[Amazon River Delta, Brazil]
21-22 September (San Antonio de Tachira, Venezuela à Caracas, Venezuela)
[El Hatillo, Caracas, Venezuela]
I closed the last post with my not-quite-legal entry into red Chavez territory after a hair pulling experience at the border. This inevitably led to my time on Venezuelan roads to be spent devising fresh tactics with which to avoid having to show my non-existent motorcycle importation documentation at the numerous police and military checkpoints. In the end this proved to be relatively simple once I noticed that the laziness of these underpaid government officials inhibited them from attempting to block the small shoulder at all of these checkpoints. This space was large enough for my bike to pass through undetected in the shadow of whatever vehicle happened to be stopped there. By the time the officials had noticed that I had passed them by, it would be too late for them to signal for me to pull over. There again I relied on these loyal Chavistas’ unflagging laziness to keep them from chasing after me. Some of you who have been carefully reading my avoidance tactic would have picked up on the fact that it contains a significant weakness. That is, it requires that another vehicle already be stopped at the checkpoint in order to work. This fortunately never proved to be an issue until the very last checkpoint located in the remotely situated Canaima National Park before crossing into Brazil, but I’ll tell that part a bit later.
But briefly back to Venezuela itself. The first thing any foreigner driving a vehicle usually notices—unless you’re from UAE or Saudi Arabia—is how cheap gas is here. Filling up my 4 gallon tank (13 liters) cost me a whopping 1.25 Bolivars (that's about $0.25 USD or 0.15 GBP). However, the quality of the gas is so poor that my gas mileage dropped from 220 miles to 160 miles on a full tank. I was told by a local that Venezuelan gas contains half as many gas molecules per unit with fuel found in the rest of the world. Moreover, the gas was so dirty that my injectors clogged up after only 400 miles and required me to use fuel injector cleaner from there onwards with every tank fill in Venezuela. Staying on the topic of gas, many know that Venezuela is the seventh largest holder of the world’s oil reserves. One would think that fuel shortages would never be an issue in this country, right? Wrong. It happens every day, or at least every day I was in the country. I always knew when I was approaching a gas station because I would begin to see a row of cars and trucks parked by the side of the road. All of which were in line patiently waiting for the gas station to receive the next fuel shipment. It’s clear that Chavez has been spending a little too much time talking to Fidel inasmuch as Cuba’s problems are starting to emerge in Venezuela.
[Trip planning note. Anyone traveling to Venezuala should avoid taking out money from ATMs with a foreign credit/debit card at all costs. Chavez has artificially set the official exchange rate at 2:1 (Bolivars:USD) while the real exchange rate on the black market is at 5:1 (Bolivars:USD). Any purchases made with a foreign debit or credit card will be charged according to the 2:1 rate. The solution is to take in enough cash, preferably USD or Euro but Colombian Pesos and Brazilian Reales are usually accepted, and then exchange with a reputable street vendor (befriend a local for this information).]
But all this negative talk of petroleum and Chavez shouldn’t give you the impression that I had anything but a fabulous time in Venezuela. In fact, Venezuela is one of the few countries on this trip that I feel require a second and even third visit in order to more fully appreciate this amazing land of magnificent landscapes and dramatic terrain which reminds one of scenes from Jurassic Park.
I had my first real close call on the drive from the border to Caracas. I came around a sharp corner and found myself staring at two semis heading straight at me with nowhere to go other than off the road. The problem was that there was a nice cliff on my right and a solid rock wall on my left. I opted for the cliff side, slammed on the brakes and cross my fingers. The truck passed about an inch from my face and then the accompanying gust of wind nearly blew me completely off the side of mountain—the rear wheel was literally starting to slide down the side. I briefly contemplated turning back and chasing down the trucker but knew it would do no good. About 36 hours after entering Venezuela I was finally in the capital.
