3 sweaty days in the Delta

Firstly I would like to reassure anybody who is worried about me travelling like this that there is absolutely NO NEED. I have never felt unsafe here and if I don´t trust something I don´t do it. I have more sense than that, and I hope people reading this realise that. If the reading of this weblog causes anyone unnecessary worry, I suggest you stop reading :)

Anyway, now about my trip! I went with Irene and two other tourists, Chris from Wales and Uval from Israel who were our age on a trip into the Orinoco Delta over the weekend. The guys were great and we had a really good laugh all weekend! On Saturday morning we headed off onto the river in a boat. Unfortunately the boat had no roof, and it rained immediately :( Fortunately I had my borrowed anorak with me to keep me dry! Quite soon we already saw some local wildlife - monkeys in the trees, and even dolphins (yes, dolphins in the river!)

We saw quite a lot of other unusual birds that weekend, including toucans, and also tarantulas! Luckily they were quite small, so I managed to get close enough to take a few photos without peeing my pants with fright! The river is a lot wider than I thought, I expected narrow canals with jungle on either side but actually it was more like sailing through a lake.

We stayed both nights at a camp with local Indian people. It wasn´t quite as primitive as I first expected, because we had a house to sleep in, but we all slept in one room in hammocks, and we had to go to the toilet in the bushes. One night I really had to pee and now I have mosquito bites on my backside :( Sleeping in the hammocks wasn´t too bad, I found them quite comfortable, but I found it hard to relax with all the noises outside. On the second night I heard something squeaking and running on the floor near my hammock. I was too nervous to look for Irene´s flashlight to see what it was, so I just lay there, frozen. Then I heard it run to the other side of the room, and Chris, who was sleeping on the floor, jumped up... "I´ve been bitten by a rat! Cheeky bastard!" Both the boys turned their lights on and started running after it, trying to stamp on it, but it escaped. Anyway I could relax a bit more after that!

We visited lots of local people who live along the river. Some of them really had nothing. They lived in shelters, not even buildings, with no electricity and only the riverwater. I´ve never seen people live like that, and I really felt awkward there with my camera and ´modern´ clothes. They all seemed so happy though. It really struck me because people back home have everything they could want, and a lot of them are really miserable. These people had so little but everywhere we went we were given pieces of coconut, sugarcane and mango to eat. I even ate baba, which is a kind of caiman, the smallest relation to the crocodile! It was very good, like a cross between fish and chicken.

Some ´houses´ did have electricity, and I even spotted a tv and dvd player in one camp! In fact our house had one too, but we didn´t watch it, it didn´t seem right! We also visited one whole community of shelters, they even had a school for the children but as it was Sunday we sadly didn´t get to see the children being taught.

Our guide Luis turned out to be an amazing cook, the food was simple but wonderful, and huge portions - big portions of eggs for breakfast, fresh lau lau (catfish) with rice, delicious fresh baked bread... wonderful! Unfortunately I didn´t wash all weekend because all my university education warned me too much about Giardia and other nasty things in the water, even though the locals wash in it, Irene and I didn´t! Plus the guys were fishing one evening and they caught a few piranhas! But it was an amazing experience, and it really taught me to appreciate what I have more.

When we got back to our hotel, guess what... another power cut, and no water. Luckily the kind hotel manager had a reservoir tank of water that he connected to a shower so we could get clean. I´ve never smelled so bad before in my life!

The next day we left for Ciudad Bolívar. On the way we met Chris and Uval, and once again we came across a demonstration in the road. This time because there had water problems in the town apparently. We told them our plan about being doctors here to do voluntary work, so we all told the policemen there and they seemed concerned but it didn´t work. So we told the people protesting, and after a short while they let us through! Great. We had arrived in Ciudad Guayana, but we had to cross the Orinoco River with a small ferry to get to the city itself. It only took about 10 or 15 minutes. Then Irene and I went to the bus terminal to get a bus to Ciudad Bolívar, and we got there with no problems. Finding a place to stay was a bit of a problem, our driver insisted he knew a great cheap hotel but it was full. When we went back to the place we originally wanted to stay, the last room had just been taken! Thanks a lot for the tip bus driver! Anyway we have a good place to stay now.

The centre of Ciudad Bolívar is very old and beautiful - very steep streets and the buildings are painted lovely colours, soft shades of pink, yellow, blue and green. It´s my favourite city here so far. We´re staying for 2 days and then travelling to Mérida, on the other side of the country in the mountains. Today we did a lot of investigating on how to get there, and how to get to Aruba and back. We have our return ticket, but we will get out ticket there when we arrive at a small airport in the north.

Anyway I´m sure I forgot to say a lot of things, as I do every time but that´s enough for now as my time has almost run out! It´s enough to say that I love travelling here, every day is an adventure and I´me very glad I came!