I happened to catch part of a TV programme last night called Only Connect. BBC3 I think. It's a quiz show with two teams and the idea is to connect things, mostly words. Towards the end they have a part of the show where they take vowels out of words, and you have to work out the words as they should be. They help by bunching them together, so at least you have an idea which ball park you're likely to be in.
So when Great South American Rivers came up as a topic, I settled confidently back, certain of a 100% score, being, as it were, on home territory. Now I know it's meant to be a challenging programme, rather than just plumping for questions which will fox only dimwits who don't watch quizzes anyway.
I got two out of four. The rivers were Orinoco RNC, Colorado (CLRD), Maule (ML)and Aconcagua (CNCG)
What?? Great rivers?? You're 'avin' a laugh aren'tcha? Three of those "great rivers" are in Chile. As everyone knows, Chile is confined by the Andes on one side and the Pacific on the other. Long and thin. About a wide as a piece of string. All the rivers flow westward to the sea - so they're about as great as the piece of string is wide. The only thing great about them is that they rise in the Andes. That's like saying the Teign and the Dart are great rivers because they rise on Dartmoor.
A whole continent full of rivers - great rivers - and we get three Chilean becks.
In Argentina, most Welshmen would easily identify the CHBT in Patagonia (they don't bother with vowels much anyway). The PRN, PRGY, RGY are probably a bit too easy.
In Bolivia the BN's a bit more challenging, as is the PLCMY (world's longest tributary of a tributary).
Peru's CYL and MRNN take a bit of thinking about; MGDLN in Colombia is easy. Guyana "land of rivers" should surely have merited a mention for one of SSQB, BRBC or DMRR - all easy.
Now I can see why they eschewed MZN - a bit too obvious - but if they think Maule's reasonable, they why not slip in SLMS (which is what the Brazilians call the upper MZN). Brazil's brimming over - XNG, MDR, SFRNCSC, and if you want a really difficult one, the 4-syllable PQ would be the one to catch them out. Not a great river, but a lot greater than those Chilean melt-water run-offs.
And the CSQR in Venezuela, whilst not actually a river - more of a natural channel linking the basins of the Orinoco and the Negro - could hold its place as an interesting watercourse. If you don't mind the mosquitos and sand flies.
I could go on - or even suggest that the producers of Only Connect come to me if they need inspiration with a Latin American flavour. Mammals of the Mato Grosso? Suburbs of Rio?
On second thoughts, don't get me started.
Tuesday, 26 January 2010
Monday, 11 January 2010
Coq o' the Roq - Venezuela and Guyanas
I see that Venezuela, or rather Hugo Chavez, announced that adjustments (a code-word for devaluation) would be made to value of the Venezuelan bolívar against the US dollar. I guess that means other currencies too, although the President's main beef is with the USA, rather than with Europe.
The first effect this will have is that imports will be more expensive - so anything imported that Venezuelans buy will also rise in price, despite the Chavez's insistence that he'll clamp down on any businesses that try to raise their prices straight away. The devaluation simply reflects a state of affairs that has existed in Venezuela for a number of years, where on the black market you could get well above the official exchange rate
It's an unusual approach, however - a two-tiered rate. A very small exchange rate increase on goods deemed essential, and a doubling of the exchange rate for non-essentials. I can't quite see how this will work, unless it's applied simply as a variable tariff on physical imports.
The commentators in the UK press say that the grander plan is to firstly dampen imports and to boost exports, and make the value of the incoming dollars higher in the local currency. So there'll be "more" money (ie twice as many bolívares)to spend on local projects. These local projects will benefit the poorer sections of society who make up Chavez's electoral support. And the general election is due on 26 September 2010...
This two-tier currency has some affinities to Cuba. There, they have one currency for locals (Cuban peso)and one currency for foreigners (Peso Convertible). The latter can only be bought with foreign exchange - eg by tourists, all of whose transactions are generally in Convertibles. Cubans who receive these have access therefore to things (goods and services) that tourists buy. Strangely, the value of the Convertibe seems to be pegged to the US dollar, but you can't use dollars to buy pesos. Euros or sterling are fine. It also has the effect of making things more expensive for tourists.
