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It has been a couple of rough days for me since leaving Manaus. We were meant to leave Manaus at 7am and we were all waiting for the truck when about 7.30am, Wes, our new driver walks up to the hotel. The port (where the ferry has been since it came up on its own ferry) wouldn't release it without more paperwork. So Ross went off with him and about 9.30am they returned, with Magaly. Our 12hrs in the truck began. We drove for a few hours through Indian reservation land and apparently it has been said that if you stop on the road, they will come out and shoot you with a bow and arrow. Needless to say, we didn't try it out. Around 7.30pm that night there was a fight between two women on the bus - it is all fun, fun, fun. We arrived into Boa Vista about 9.30pm and after checking in went and found some dinner.
Afterwards, checking my email I found out that a much loved friend and mentor, a Director from camp had died. He has been suffering from leukaemia since last year but I thought he was getting better and it was a real shock. Needless to say all I wanted to do was ring Mum but the Skype connection was crap and it just couldn't happen. However, friends here on the trip have been very good. So, after a s***ty night we were supposed to have a short day on the truck.
We loaded up and headed to the border. We arrived at 12.07pm. It closed at noon for lunch for 2hrs. So we set up and had lunch (my last cooking day) and then went and spent our last lot of Brazilian money. Once we had exited Brazil, we headed to Venezuela, where after handing our passports in, Ross came out and told us that we all had to be jabbed with some vaccination. He didn't know with what so we asked him to at least find that out since it was going into our body. Turned out it was Rubella. So we lined up and got jabbed. Not much else you could do if you wanted to enter.
Was a short drive to Santa Elenor where we changed money on the street on the black market. The official rate here is US$1 = 2 bolivar fuerte (strong bolivar, which is a new currency introduced last year). The black market is 1-5. All to do with Chavez giving money to the poor people and not liking the rich people. Checked into our hotel and had a nice Chinese for dinner, surprisingly.
Yesterday we had a 12.5hr drive on the truck, here to Ciudad Bolivar. This is the jumping off point for Angel Falls. 10 of us are heading out in 30mins to fly out to start a boat trip up to the falls. Very excited. All I know now, is there is another angel up there looking after me and it is sort of appropriate I am heading to Angel Falls. Will say my goodbyes to Tim out there who was always so excited to hear and talk about my travels.
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