In Caracas I stayed with a couple whom I had met at a London Business School event in London. In Caracas I stayed with the Bethencourt family who opened their beautiful home to me and went to great lengths to make my short stay with them as enjoyable as possible. My arrival also happened to coincide with a dinner party Carlos and Anna Maria were hosting for 25 prominent regional business leaders to include the head partner at McKinsey’s regional office and the President of Citibank in Venezuela just to name a few. With such erudition at the table, I was assured a dynamic discussion on Hugo Chavez’s latest attempts to oust any remnants of capitalism and stamp out any remaining entrepreneurial spirit in Venezuela. The mood for the future was understandably glum that evening yet their love for all that is Venezuela shone through.
24 September (Caracas, Venezuela à Cuidad Guyana, Venezuela)
[Getting new tires put on before entering Canaima National Park]
After Caracas, I made my way to Canaima National Park for which Venezuela is probably best known—aside from producing a plethora of beauty queens. The drive from Caracas to Canaima was too long to do in a single day so I had a quick stopover in Cuidad Guyana before continuing on. This is a good point to continue with the gasoline theme I had started this post with. I mentioned how most gas stations either had huge waiting lines or were closed. The lines at the pump were mainly an effect of military soldiers physically regulating how much fuel a vehicle could take on in the case the gas station was close to running dry. After two attempts of trying to fill up by employing monetary persuasive tactics, I decided to use a different approach acquired through the quiet observation of the locals. I realized that there were black market sources of gasoline that the locals would turn to when normal sources ran dry. So from there onwards, whenever I needed to fill up, I would first ask any of the locals in the village who sold gas nearby and would then be directed to the gas delivery point through sophisticated navigational guidance such as, “…then at the third banyan tree turn left, when you get to the house with 3 rusted cars on the front lawn, pull in there and ask the woman with a long weave to call for Juan…” Below are two clips showing you the actual procedure which I found myself repeating throughout much of Venezuela:
[Filling up in Venezuela -- Part I]
[Filling up in Venezuela -- Part II]
25 September (Cuidad Guyana, Venezuela à Paraitepuy, Venezuela)
About two hours after leaving Cuidad Guyana, I entered what was to be the most scenic part of the trip to date, Canaima National Park. The park is characterized by tabletop mountains (call tepuis) of all shapes and sizes. There are literally dozens of notable waterfalls with the mother of them all being Angel Falls. It’s a five day journey to Angel Falls from where I was in the park and I was unfortunately several days behind schedule so I had to skip the falls till the next time when I’ll be able to combine a BASE jump into it all. Instead I placated myself with a wandering around Mount Roraima. However, to get there required a long two-hour technically-challenging drive to a small Indian village called Paraitepuy. Appearently a hard rain the week before had cut hundreds of meter-deep ruts throughout the length of the 40km road leading to the village. Upon arrival, I was rewarded by meeting two local indians who were headed out on the preparatory phase of a hunt for an upcoming celebration. I honestly had no idea what they were asking me to do but figured they looked harmless enough so I tagged along anyway. The two indians I was with were responsible for settings a series of strategically placed fires which would then drive whatever furry animals happened to be living in the middle, toward a group of hunters with rifles waiting for them at the other end of the fire funnel. I helped them start fires with some homemade torches for several hours (unfortunately the video was to dark to be of any good). Afterwards I joined them for a meal of meat-stuffed arepas and fried plantains around a fire outside their hut.