Cuba and Venezuela do a fair amount of trade with each other. In simple terms, the most obvious sign of this is: Cuba buys oil and petrol and pays for it in medical services - doctors and surgeons.
I wonder what effect this devaluation will have on the tourism industry in Venezuela? Incoming tourism is an export - tourists bring in foreign exchange. Thus, on the face of it things will be cheaper for foreign tourists, because they'll get more bolívares for their buck. But there's a reasonable chance that Chavez's next plan will be to introduce not so much a two-tier exchange rate as a two-tier retail structure, so that anything a tourist might buy has a premium price.
Of course, he'll be faced with a small dilemma: put off foreign tourists, and they don't come with their euros and dollars. But Venezuela's huge reliance on oil exports for the last 80 years isn't likely to change. That's where they're expecting to reap their benefits. Encouraging tourism has always been low on their agenda.
The first effect this will have is that imports will be more expensive - so anything imported that Venezuelans buy will also rise in price, despite the Chavez's insistence that he'll clamp down on any businesses that try to raise their prices straight away. The devaluation simply reflects a state of affairs that has existed in Venezuela for a number of years, where on the black market you could get well above the official exchange rate
It's an unusual approach, however - a two-tiered rate. A very small exchange rate increase on goods deemed essential, and a doubling of the exchange rate for non-essentials. I can't quite see how this will work, unless it's applied simply as a variable tariff on physical imports.
The commentators in the UK press say that the grander plan is to firstly dampen imports and to boost exports, and make the value of the incoming dollars higher in the local currency. So there'll be "more" money (ie twice as many bolívares)to spend on local projects. These local projects will benefit the poorer sections of society who make up Chavez's electoral support. And the general election is due on 26 September 2010...
This two-tier currency has some affinities to Cuba. There, they have one currency for locals (Cuban peso)and one currency for foreigners (Peso Convertible). The latter can only be bought with foreign exchange - eg by tourists, all of whose transactions are generally in Convertibles. Cubans who receive these have access therefore to things (goods and services) that tourists buy. Strangely, the value of the Convertibe seems to be pegged to the US dollar, but you can't use dollars to buy pesos. Euros or sterling are fine. It also has the effect of making things more expensive for tourists.
Cuba and Venezuela do a fair amount of trade with each other. In simple terms, the most obvious sign of this is: Cuba buys oil and petrol and pays for it in medical services - doctors and surgeons.
I wonder what effect this devaluation will have on the tourism industry in Venezuela? Incoming tourism is an export - tourists bring in foreign exchange. Thus, on the face of it things will be cheaper for foreign tourists, because they'll get more bolívares for their buck. But there's a reasonable chance that Chavez's next plan will be to introduce not so much a two-tier exchange rate as a two-tier retail structure, so that anything a tourist might buy has a premium price.
Of course, he'll be faced with a small dilemma: put off foreign tourists, and they don't come with their euros and dollars. But Venezuela's huge reliance on oil exports for the last 80 years isn't likely to change. That's where they're expecting to reap their benefits. Encouraging tourism has always been low on their agenda.
Friday, 8 January 2010
Bolivia – the world’s most dangerous road.
I was abroad last week when BBC’s Top Gear did its Bolivia Special. They drove three second-hand 4WDs, first hacking their way through the rainforest, then up the steep eastern side of the Andes to La Paz. Then they crossed the altiplano towards the Chilean border, before dropping down past snowcapped high altitude volcanoes to the Atacama desert and the Pacific Ocean. Great television - especially for someone who knows the area.
The so-called World’s Most Dangerous Road is the bit where the all-weather road climbs out of the sweltering forest to the foothills of the Andes, and continues up and up through the fertile Yungas – coffee, fruit groves, flowers – to the high pass at La Cumbre, 4675 metres (15330ft) above sea level.
The “Most Dangerous” label came originally from the Inter-American Development Bank in 1995 – and we know now that American bankers aren’t averse to taking a few risks. Now it’s the USP for anyone selling trips down this way. Or making TV programmes.
In those good old 1995 days, the only road (built by prisoners of war in the 1930s) was an all-weather gravel affair (single track with passing places) which clung to the mountainside with vertical drops on left or right. Traffic usually passed even if there wasn’t a passing place. Occasionally (regularly is a better word) there’s a little shrine with blanched plastic flowers, or a cluster of small rusting crosses, where a wheel must have veered just that bit too far off track. El Camino de la Muerte - Death Road.
