…and I continue with part 3. Much later, but better late than never, right? No but seriously, sorry if you have been waiting with bated breath. The past 6 weeks ended up being pure rumba (translated: party time) for me, and I think I saw about 60% of Venezuela in about 3 weeks... So I will pick up where I left off, in Roraima.
From our minor car accident, we came zooming back into Santa Elena, where we had delicious celebratory pizza, took very much needed showers, and caught yet another night bus to Ciudad Bolivar. Ciudad Bolivar was a very strange place for me—colorful and bustling, with aggressive street vendors everywhere. It was pleasant during the day—you could stroll along the rio (river), visit the many statues of Simon Bolivar (the ubiquitous liberator of Northern South America—people are OBSESSED with him), and his historic residence. But the thing was, when we read in the Lonely Planet that everything closes early in Ciudad Bolivar, we did not realize that this meant that by about 5:30 or 6 EVERYTHING would close. We walked around, innocently looking for a place to have dinner, when street vendors started to grab at me… so we bought some skewers of beef and another mystery food, some apple sodas and hustled on back to our little posada, trying to avoid molestors. We bought the movie Milk, only to realize when we put it in that it was actually a pirated copy of X-Men. Gotta love pirated materials… So we snarfed our shishkabob things and hopped into bed.
The next morning we woke up bright and early to go to the airport to take our very own 5 passenger plane in the general direction of Angel Falls. As we gained speed on the runway, the windows were flapping open and the pilot was fidgeting with some maps and the 1400 controls in front of him. We flew low over the mountains, our pilot gesturing wildly at structures that were obscured behind clouds. The man in the front seat was taking pictures, and suddenly the pilot started shouting at him. In one swift movement, the pilot took the camera from his hand and sent the plane into a brief nose dive. The pilot took some pictures with his recently acquired camera, returned it, and restored the plane to its correct angle (I freaked a little). We passed through thick layers of clouds, bumping around a lot more than one would like, and landed gracefully on the runway in Canaima. Upon looking out the window, the first two things that I saw were a plane that had lost its landing gear, and the gravel runway next to us. I gave a little prayer of gratitude to an unidentified being, and I gave it with gusto.
In Canaima, we were taken on a boat and hiking tour of the nearby waterfalls. We were taken under and through several waterfalls, trying like the ridiculous tourists that we were to take pictures without slipping on the slimy rocks beneath the falls. I watched a few people with their cameras scrambling to not fall down, and in the end, all of us but one left with cameras intact.
The next day, we woke up bright and early for our boat tour to Angel Falls. We were told that if the water was low, “we might have to get out and push…” But little did we know that this meant that our 4-5 hour boat ride would be turned into a 7 hour one, predominantly because we spent the difference attempting to push our way over arguably innavigable waters. In the end, though, the fact that some people had to get out of the boat every 5 to 10 minutes didn’t really affect me that much. You see, being a woman in Venezuela, it was not my responsibility to push. When we encountered rapids, only the caballeros (gentleman) were told to get out and push. It was a rare occasion when we were all invited out of the boat, and only happened a handful of times… One of my favorite moments of the trip, however, was when one of the guides shouted with exasperation to another, “Jesus, it’s the time of female liberation, we’ve gotta give them a chance!!”
One of my favorite things about taking organized tours when abroad is the entertainment of putting a group of foreigners together and expecting them to make friends immediately. The dynamics of our tour group to Angel Falls were certainly more interesting than the group to Roraima. There were much more severe language and cultural barriers, though maybe I just imagined them… It was pretty funny how we all really fulfilled the stereotypes of our countries… The wild Brits with dry humor, the loud Americans, the high maintenance Venezuelan, the solitary Polish group, and the overly adventurous Germans so eager to explore that they went missing in the forest (this is true). At one point I watched our Venezuelan guide attempt to pass the German explorers, which actually sent them all into a fast trot and then run. The guide wanted to pass them, and yet the Germans did not want to be passed… We (meaning all the foreigners) spent the night sleeping in hammocks which they put puzzlingly close to one another, so close in fact, that all night long the German guy sleeping next to me kept crashing into my hammock. More than once I looked over to see his little German head, adorned with oversized, very thick, perfectly round glasses peak over the edge of his hammock in my direction to investigate. Talk about awkward…
Angel Falls was just as spectacular as I’m sure you all might imagine. But while Angel Falls itself is beautiful, the landscape of the entire region is truly spectacular. The tepuis are stunningly solitary—enormous plateaus jutting out from seemingly nowhere, speckled with frigid rivers tinted red from all the tannins flowing through them, thick forests, bare rocks. At the base of Angel Falls we got to swim in the frigid waters of a pool formed by the plummeting water. It was reeeaaaallll cold. Or should I say refreshing?