[Scenes from Canaima National Park, Venezuela]
26 September (Paraitepuy, Venezuela à Boa Vista, Brazil)
[Mount Roraima, Canaima National Park, Venezuela]
27 September (Boa Vista, Brazil à Annai, Guyana)
[Seen shortly after entering Guyana. LBS students should note the advert and think back on marketing]
I left Boa Vista at daybreak in the hope of making it to the northern coast of Guyana by nightfall. It was a short-lived dream which was once again crushed by the realities of the incredible inefficiencies found at these customs offices. Leaving Brazil could have been a relatively straightforward process had I not nearly gotten into an all out fight with the head customs officer. Allow me to explain. The approach to the border was somewhat confusing and I thought I had stopped at the post office instead of the customs house. I went to turn around when some guy in civilian clothes impeded my passage and began yelling at me in Portuguese. I told him I was trying to find the customs office to which he responded by trying to kick my motorcycle over with me on it for no apparent reason—I later figured out that he was half drunk. I quickly got off the bike and placed him on the ground. The other customs officers then came over and held us apart after he got up. It was a few minutes later that I realized that the drunk in civilian clothes I had just thrown to the ground was in fact the head officer in charge of the entire operation. I nearly started laughing. My first thought was that I wished I had gotten something to eat beforehand because this was going to take a while to sort out. After having to tear my bike down to the chassis and put back together again for the most thorough inspection I had undergone, I finally received my exit stamp and could proceed across the bridge to Guyana. I never did see the unruly official again. When I got to the other side I was pleased to find that I was the only one there trying to enter Guyana and mistakenly thought that the entry process would be a relatively straightforward process. The first delay I had was in getting insurance. I needed Guyanese insurance before they would give me the permit so I drove into village and found the only guy in town who sold it. In fact, he turned out to be the only guy that sold anything in town. When I did find Albert, he was on his way to his farm and wouldn’t be back for several hours. So I sat around his hotel lobby till he returned. Once I got my insurance papers I went back to office where I hoped my permit would be nearly ready for pick up. Wrong. The customs guy had taken a long lunch and still hadn’t even started on my paperwork. I sat there for another three hours and watched him eke out a single piece of paper with maybe ten pieces of actual information that needed to be transcribed. I had arrived at the border at 8 a.m. and was free to go on the other side at 4 p.m.. It’s too bad that it so difficult to convince governments to privatize these processes. Anyhow, with the few hours of daylight remaining, I made it as far as Annai, Guyana. The entire road from Lethem to Georgetown, Guyana is considered by many adventure motorcyclists to be one of the worst in the world. It’s pure dirt, mud, and sand with potholes large enough to house small families. Rivers and streams are bridged using rotting planks of wood which are rarely nailed down. I expected everytime I had to cross over one of these makeshift bridges to have one of these planks collapse under my weight and end up in the water below. I do have to say however that the ride from Lethem to Annai, Guyana made the entire trip worth it.
[On the road to Annai, Guyana]
[Rapunni Savannah, Guyana]
By the time I got to Annai I was covered in a thin film of red dust and happily exhausted. I found a covered place where I could set up my hammock for the night, washed up in a river nearby and headed to the only restaurant for dinner and entertainment. As soon as I got there I made friends with the Brazilian owner of the place who had immigrated to Guyana five years earlier. After getting to know each other as best we could considering the language barrier, he introduced me to the local alcoholic beverage of choice: a home-brewed potent substance made from casaba and yucca.
[Video of me having a taste of whatever was in that can]
If you didn’t catch it the first time, play the video again and pay close attention to the gentleman’s mouth when he smiles. He only had one tooth in his upper jaw. When I asked him if the stuff was safe to drink, he assuaged my trepidation by telling me that he had been drinking it his whole life and he was perfectly fine, followed by a big toothless smile of course. I assume you all will now understand my hesitation to imbibe as freely as my host—he and his toothless companion finished the bucket an hour later. As of this post I thankfully still have all my teeth. After the alcohol hit him, he introduced me to his twelve year old daughter whom he suggestively mentioned was approaching a marrying age. I politely complimented her looks and asked if she had started drinking from the bucket yet. Just kidding. I told him that I was already married with children back home to keep the situation from getting uncomfortable.