In 2006, a new wider road was opened, which follows a different route, albeit mostly just a few hundred metres away on the other side of the valley. It’s a properly metalled and asphalted two-lane surface, with bridges, viaducts and tunnels instead of corrugated iron conduits and dodgy rock overhangs. Some of the time you can still see the old road, which is still open, but with much less traffic.
I’ve been along both these roads, both up and down – down on a mountain bike, up in an MPV people-carrier. Both old and new roads are mountain roads, and as you might expect when you climb some 12000 feet in 40 miles, there are bends, and plenty of them. For the most part, the new road sweeps up the right-hand side of the valley, with steep drops on the left. The old road hugs the mountainside on the left of the valley, with sheer and apparently fathomless drops on your right.
Knowing this, and watching Top Gear on iPlayer, set me musing.
On the old road, if you’re ascending you’d be right next to the edge of the abyss. But most of the time the Top Gear lads weren’t. They were hugging the mountainside. From this, it’s evident that they were driving on the left, and it’s certainly true that the convention on the old road is that those coming up have right of way, and those going down give way. Descenders are also on the left, next to the drop...you can lean out of the window and see how close your wheels are to eternity.
I suspect that they also must have actually filmed some of it going down.
The old trick of cinema. Set the scene for going up, and the willing suspension of disbelief does the rest. There’s certainly one scene where Jeremy Clarkson squeezes his Range Rover past on the precipice side, road crumbling away beneath his wheels – great TV, and clearly set up, because they had a long-distance camera filming it.
The convention makes sense. Generally, you descend faster than you climb. If you’re on the outside, and closest to your maker, you’ll naturally slow down if you’re passing someone coming in the other direction.
There are several companies in La Paz which offer downhill mountain-bike full-day excursions – of which Gravity Assisted Mountain Biking is by far the best and most safety-conscious. The latter is important. Whichever side of the valley or the road you’re on, you’re at the bottom of the pecking-order on a bike.
Caption for photograph: The sign at the beginning of Death Road reads " TAKE CARE Mr Driver Drive on the left as far as Caranavi Give way to traffic travelling towards La Paz Keep headlights on day and night Sound your horn before each bend"
Tuesday, 5 January 2010
Ilha Grande (Brazil) and Villarrica volcano (Chile)
A couple of natural disasters in Latin America have made it into the UK press in recent days.
Although it's the hottest time of the year for the coastal area around Rio, it's also the wettest. There are plenty of places where the coastal mountain range comes right down to the sea. On New Year’s Eve/Day torrential rain caused mudslides and landslides which caused loss of life, damage to property and severe disrupution to infrastructure. Particularly badly hit was the large island of Ilha Grande off the coast south of Rio de Janeiro, and Angra dos Reis on the mainland a couple of hours' drive south.
Fortunately, the properties Journey Latin America uses are at Abraão, about 8 miles away from where most of the damage occurred - we did have four clients in Abraão but all are ok, and more travelled to Ilha Grande on Saturday 2 January.
The current situation (as of 4th January) is as follows:
• Weather has improved.
• The Rio-Angra-Parati road closed for 2 hours on 4th Jan but is now open.
• The Ilha Grande ferry from the mainland is operating.
• Things are generally working as normal on Ilha Grande.
• The hotel Pestana Angra, near Angra dos Reis, will remain closed for a week for repair. There was no loss of life at the hotel but a sea wall collapsed.
• The FCO is not advising against travel to the area.
In Chile, in the northen area of the Lake District near Pucón (800 km south of Santiago) there was an avalanche on Villarrica volcano on 2nd January. Fortunately there were no fatalities although a group of Chilean climbers were caught up in it. The volcano is now closed for climbing until further notice, which affects Journey Latin America's Nandú Discovery Journey.
As an alternative, the next best thing is the full-day walk/trek in Huerquehue National park (pronounnced Wear-kay-way) – 6 to 8 hours through stunning forest with views of lakes and the volcanoes, 7-8km up through Araucaria forest – stands of enormous monkey puzzle trees with openings so you can see across the lakes to Villarrica Volcano. For bird lovers, it's a great place to spot (well, try to) the chucao http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chucao_Tapaculo
At the highest point of the walk there are lakes which mirror the monkey puzzles. Then you come back again, often with a stop at the termas (hot springs) on the way back to Pucón.
