, to finally emerge and see the falls. They really are quite amazing.

We headed back to Georgetown via a hotel resort near Bartica. Quite decadent actually making a stop in a plane just for lunch. We were greeted by staff with umbrellas and shown to our delicous lunch. Back in Georgetown that night it was a couple of beers at Windies bar before hitting the sack early.

Suriname tomorrow.

Georgetown

Georgetown is a great place. The buildings are either in lovely colonial style or completely dilapadated, held together with duct tape and rosary beads. The people are extremely friendly, their English is either a sing song creole or like it was stuck in the 50s. They all seemed to be amused at my gringoness walking around town.
"How de sun be treatin ye today" was one comment from a rasta cycling by. My general whiteness seemed a neverending source of amusement to the locals.

One night a large black chap stopped me and said "I want a white dick". I was about to break into tears and offer him thousands of dollars not to hurt me when he interrupted. "I want two dicks, me black one and a white one". Flattering him I said that I was sure his black one was enough to keep the ladies happy. "Sure it is man, I just want de white one to tickle dem with". We both burst out laughing and he gave me a beer from his sixpack.
Another highlight was the turning on of the Christmas lights outside Courts supermarket. The prime minister was there, models in black leather catsuits too and to cap it all of a black Santa Claus that was gyrating his hips so lewdly and generally bumping and grinding like it was an olympic sport, that I'm sure in the USA childrens' eyes would have had to be covered by concerned parents. All he was missing was a bottle of rum in his hand.

Grooving into Guyana

The first impressions of Guyana were slightly amusing. Lots of stuffy looking black chaps in immigration, dressed as if the Brits had never left. But on the plus side the language was English. If with a slightly weird creole lilt. I was asked how long I wanted to stay. I said a week and the nice chap gave me a whole 10 days. Obviously they don't want people overstaying their welcome. Then a bored customs lady wanted to inspect my backpack. She had a quick look in and was obviously repelled by the odours eminating from within as she said ¨Thank you, that's enough¨ seconds after opening it.

In Lethem I sat around a minibus office for about an hour before being told that the bus had actually left... Did it not strike them to tell me this earlier? Or were they just reluctant to upset me after my 18 bus ride from Venezuela? I asked them were there any other busses. ¨No¨. She said I could sleep in the office, I politely declined and asked if there was a hotel in town. ¨No¨ she said. Perhaps an ATM? ¨No¨. She was a right bundle of laughs. I asked her which way the town centre was (we were sitting in a field with a couple of houses around us). She said ¨This is the town centre¨ . Guyana and me were off to a troubled start. Reassesing her office floor I finally got a ¨yes¨ when I asked if there was internet access somewhere.

I logged on and googled ¨Lethem Bus¨ and ¨Lethem hotel¨. There were indeed 2 hotels and apparently a night bus at 9. Fantastic! I nearly went back to minibus lady and blew a raspberry in her face. I found my way to the bus ¨terminal¨ at 6 only to be told that the ticket seller was closed. I riposted with ultimate logic that the bus wasn't leaving till 9, a whole 3 hours of time for me to obtain a ticket. ¨No, it's closed¨ explained the lady as if I were an imbicile. So despite the fact that the bus was probably half empty I left sans ticket and checked into the Kakuru hotel which proved quite decent.

Things started looking up even more over dinner where my hostess with the mostess kept taking the mickey out of me at every opportunity. She was laughing to herself as she told me my white face glowed in the dark. It was good clean banter and I had a couple of beers and laughed away with her. Guyana and myself were geting to know and like each other.

The next morning I managed to get my ticket and waited for the bus which turned up only an hour or so late. The journey was 12 hours long and was quite spectacular - from the pampa like plains to the south of Guyana we gradually transgressed into the deepest, darkest rainforest you have ever seen. The main ¨road¨ to Georgetown was a mud track cut right through the middle of the forest. At most the road was 4 meters wide. At one stage the bus had to get on a ferry to cross a river. Whilst we were waiting for the ferry (which was obviously in no hurry) macaws flew by and even a Toucan made an appearance. It was just like you picture a rainforest, complete with weird sounds coming from deep within the trees. We drove for at least 5 hours through the forest, which just got more and more dense. Ocassionaly we would pass by a military check point where we would all have to leave the bus, show our passports and get back on again. The whole day we passed a sum total of 6 cars and finally around 10pm we exited the jungle and soon hit a main road and were in Georgetown in jig time, where I crashed into bed in the lovely Rima Guesthouse.

Yes, Guyana and myself were definitely now getting it on.