[Dogs named Obama and Bush beating up on a cat named Putin at the restaurant in Annai, Guyana]
After several hours of playing Guyanese checkers and watching bad Brazilian rap videos with a brief interlude to feed baby goats, I headed back to my hammock for get some sleep. For the first time during this trip, I didn't need to attach the rainfly to the hammock as I had found a spot well protected from the rain. Well, I found out later that night that the rainfly should have been used regardless. There were several hundred bats living on the overhang above me which I hadn't noticed when I set up camp. Around midnight they became very active as bats normally do at night. Shortly before falling completely asleep, I was aroused by a light sprinkling of liquid on my face. I thought at first that it might have been the wind sweeping in some moisture from the outside but somehow I knew that that couldn't be the case. The second and third time confirmed my suspicions: bat urine. And to be honest, I was too tired to be bothered to put the rainfly up so I endured a night of bats urinating all over me unconsciously hoping that scientists had discovered that bat urine was good for preventing cancer or something. Their bladders ran dry around four in the morning.
28 September (Annai, Guyana à Georgetown, Guyana)
After a thorough cleansing in the river, I packed up camp and headed out towards Georgetown. I still had another eight hours of hard riding to do before getting to civilization but was encouraged by yesterday’s breathtaking ride through the savannah. The dirt road on this section was marginally better and I was able to average about 40-50 mph on the hard-packed dirt. After a river crossing with a barge, I was in the deep rainforest of Guyana. I was just about smack dead in the center of Guyana, about four hours away from Georgetown, when the one thing that I feared could ruin the rest of the trip occurred. I had an accident. I was going about 50 mph (80 kph) when out of nowhere the road went from hard-packed dirt to loose sand about two feet deep. For those non-riders, sand has a similar effect on controllability as ice. Unless you go into deep sand very slow with near flat tires, there is nearly no way to control the bike. The whole chain of events lasted maybe three seconds. The back end started fishtailing increasingly violently until one of the panniers—sideboxes made of aluminum—hit the sand hard enough to cause the back end to buck like a bull, in the process ejecting me off the bike while the motorcycle flipped back-to-front landing upside down in the sand.
[Insert helmet cam video of the crash (corrupted video file to be professionally recovered)]
I did a quick self check for injuries while still lying on the ground and then got up to better assess the damage to myself and the bike. I thought the bike was completely done for. As for me, aside from some tasty road rash packed full of sand all over my body, I had a deep pain in my collarbone and thought it was either broken or dislocated due to the fact that one end was pushing out of my shoulder, all the while very cognizant of the fact that my body was pumped full of adrenaline which was undoubtedly veiling other injuries. I started removing the luggage off the bike so I could have half a chance at digging the bike out of the sand when I heard a vehicle approach from behind. I saw the driver of the pickup truck hit the same pit of sand and nearly spin out of control and slam into the same spot I was at. I could see three guys in the bed of pickup hanging on for dear life. A little background on Guyana. This is the only country during this trip that I was mildly concerned about. The reports of violence, murders, smuggling and kidnapping activity easily make it the most dangerous country in all of Latin America at this time. Because the country is so underdeveloped, corrupt, completely lacking in infrastructure, and “blessed” with an abundance of natural resources, there is little to inhibit criminal activity of any sort. It was with this in mind and my right hand on the butt of a blade that I approached this beat up ‘80s Ford Ranger pickup. The older gentleman in the driver’s seat could have been Sam Elliot’s body double.