Next best thing? For many, it's better than the steeper Villarrica trek.
Although it's the hottest time of the year for the coastal area around Rio, it's also the wettest. There are plenty of places where the coastal mountain range comes right down to the sea. On New Year’s Eve/Day torrential rain caused mudslides and landslides which caused loss of life, damage to property and severe disrupution to infrastructure. Particularly badly hit was the large island of Ilha Grande off the coast south of Rio de Janeiro, and Angra dos Reis on the mainland a couple of hours' drive south.
Fortunately, the properties Journey Latin America uses are at Abraão, about 8 miles away from where most of the damage occurred - we did have four clients in Abraão but all are ok, and more travelled to Ilha Grande on Saturday 2 January.
The current situation (as of 4th January) is as follows:
• Weather has improved.
• The Rio-Angra-Parati road closed for 2 hours on 4th Jan but is now open.
• The Ilha Grande ferry from the mainland is operating.
• Things are generally working as normal on Ilha Grande.
• The hotel Pestana Angra, near Angra dos Reis, will remain closed for a week for repair. There was no loss of life at the hotel but a sea wall collapsed.
• The FCO is not advising against travel to the area.
In Chile, in the northen area of the Lake District near Pucón (800 km south of Santiago) there was an avalanche on Villarrica volcano on 2nd January. Fortunately there were no fatalities although a group of Chilean climbers were caught up in it. The volcano is now closed for climbing until further notice, which affects Journey Latin America's Nandú Discovery Journey.
As an alternative, the next best thing is the full-day walk/trek in Huerquehue National park (pronounnced Wear-kay-way) – 6 to 8 hours through stunning forest with views of lakes and the volcanoes, 7-8km up through Araucaria forest – stands of enormous monkey puzzle trees with openings so you can see across the lakes to Villarrica Volcano. For bird lovers, it's a great place to spot (well, try to) the chucao http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chucao_Tapaculo
At the highest point of the walk there are lakes which mirror the monkey puzzles. Then you come back again, often with a stop at the termas (hot springs) on the way back to Pucón.
Next best thing? For many, it's better than the steeper Villarrica trek.
Thursday, 24 December 2009
Guyanas trip 2010 (continued)
I've at last finalised the route of the journey through Venezuela, Brazil, Guyana, Suriname and French Guiana - inasmuch as an itinerary like this ever gets set in stone. Click here to read more.
In keeping with the tradition which started in 1980, when we devised our first trips, we've named the journey after an iconic South American bird: Coq o' the Roq. It's a brilliant orange bird which is native to the Guiana shield. The Latin name is Rupicola rupicola, but even non-ornithologists will have noticed that coq is not the usual spelling in English of that word. In the first flush of publicising the trip, we discovered that whatever algorithms web-browsers use to block pornography were pouncing on the hapless English version of our chosen name. So we changed it.
In future I'll also try in this blog to avoid using pictures which have a pre-dominance of flesh tones in their colour balance. Plenty of greens and blues. That should fool 'em.
Another unseen complication. This week, good old president Chavez has decreed that the Angel Falls are no longer to be known as the Angel Falls. Henceforth they shall be known as Salto Kerepakupai-Meru.
Why should this greatest of Venezuelan tourist attractions commemorate a lickspittle Yankee adventurer who chanced upon the falls in the 1930s? They were there long before he got there. The Pemón indians, argues Chavez, knew about them first, even if the rest of us didn't.
I can give the illustrious president a bit of advice here. Don't mess with marketing for the sake of political correctness. 20 years ago, when Journey Latin America first started running an adventure trip to climb Roraima tepuy, in a moment of inspired folly, I hit upon "Archaeopteryx" as a suitable name for the journey.
This was where Conan Doyle had set his Lost World of T.rex and pterodactyls. Archaeopteryx was the name given by palaeontologists to the "bird" which showed the first fossil evidence of birds having evolved from dinosaurs. All the boxes, as they say, were ticked. We'd be able to stick to our tradition of naming trips after birds.
"But no-one will able to pronounce it" protested practically everyone. "No matter" decreed I.