Angel Falls

Back in Manaus late at night, I got a room in what appeared to be the Bates motel. It was also probably the only hotel I have ever been to that had a bible AND a condom beside each other on the night stand. Some kinky scenarious came to mind though... The next morning it was a 12 hour journey to Boa Vista. Another night another motel, this time with TV but no remote. But the room was so small I could operate the TV controls with my toes. The next morning I got on the internet, did my research on Venezuela, got some US Dollars and took a bus to Santa Elena, Venezuela.

The first thing that struck me as I entered Venezuela, was how run down it was - especially in comparison to Brazil. Dogs roamed the streets, the cars were all big old American jalopies and Santa Elena had a general run down feel about it. But as usual the people were friendly and I found a place to book a tour to the Angel Falls - the highest waterfalls in the world and my reason for the quick diversion into Venezuela.

Another night bus, this time with 4 military check points along the way. Nothing like being woken up by an armed po faced soldier asking for your passport at 4am to start your day. I arrived in Ciudad Bolivar bright and chirpy at 5. Luis, the tour company owner with perfect English picked me up in his bashed up car and we had a good old blether about Venezuela. I must admit I had been initially captivated by Chavez and all his bluster about standing up to Dubya Bush.

On further inspection it turns out the man is an idiot. His foreign minister is a bus driver, his "security" minister was shot by criminals, there are power outages all the time, hospitals lack security and are falling apart (apparently if a hit man doesn't kill his target the first time he can just stroll into the hospital and shoot him again while he lies in intensive care), the official exchange rate is 2.15 Bolivars to a dollar (when using an ATM), the black market rate is 5 to 1, causing unsuspecting tourists no end of misery when arriving with no cash. Not to mention he is on the verge of starting a war with Colombia. But hey, at least the price of petrol in Venezuela is cheap. Actually it is cheaper than WATER. 1 dollar to fill a tank up. No joke.

I waited around C.B. airport for a while as legions of tourists were packed into 6 seater Cessnas and flown to Canaima, the nearest airstrip to the falls. I was lucky enough to get a seat up front and really had to resist the urge to take hold of the controls in front of me. I played some flight sims as a kid, how hard can it be? The scenery below us was fantastic - the Orinoco flowed peacfully along, followed by some lakes with millions of islands and finally rainforest appeared, which looks uncannily like Broccoli from above.

Midway into the flight the fuel gauge in front of my nose started to blink. I looked at the pilot who seemed not to notice or was supremely unconcerned. The gauge read 5. A couple of minutes later it read 3. I could see where this was headed. The pilot had still not studied the dial. By the time it was at 2 I was trying to use Jedi mind tricks to force the pilot into looking at the gauge. Of course I wasn't going to actually SAY anything to him. That would have been _totally_ uncool (god forbid). So instead I watched it go down to 1 and finally 0, at which the pilot, with minimal effort, reached a hand out and switched a level. Fucker. But at least neither of us looked like a newbie.

We landed at the beautfiul Canaima lagoon and stepped out into the opressive heat. The lagoon itself is filled by 3 waterfalls which are impressive in their own right. To complete things the lagoon is fringed by the whitest sand this side of the Carribean. We took a bit of a tour of the area, which involved walking under some of the waterfalls. No gold unfortunately.

On the second day we fell out of bed early and got in a dug out canoe. It was to be a 4 hour upstream motor to the basecamp from which we would hike to the Angel Falls. The ride was nice enough, if not hard on the arse - only 2 inches of wood between my precious flesh and the river below. After about an hour it turned spectacular as the Auyantepui from which the Angel plummets, loomed out of the distance. We kept heading towards it and the tepuy got larger and larger till it was nearly a block of rock a kilometer high in front of our noses. We docked on the lovely isla raton and strolled up to our camp and put on out hiking boots for the final ascent to the falls.

Despite the Angel Falls being famous as the highest in the world, the trek up to the base is still completely undeveloped. No signs, no warnings, no railings, no asphalt path. Instead we scrambled over tree roots, swung tarzan like on vines over mini-lakes and generally swashbuckled our way till the climb started. An hour later we turned a corner and there they were.

I use a lot of superlatives, but the Angel Falls deserve every one. Stick ¨amazing¨ in a thesaurus and see what comes out. They are certainly one of the few things that I have seen (along with the Taj Mahal) that are just as good if not better in real life. After shooting dozens of photos we hiked down to the base and had a good old swim. Nothing like a kilometer of water to give you the power shower feeling.