I spotted the U.S. Army’s 9th Cavalry emblem on his 10 gallon hat and blew a sigh of relief when he started speaking with an American accent. His name was Chris Stalnaker and it turned out that he was an old gold miner from Arizona who had moved to Guyana many years ago in the hopes of striking it rich. He had his crew from the back of the pickup help me get the bike back on two wheels and to my complete surprise it started without a sputter a few minutes later. A toast to reliable German engineering! A quick inspection of the bike revealed the following damage:
[Chris Stalnaker, gold miner and good friend]
I spotted the U.S. Army’s 9th Cavalry emblem on his 10 gallon hat and blew a sigh of relief when he started speaking with an American accent. His name was Chris Stalnaker and it turned out that he was an old gold miner from Arizona who had moved to Guyana many years ago in the hopes of striking it rich. He had his crew from the back of the pickup help me get the bike back on two wheels and to my complete surprise it started without a sputter a few minutes later. A toast to reliable German engineering! A quick inspection of the bike revealed the following damage:
- Busted windshield
- Both side view mirrors broken off with the female threads stripped out
- Bent brake lever
- Headlamp assembly badly bent to the left
- Left turn signal destroyed
- Rear frame assembly bent to the left including several large chassis bolt heads busted off
[Bike damage]
But the motorcycle was drivable after removing all the gear off the back end. At this point the adrenaline started working its way out my system and the ache in my collarbone began to intensify. I had a few vials of morphine in my emergency first aid kit which I had gotten from an old military medic friend of mine for just this sort of thing. I gave myself a very small injection. It was just enough to allow me to drive without passing out till I got to the nearest hospital which was, according to Chris, in Georgetown. He offered to slowly follow behind me to ensure that I made it safely. That was one of the longest drives of my life. I kept the bike in second gear the whole time as there was no way I could manipulate the clutch with my left hand. The morphine started wearing off around the second hour and I had to stop and vomit several times from a combination of the pain, heat and system shock. After finally making it to Georgetown and dropping off my bike and things at Chris’s house, he drove me to the hospital but the emergency room doctor was not there so I was told to return in the morning. An on-call emergency doctor who isn’t there, that’s useful. The next morning I went straight to an orthopedic surgeon that Chris knew and there the x-rays revealed that two out of three of my left collarbone’s connecting ligaments were most likely torn. X-rays don’t actually show connective tissue damage but tore ligaments is really the only way that the bone could have been in the position it was and still is. The only solution is surgery. Problem is that after surgery I would be immobile for 4-6 weeks, i.e. not able to drive a motorcycle at all, which meant that I would have to leave the motorcycle in Guyana and fly to Buenos Aires in order to make it on time for classes to start to then deal with the motorcycle at another time. Moreover, Guyana isn’t particularly well known for professional medical care. This was obviously not an attractive option. Another option was to ship the motorcycle to Buenos Aires ($2000 USD), fly back to the U.S. or London where I could get costless quality medical care. The last option I contemplated was to finish the drive to Buenos Aires in my current condition assuming the swelling would dissipate enough to allow me to manipulate the clutch if only briefly. I had a few days to mull my options over while I repaired the damage on the bike.
I spent the next two days going back and forth to the Guyanese hardware stores looking for temporary repair solutions for the bike. With the help of Chris and one of his employees Rocco, I was able to patch the bike back together in respectable fashion. For the hardest part, we used ropes and pulleys for the construction of an improvised chassis straightener in order to straighten out the rear end just enough to extract and insert new chassis bolts. Two days and various makeshift repair materials later, the bike was once again drivable. A short test drive revealed an unpleasant sound from the engine which I suspected to be a malfunctioning timing chain tensioner, but to repair that would have required more time and tools than I had at my disposal.
[Rocco helping me with repairs]
Over the course of those two days, Chris and his friend Joan revealed to me a brief glimpse into Guyanese life. Chris, a very loquacious fella, spent many hours describing every problem and nuance associated with gold mining in what many consider to be the lawless Old West of South America. I learned everything from the main causes of so much murder and violence, the latest creative techniques being employed to smuggle drugs from Colombia through Guyana and then onwards, to who exactly needs to be bribed in order to have any chance of surviving in business dealings. One of the many stories that came out in the process was that Rocco had killed several people in the defense of Chris’s mining territory—which is always under dispute—and Chris spent several years and thousands of dollars in bribe money to get him off the hook. And apparently a contract is still out on Rocco’s head. That was reassuring information as I slept in the room next to him. As a side note, one can have someone killed in Guyana for a mere $250 USD. If you negotiate properly you might even be able to get a 2 for 1 discount.