Our few competitors named their trips "The Lost World". So, Señor Presidente, you can probably guess who sold more.
CP
In keeping with the tradition which started in 1980, when we devised our first trips, we've named the journey after an iconic South American bird: Coq o' the Roq. It's a brilliant orange bird which is native to the Guiana shield. The Latin name is Rupicola rupicola, but even non-ornithologists will have noticed that coq is not the usual spelling in English of that word. In the first flush of publicising the trip, we discovered that whatever algorithms web-browsers use to block pornography were pouncing on the hapless English version of our chosen name. So we changed it.
In future I'll also try in this blog to avoid using pictures which have a pre-dominance of flesh tones in their colour balance. Plenty of greens and blues. That should fool 'em.
Another unseen complication. This week, good old president Chavez has decreed that the Angel Falls are no longer to be known as the Angel Falls. Henceforth they shall be known as Salto Kerepakupai-Meru.
Why should this greatest of Venezuelan tourist attractions commemorate a lickspittle Yankee adventurer who chanced upon the falls in the 1930s? They were there long before he got there. The Pemón indians, argues Chavez, knew about them first, even if the rest of us didn't.
I can give the illustrious president a bit of advice here. Don't mess with marketing for the sake of political correctness. 20 years ago, when Journey Latin America first started running an adventure trip to climb Roraima tepuy, in a moment of inspired folly, I hit upon "Archaeopteryx" as a suitable name for the journey.
This was where Conan Doyle had set his Lost World of T.rex and pterodactyls. Archaeopteryx was the name given by palaeontologists to the "bird" which showed the first fossil evidence of birds having evolved from dinosaurs. All the boxes, as they say, were ticked. We'd be able to stick to our tradition of naming trips after birds.
"But no-one will able to pronounce it" protested practically everyone. "No matter" decreed I.
Our few competitors named their trips "The Lost World". So, Señor Presidente, you can probably guess who sold more.
CP
Wednesday, 30 September 2009
Venezuela Guianas Brazil trip (continued)
As more information comes in, the tweaking continues.
Firstly, connecting flights. Since we're flying into one airport and returning from another ("open-jaw"), realistically, the options are limited to carriers which serve both cities.
Which means: Air France into Caracas, and out of either Cayenne or Rio. This is likely to be the most expensive, and flying out of Cayenne will mean a change of airports in Paris on the way back (Orly to Roissy Charles de Gaulle).
Cheaper would be Iberia with good connections via Madrid , into Caracas and out of Rio.
Cheapest is Air Portugal, into Caracas and returning from Belem via Lisbon. This would mean an additional 'plane change and several hours' connecting time in Fortaleza.
It's likely that we'll probably cut out Rio at the end - it's a lot of extra flying to have a couple of days in the Cidade Maravilhosa, and lots of our other trips go there. Which will mean ending either in Cayenne or Belem (see above).
In Venezuela, the original plan was to spend no more than a few hours, or an overnight, in Caracas. It's a big city without much to offer, but missing it altogether is probably doing it too much of a disservice. So we'll stay in town, and take a late afternoon flight next day to Ciudad Bolivar, and stay the second night there at the Angostura Hotel.
Going by bus to Ciudad Bolivar means a ten-hour overnight bus, and arriving before dawn. This is supposed to be fun, so we've ditched that idea.
The Alba Hotel in Caracas doesn't get much of write up on web review sites, but most recent comments are from Texans who seem to be beefing more about socialism than hotels. We'll monitor reviews. An alternative is the Melia.
Flights from Ciudad Bolivar to Canaima offer the option either to fly past the Angel Falls on the way in, or not - the difference is that flying past costs a lot more. We're investigating whether our charter flight out towards to Brazil border can incorporate a fly-by.
The canoe trip upstream to the base of the falls is through rainforest, and if you're interested in birds, you'll know that rivers are linear clearings and an ideal opportunity for sightings. As we get closer to the falls, the range of habitats increases; 1000ft sheer cliffs flank the waterways.
The's only one bus a day from the Brazilian border to Boa Vista, so we'll spend a night in Santa Elena de Uairen (Hotel Yakoo), which is on the Venezuelan side about 20km from the frontier. Santa Elena is the starting point for trekkers aiming to scale Roraima tepuy - a six-day round trip which we won't be doing - this time...