The executive life #1: A warming [pre-] Christmas tale

Whilst I get my act together to write up Venezuela and Guyana here's a little story from mid December 2008 I sent in Email form to a couple of non-shockable friends...

"Our shares in the company were finally paid out, so we went celebrating large stylee in Frankfurt. It started with small beers, progressed through hefeweizens and at some stage I vaguely remember Jagermeisters being brought out. There may have been Mojitos in there at some stage but don't quote me on that. Got back to hotel 74 sheets to the wind and of course was still in dire need of a drink. So took night cap or 3 in the hotel bar with Chris (colleague) and our COO. Finally stand up and bump my way to hotel room like a ball in a pinball machine.

Manage to exit my suit in about 4 seconds flat and in typical Andrew style throw the clothes pretty much over my shoulder and collapse into bed, "doing the human starfish".
Wake up bright and breezy the next morning. OK, lie - it took me 20 minutes from alarm going off to open my eyes. Bladder eventually drives me from the bed. Room in pitch darkness, so I stick my key card in the box to get some electricity going. Head to bathroom to do what a man's gotta do and whilst sitting there contemplating life's rich tapestry I get a waft of what smells like singed hair. Think nothing more of it and get back to business. Smell starts to get worse, so finish up and debathroom. Outside the smell gets even stronger so I open the hotel door to see if there is some kind of fire outside. Nope, all quiet on the western front.

Close door and walk back in, only to see that the standup light beside the bed has a pair of trousers draped over them and they are nicely flaming away like a campfire...
Run across the room, whip them off and jump up and down on them to put the fire out. Fireman duty done I inspect the damage and find everything more or less OK, except for a nice grapefruit sized hole that has been burnt right slap bang in the crotch area.

Curse the gods as first high powered meeting is in 30 minutes. Luckily with buttoned up jacket, a slightly forward-bending stance and no dynamic motion, hole was not visible. Endure meeting, during which Chris whispers to me "can you smell something burning?". I manage to keep a straight face, as if I whispered the truth he would probably break out into one of his famous laughing fits. So reply "eh... no, really?". Make it out of mind-numbingly boring meeting more or less alive. 45 minutes till next meeting, so I hop in a cab downtown, head into nearest jeans shop and purchase first pair I find in my size and pay 120 Euros for the pleasure. Tell cute assistant that I'll wear them, so head back to changing room to put them on and come back to her and deposit one pair of anthracite grey charred business trousers in her hands. She looks so stunned that no questions were asked. I leave shop like a new man.

Back in cab to arrive into next meeting, perfectly timed, with lovely fresh trousers. No one even noticed the difference.

Flying back to London that night, Chris and I were sitting in the B.A. lounge. He was holding up better than I and had got us a champagne. For medicinal purposes of course. Or at least to take the edge off. I decided it was time to tell the story so started to recount the events of that morning. Half way in Chris was snorting Champagne through his nose, tears were streaming down his face and he was laughing so loud that all those professional types, drinking green tea and San Sellegrino, were looking decidedly disturbed.
In hindsight proving my decision not to tell him during the meeting as rather wise.

Any one got a spare pair of grey suit trousers?

Travelling 101; #7: Sleeping Policemen

I'm going to have to take a tranquilizer before I write this as this topic can cause me to have tourettes like outbreaks. Indeed few things whilst travelling can make me seethe as much and cause the cursing of all gods known to Christianity, Judaism, Islam, Buddism and Hinduism (eh, 1 + 1 + 1 + 1 + 49 million = 49,000,004 gods).

A sleeping policeman may be know to you as a speed ramp, speed bump, traffic calming device (well only if you are a town planner) or simply a "hump", a term which caused me endless thighslapping moments whilst living in London. Despite my thirtysomething years I cannot walk by a sign saying "humps for 450 yards" without sniggering like a teenager.

Whatever it may be called it is an obstacle in the middle of the road to slow traffic down. Fine, wonderful, dandy. Stick them outside schools or in residential areas to make sure reckless drivers don't mow down unsuspecting kids.

The problem is that in South America the drivers obey no signage known to man so the authorities stick humps literally ANYWHERE, including fucking main roads. In Brazil, where a short hop down the road means a 24 hour drive, speed bumps are even laid out in the middle of super straight, Euclid would have come in his pants, highways. You might be sleeping on a leather seats, in-drive refreshments and blowjob included super-deluxe bus (more on this later), but no matter how comfy you may get you will still be jarred out of your sleep every ten minutes as a bus enters yet another mini-hamlet with 14 speed bumps.