On the other hand, Rocco’s mother Joan was a great storyteller and recounted countless stories from her childhood growing up in the Guyanese jungle. I have recorded one of these stories and placed it here for your listening enjoyment. Note that her manner of speaking is very typical of Guyana. I’m not a sufficiently knowledgeable in linguistics to classify the language as a pigeon or creole form of English, but you will probably note the lack of the use “me” where the pronoun “I” should be used. And some sentences are structured in subject-object-verb format like in many Germanic languages instead of the English subject-verb-object format, while some words are of Hindi origin—or so I was told. Note that Joan mentions a “bushmaster” in her story which is a type of poisonous snake found in the region.
[Insert sound file of Joan storytelling]
So at this point during my extended stay in Guyana, the swelling in my shoulder had gone down significantly and I decided that I could and would finish the drive on it.
[A horse just about to fall into a canal, Guyana]
1 October (Georgetown, Guyana à Paramaribo, Suriname)
[One of the many Chinese restaurants somewhere in Suriname]
After saying farewell to Chris, Joan and Rocco, to whom I am forever indebted to for the kindness and hospitality they showed me those difficult three days, I headed to the river border to cross over to Suriname. Here I had to make another river crossing but at least this time is was a real ferry instead of a canoe or longboat. Passing through customs and immigration with the motorcycle was a relatively straightforward process this time, even if it did take the average four hours.
[Trip planning note. You must purchase vehicular insurance in Georgetown before heading to Suriname because there is no place to purchase it at the border like in most other countries. Send me a PM and I will send you the details.]
When I arrived in Suriname the first thing I noticed was that the roads were actually paved—albeit poorly at best, a godsend for my injuries. The second thing I noticed was that an inordinately high percentage of the populous seemed to be highly intoxicated, and it was still morning that I made this observation. When I stopped for lunch at the only open establishment, a Chinese restaurant, I was approached by yet another drunk begging for money for more booze. While I quietly enjoyed my chowmein noodles with roasted goat meat, the drunk must have thought that my motorcycle was an amusement ride and got right on. I went over and asked him to dismount but he refused. After I used physical force to remove him, he became rather agitated as I had apparently been the source of a buzz kill. This all started to attract the attention of a crowd. Two men standing nearby egged me on to rough the drunk up by telling me that he was crazy and needed a good whipping, but all I wanted to do was finish my meal and get out of there. The drunk eventually became distracted by his unfinished bottle of run and calmed down at which point the two guys who had attempted to instigate a fight, identified themselves to me as the local police, got into their police pickup truck and drove off.
[Macaw overseeing some construction work in Suriname]
I skipped all the sightseeing I had planned to do here as I was in too much physical discomfort to want to prance around taking pictures. I spent the night in Paramaribo with plans to head into French Guiana early the next morning. From what I saw of Paramaribo, it seemed that the only thing to do was gamble at one of the many casinos found in the downtown area and I was in no mood for that. If your thinking of come here, I’ld think twice. Service is terrible and everything is unjustifiably overpriced. I would recommend French Guiana or even Guyana for a more raw and feral experience.
[Sinnamary, French Guiana]
2 October (Paramaribo, Suriname à Cayenne, French Guiana)
[Maroni River, Suriname]
I left Paramaribo in the early morning in order to make it to the only daily ferry crossing into French Guiana. After another uneventful ferry crossing, I was on French soil. Here I will happily deviate from my typical negative assessment of the customs/immigration procedure and say that the French here got it right. It took me an entire five minutes to get the paperwork for my motorcycle process before I was promptly on my way to the capital, Cayenne. Fuel was expensive ($5/gal) but the roads were immaculate. When I arrived in Cayenne later that day I had a very difficult time finding a hotel that wasn’t fully booked. I eventually found the only available room in Cayenne at a small but very charming hotel run by a sweet old lady.