Mount Roraima straddles the three borders (Brazil,Guyana,Venezuela), but access is only from Venezuela for trekkers without climbing experience, ropes and heavy-duty back up.
Our journey routes through Brazil and then loops back up to Guyana because a combination of terrain and politics means there's no overland route directly into Guyana
The bus to Boa Vista takes about 3 hours on a paved road. I was last there in 1975, when I remember a newly-built modern frontier town in the middle of open savannah. It will have changed.
So, Venezuelan section is now:
Caracas 1N
Ciudad Bolivar 1N
Canaima/Angel Falls 2N
Santa Elena 1N
Bird lists and Climate charts to follow.
Firstly, connecting flights. Since we're flying into one airport and returning from another ("open-jaw"), realistically, the options are limited to carriers which serve both cities.
Which means: Air France into Caracas, and out of either Cayenne or Rio. This is likely to be the most expensive, and flying out of Cayenne will mean a change of airports in Paris on the way back (Orly to Roissy Charles de Gaulle).
Cheaper would be Iberia with good connections via Madrid , into Caracas and out of Rio.
Cheapest is Air Portugal, into Caracas and returning from Belem via Lisbon. This would mean an additional 'plane change and several hours' connecting time in Fortaleza.
It's likely that we'll probably cut out Rio at the end - it's a lot of extra flying to have a couple of days in the Cidade Maravilhosa, and lots of our other trips go there. Which will mean ending either in Cayenne or Belem (see above).
In Venezuela, the original plan was to spend no more than a few hours, or an overnight, in Caracas. It's a big city without much to offer, but missing it altogether is probably doing it too much of a disservice. So we'll stay in town, and take a late afternoon flight next day to Ciudad Bolivar, and stay the second night there at the Angostura Hotel.
Going by bus to Ciudad Bolivar means a ten-hour overnight bus, and arriving before dawn. This is supposed to be fun, so we've ditched that idea.
The Alba Hotel in Caracas doesn't get much of write up on web review sites, but most recent comments are from Texans who seem to be beefing more about socialism than hotels. We'll monitor reviews. An alternative is the Melia.
Flights from Ciudad Bolivar to Canaima offer the option either to fly past the Angel Falls on the way in, or not - the difference is that flying past costs a lot more. We're investigating whether our charter flight out towards to Brazil border can incorporate a fly-by.
The canoe trip upstream to the base of the falls is through rainforest, and if you're interested in birds, you'll know that rivers are linear clearings and an ideal opportunity for sightings. As we get closer to the falls, the range of habitats increases; 1000ft sheer cliffs flank the waterways.
The's only one bus a day from the Brazilian border to Boa Vista, so we'll spend a night in Santa Elena de Uairen (Hotel Yakoo), which is on the Venezuelan side about 20km from the frontier. Santa Elena is the starting point for trekkers aiming to scale Roraima tepuy - a six-day round trip which we won't be doing - this time...
Mount Roraima straddles the three borders (Brazil,Guyana,Venezuela), but access is only from Venezuela for trekkers without climbing experience, ropes and heavy-duty back up.
Our journey routes through Brazil and then loops back up to Guyana because a combination of terrain and politics means there's no overland route directly into Guyana
The bus to Boa Vista takes about 3 hours on a paved road. I was last there in 1975, when I remember a newly-built modern frontier town in the middle of open savannah. It will have changed.
So, Venezuelan section is now:
Caracas 1N
Ciudad Bolivar 1N
Canaima/Angel Falls 2N
Santa Elena 1N
Bird lists and Climate charts to follow.
Friday, 25 September 2009
Venezuela Brazil Guianas – projected trip September 2010.
Whilst this trip is likely still to be in the planning stage for the next few weeks, I think it’s useful to allow everyone to see the engineering which goes into the building of the trip. There’s still likely to be a fair amount of jiggling as we ensure that we’re allowing enough days to get from A to B to C and see what there is to see. But here’s some of what Venezuela has to offer.
Caracas airport is about 20 miles from the city, in the coastal suburb of Maiquetia. We have the option of staying near here (since next day we may be flying from the nearby domestic airport to direct to the Angel Falls).
