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Shane and Sarah's Adventures
Hola Familia y Amigos! Well the week in Venezuela so far has been fantastic and already beats doing an organised tour. Caracas was a little scary and a bit of a culture shock to be honest. NO ONE can speak any English! Everyone warns you not to go out alone or at night and this and that....you dont really feel very safe there. Shane and I spent hours at a cafe just drinking coffee and practicing our much needed Spanish phrases. Two days later we were on a bus to Ciudad Bolivar (10 hours south of Caracas). We chose the day bus so we could take in the sites and scenery along the way...alas the locals had a different idea and wanted to sleep and made sure all the curtains on the bus were securely drawn tight against the daylight, so we could only peak out a wee crack and watch Venezuela zoom past. We only stayed in Ciudad Boliver the night so didnt get to really see much apart from lots of little flat houses of many bright colours lining the hilly streets. The heat and humidity was almost overbearring but lucky for us Venuzeula does not care for hot water so the cold shower came in handy. We took a cesna flight to Canaima which took about 50 minutes and gave us some good site-seeing from the air. The scenery changed from dry and flat arid land to large deltas where soil coloured jigsaw pieces of land made pretty viewing......then into moutainous greenery of dense jungle and waterfalls. Canaima is a small community set on a gorgeous white sand beach with jungle all around and large waterfalls beating into a calm river. It was from here that we boarded into some motorised canoes with two Slovinian friends who we met in C. Bolivar and headed for Salto Angel (Angel Falls). The river was the colour of tea and it felt like we were on a river of gingerale! Apparently its because of the tanins and minerals in the rocks and sand...but it was very pretty. Shane and the boys had to jump out into the water a few times and help the boat up small waterfalls and rapids as the river was low due to it being the dry season. It was great getting wet and making our way up the river although our bottoms were pretty sore sitting on wooden seats for 6 hours! We finally get a view of Angel Falls and she is so high with a trickle of water falling nearly 1000m. Our campsite is opposite the falls and we have a hammock for a bed. The following morning we start out early and make our way to Angel Falls walking for a couple of hours through very humid jungle and listening to very strange tweets and shrieks from crazy Venezuelan birds. We also take a swim in a pool virtually below the falls. Later that day we make our way back to Canaima (this time only a few hours as we are going with the river) and view a few other falls as well as walk behind one of them where we got pretty wet in the process. We did mean to leave Canaima a day later but there was no plane for us so we chilled on the beach and practiced our Spanish. Today we left by small cesna and flew to Santa Elena (had two stops along the way dropping off supplies to small villages in the middle of nowhere and picking people up etc. One of the stops included a pretty hair raising landing and take off which involved just clearing the tree tops and a very short runway). Santa Elena is a small town close to the border of Brasil, so now we are deciding whether we cross the border and head to Manaus or do a trip into Gran Sabana whilst we are in Venezuela......so many decisions - travelling sure is tough! Lots of love Sarah and Shane xx
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