At the reception desk I met a very friendly French girl named Sarah who had recognized me from the many hours I had spent driving around looking for a hotel room. She explained to me that there was a French movie being filmed near Cayenne, “600 Kilograms of Pure Gold”, and that the film crew had booked most hotel rooms in city. It turned out that she was also on the special effects team and later introduced me to most of the crew which happened to be celebrating nearby. After a few of them had heard about my accident they were immediately on the phone calling people in the area. Within half an hour an orthopedic surgeon and a bike mechanic appeared at the restaurant offering their assistance. After the surgeon realized that I needed to drive to Buenos Aires, he gave me some more medication for the pain and wished me luck. The bike enthusiast, Claude, and I spent a while swapping travel advice as he was planning on driving up to Canada later this year. After a while he offered to help me make some more repairs to bike as some of the temporary fixes I had made were starting for fall apart.
[Hotel owner in Cayenne, French Guiana]
[Cayenne streets at night]
3 October (Cayenne, French Guiana à St. George, French Guiana)
The next morning I made my way over to Claude’s workshop. He spent his time professionally repairing my front fender while I fabricated a new windshield from an old piece of plexiglass and fabricated some rubber spacers from a used piece of conveyor belt. Afterwards Claude popped open a bottle of scotch, invited over some friends, and in typical French Guianese fashion, we spent the rest of the morning relaxing and playing billiards.
[Sink plumbing in French Guiana]
As much as I wanted to hang out in Cayenne for a while, the clock was ticking and my collarbone wasn’t getting any better so I said my goodbyes to Claude and his friends and made my way to the French Guiana-Brazil border.
Unfortunately by the time I arrived, immigration had already closed up shop for the night and wouldn't open till morning so I found myself a hotel room and made myself comfortable in the sleepy town of St. George. As is typical of most border towns, this one was teeming with French and Brazilians alike. While having dinner I met a few Brazilian girls who invited me to a party one the other side of the river, so off I went.
My previous comment about those very friendly, “passionate” Brazilians in Boa Vista was once again confirmed as the party was teeming with samba, caipiniñas and very little clothing. It was like Spring Break in the U.S. only I’m guessing that it’s nearly every day in Brazil. But I had a long drive through the Amazon in the morning so I made my way back rather early to get a good night’s rest.
[A typical scene throughout most of Suriname and French Guiana (St. George, French Guiana)]
[The other side of the river from French Guiana (Oiapoque, Brazil)]
My previous comment about those very friendly, “passionate” Brazilians in Boa Vista was once again confirmed as the party was teeming with samba, caipiniñas and very little clothing. It was like Spring Break in the U.S. only I’m guessing that it’s nearly every day in Brazil. But I had a long drive through the Amazon in the morning so I made my way back rather early to get a good night’s rest.
4-5 October (St. George, French Guiana à Macapu, Brazil)
That morning I got my exit stamp from the police in French Guiana and then asked around and negotiated till I found a long boat to take me across the river for 20 Reales ($10 USD).
[Video clip of the boat crossing from French Guiana to Brazil]
Once on the Brazilian side, I discovered to my dismay that the customs office was closed for the holiday. I was looking at two option: (1) waste another day waiting for the proper paperwork or (2) once again drive through another country without papers trying to avoid police stops. Oiapoque seemed like a charming town but I wasn't about to spend another minute there. And so off I went to Macapu where I would hopefully be able to find a boat that would take me the 500 kilometers along the almighty Amazon River to Belem. The road to Macapu consisted of 250 km of unpaved road and 250 km of paved road. It took me the better part of the day to get through the unpaved section as it was rife with potholes and the such.
[On the road to Macapu, Brazil]
Just as I had made it onto pavement and the sun was setting, I noticed a brand new BMW GS1200 motorcycle with all the trimming parked by the side of the road. I had found another traveling motorcyclist so I turned around to introduce myself. The rider was named Orlando and he was an older wealthy Brazilian who was headed into French Guiana and Suriname for a short two week ride. He was accompanied by a young French doctor named Florien whom he had apparently run across earlier that day. I couldn't figure out how the doctor was accompanying Orlando because there didn’t appear to be any room on the bike for a second rider. That’s when the back end of this large truck-motor home, which was parked right next to us, opened up to reveal a hydraulic lift and a compartment for two large motorcycles. It turned out to be Orlando’s support vehicle.