The alternative we may take is to drive up the spectacular mountain motorway to the city itself. This road passes close to the shanty towns from where Venezuela’s president Hugo Chavez garners much of his support. This city of 8 million souls lies 1000m a.s.l. in a long valley between two coastal ranges.
An option we’re considering is getting the bus to Ciudad Bolivar, which gives us a better feel of the lie of the land, and also takes us over the Orinoco by the bridge at the Angostura Narrows. The famous bitters no longer originate from here, though they’ve kept the name.
Caracas is a city ruled by the internal combustion engine – 8 cylinders is no disadvantage when petrol is cheap as chips, and elevated motorways, freeways and expressways seem to dominate every inch of this elongated city.
Either way we end up in the Gran Sabana – a vast and almost roadless region of sheer-sided red sandstone plateaux which is reputed to be the inspiration for Conan Doyle’s Lost world. Sadly, though several places in Latin America have evidence of dinosaur footprints, these flat-topped tepuis have yet to yield any evidence beyond very small lizards.
We’ll be staying a couple of nights at one of the several lodges in the Gran Sabana, and the accommodation is in a pleasant resort where you can swim in the lake from a pink-sand beach. It’s a few years since I was there last – I wonder if the scarlet macaws from the nearby forest are still habituated enough to come and share your breakfast with you.
From the top of Auyan Tepuy tumble the Angel Falls, the world’s highest. We’ll be there towards the end of the wet season, so there’ll be plenty of water – in the dry season the wispy cascades have turned to misty spray after their kilometre fall. There’s a reasonably good chance that the flight into the nearest airport (Canaima) will fly past the falls if the clouds aren’t too many; or possibly when we fly out.
But cloud is quite prevalent in September.
So the plan is to do an all-day canoe trip to the foot of the falls. There’s enough water in the rivers to do this in September. I recommend doing flexibility exercises for a few days before, so you don’t crick your neck looking up. Angel Falls is 979 metres high.
For comparison Canary Wharf is 235m, and the Empire State is 381m. Peanuts.
Caracas airport is about 20 miles from the city, in the coastal suburb of Maiquetia. We have the option of staying near here (since next day we may be flying from the nearby domestic airport to direct to the Angel Falls).
The alternative we may take is to drive up the spectacular mountain motorway to the city itself. This road passes close to the shanty towns from where Venezuela’s president Hugo Chavez garners much of his support. This city of 8 million souls lies 1000m a.s.l. in a long valley between two coastal ranges.
An option we’re considering is getting the bus to Ciudad Bolivar, which gives us a better feel of the lie of the land, and also takes us over the Orinoco by the bridge at the Angostura Narrows. The famous bitters no longer originate from here, though they’ve kept the name.
Caracas is a city ruled by the internal combustion engine – 8 cylinders is no disadvantage when petrol is cheap as chips, and elevated motorways, freeways and expressways seem to dominate every inch of this elongated city.
Either way we end up in the Gran Sabana – a vast and almost roadless region of sheer-sided red sandstone plateaux which is reputed to be the inspiration for Conan Doyle’s Lost world. Sadly, though several places in Latin America have evidence of dinosaur footprints, these flat-topped tepuis have yet to yield any evidence beyond very small lizards.
We’ll be staying a couple of nights at one of the several lodges in the Gran Sabana, and the accommodation is in a pleasant resort where you can swim in the lake from a pink-sand beach. It’s a few years since I was there last – I wonder if the scarlet macaws from the nearby forest are still habituated enough to come and share your breakfast with you.
From the top of Auyan Tepuy tumble the Angel Falls, the world’s highest. We’ll be there towards the end of the wet season, so there’ll be plenty of water – in the dry season the wispy cascades have turned to misty spray after their kilometre fall. There’s a reasonably good chance that the flight into the nearest airport (Canaima) will fly past the falls if the clouds aren’t too many; or possibly when we fly out.
But cloud is quite prevalent in September.
So the plan is to do an all-day canoe trip to the foot of the falls. There’s enough water in the rivers to do this in September. I recommend doing flexibility exercises for a few days before, so you don’t crick your neck looking up. Angel Falls is 979 metres high.
For comparison Canary Wharf is 235m, and the Empire State is 381m. Peanuts.
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