The trip back relatively uneventful, the highlight being when the pilot of our CESSNA gave me permission to sit in the passenger’s seat in the plane for the trip home, and then ultimately in the pilot’s seat for a photo shoot that Zach told me was lame. Whatever. I enjoyed it… and my Brit friend was happy to take pictures, though my favorite travel partner was slightly desanimado about it… (TQM, Zach).
After our little adventure in Angel Falls, we hopped a flight back to Caracas. This was relatively smooth, until we actually got into the plane (my favorite place for plans to falter). We were told that there was a possibility that we couldn’t take off, because they had to “fix the runway,” but they would tell us in 15 minutes if we could leave or not… Oh, okay… but WHAT DO YOU MEAN THEY ARE GOING TO FIX THE RUNWAY IN 15 MINUTES??!! Tell me, please, what you can do to fix a runway in 15 minutes?! Well, to this day I have no idea what they did, but whatever it was in those 15 minutes, it fixed the runway and we left.
From Caracas I went straight for Valera, which consisted of waiting for about a gazillion hours in the terminal with Zach (thanks!) and another gazillion in the bus. In the end, I arrived sleepily to my very own bed, relieved to be back home safely without incident.
I arrived back in Valera something around the 21st of December, which gave me a few days to chill, wash my rotting clothes, and enjoy the holiday season. It was a very odd Christmas for me here, not bad, just very off. It never quite felt like Christmas simply because it was so hot, I didn’t hear any Christmas carols, I didn’t eat a single Christmas cookie, houses didn’t smell like spruce boughs and cinnamon, I could go on and on… basically, celebrations were really different from what I am used to. I was told that at 12 o’clock on Dec 24th, you usually have a big meal with your family, and then afterwards you rumbiar (ie party). Being the gringa that I am, I kind of assumed that they meant that you would have a big meal with your family at 12 in the afternoon… but to my great surprise, at noon, nobody was home. At midnight, several people arrived, ate really quickly, and by 12:30 we were on our way to a wild party. I decided I would just stay up all night, and talk to my American family in the morning before going to sleep…
As planned, we danced and danced in a friend’s apartment until the sun came up. The fireworks lasted all night, until they were just sounds of explosions against the colorful sunrise. I got home at about 7:30 AM, dozed a little, and talked with the fam back home.
The day after Christmas, I went (yet again) on vacation!!! At about 9 PM Yervio, Antonio, Susana and I hopped a bus to the beach where we were to meet several of my American companions! After many hours of intestinal anxiety and freezing buses, we arrived to our little apartment for 7 in Chichiriviche (that’s a mouthful). Chichiriviche is known for its Cayos (island beaches) that form part of Morrocoy National Park. I was SUPER excited to go there, because Morrocoy is supposed ot have the best coral reefs in Venezuela… So I packed my snorkel and mask in my little backpack before leaving and couldn’t wait to take them out.
The beaches were spectacular. Beautiful, though frighteningly overcrowded, which (along with the fascinating beachwear fashion sense) made for excellent people watching all week. Clowns performed on the shore, hippie kids sold homemade jewels, bronzed women sunbathed, couples played ping pong at the water’s edge, and our group of Americans/Venezuelans attempted to play something like volleyball and monkey in the middle, to the entertainment of many. I really enjoyed the company of my American and Venezuelan friends, and between our blonde hair, embassy paraphernalia, and very American looks, we attracted quite a bit of attention, and created an equal amount of mischief…
In the US, Christmas is very family oriented, and New Year’s is the wild party—but in Venezuela it is the opposite. Christmas is cray cray, New Year’s is all about the family. So imagine 3 American girls wandering the streets of Chichiriviche, Venezuela on New Year’s Eve, stumbling upon party after party of drunken Venezuelan families. I don’t feel like I really MET anyone that night, but I know that I had my picture taken with a lot of strangers, was dressed up in a lot of hats and other accessories, was danced around in circles by a lot of unknown men, and had multiple new facebook friends the next day…
While I had a wonderful time at the beach, I was plagued by a series of very severe and inexplicable maladies. Typical intestinal woes, combated only by immodium and ciproflaxin, but more interestingly, I think I may have gotten mange… weird, right? I have never itched so badly so consistently for so long in my life. I don’t know what it was, but for some reason my stomach and back were unbearably itchy for almost a week… Too itchy to sleep, to itchy to sit still, too itchy to do anything but scratch. If you have ever heard of such a problem and know the cause, I am very curious and very far from any doctors that I would trust to give a correct diagnosis. Thank the lord above that after about a week it went away…
From the beach, I spent 2 days at home once again, washing my once again rotting clothes, before heading out YET AGAIN on vacation to Merida! More about this to come!
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