And while he loaded his BMW into the truck, his driver/butler/assistant served us all glasses of scotch and a plate of cheese right there by the side of the road. The whole thing was quite surreal. Here I was in the midst of the Amazon basis drinking scotch with a Brazilian and a French guy discussing Obama’s current track record. I couldn’t help but laugh to myself. This is what the trip was all about. I decided to spend the night in the town and get to know my two new friends a bit better. Orlando really enjoyed his scotch as their seemed to be an endless supply of bottles coming out of his truck before and after dinner. By the end of dinner Orlando had gotten both Florien and I nearly completely drunk. Orlando then decided it would be a good idea to go in search of whatever nightlife the town had to offer all the while Arthur, the servant, complained that he had to drive in the morning. A little bit more color on Orlando. He’s what I like to call a fair-weather quasi-adventure motorcyclist. He never rides in the rain, never rides at night, and more important, never rides without his fully-stocked-with-every-luxury-possible support truck following close behind. Whenever he gets mildly tired, he loads the bike in the truck and sleeps while the driver continues on. Well, back to the story. It was a small town, so we didn’t have to go far to find the only club. Once we got there Orlando was like a hormone-driven machine. He immediately scoped out the oldest, least attractive women in the club and brought them over to us like a lioness bringing home downed prey for her cubs. He must have told these women that we were desperately seeking company or something because they confidently assumed that we were very interested. Florien and I spent the next ten minutes or so extricating ourselves from their claws and then found a corner in the club away from Orlando and his group of witches. Good intentions on Orlando’s part, poor execution.
[Orlando's support vehicle]
5-7 October (Macapu, Brazil à Belem, Brazil)
[Harbor in Santana, Brazil]
[Kids playing near Macapu, Brazil]
I finished the ride to Macapu in four hours and easily found the place Orlando had suggested for finding boats to Belem. After loading up my bike on the boat and paying 200 Reales ($100 USD), off I was to Belem along the Amazon.
[Scene along the Amazon River]
The two-day ride along the Amazon was not only a well needed rest but also a highlight of the trip for me. Apart from being the only foreigner on a barge with about 50 other Brazilians, I also seemed to be the main attraction for all the kids and even some of the adults. One in particular (pictured below) was so curious of everything that I did that he did not leave my side the entire two days. He even had his mother move his hammock next to mine. Throughout the length of the journey along the Amazon, the boat would stop at all the waterside villages to drop off and pick up passengers. The boat I was on was also carrying foodstuffs like watermelon, casaba and palm oil which would be traded to these waterside villagers by having them come alongside in their small canoes while we were still moving at a decent clip and then conduct the trade. It all reminded me of my navy days and the underway replenishments alongside aircraft carriers and large cargo vessels although clearly on a different scale.
[More scenes along the Amazon]
[Trip planning note. Many people will tell you that you can find a boat to Belem in Macapu but in actuality boats to Belem only leave from a nearby town called Puerto Santana. Moreover, most of these operate on a two-part basis. Meaning that on some small island you will have to transfer to another boat which will take you the rest of the way. Many boat owners will try to cheat you out of more money by saying that the fare had gone up while the boat was in transit. I was able to avoid paying any more money by publicly insulting the would-be swindling boat captain in several languages until he desisted. Try it, it might work for you.]
7-9 October (Belem, Brazil à Brasilia, Brazil)
[Riding near the Amazon river delta, Brazil]
On the morning of the third day, I was safely in Belem and making my way to Brasilia. Two days and a few thousand kilometers later, I was just three hours from Brasilia when the engine noise that had appeared after the accident in Guyana, culminated in engine failure. After hitching a ride back to the previous town I had just passed, I was able to find a local whose cousin was the area’s tow truck driver. Knowing that the only solution to my predicament lie at the BMW dealership in Brasilia, I reluctantly dished out $500 USD for the three-hour tow. As luck would have it, I arrived at an ill-timed hour. It was Friday afternoon and Monday was a holiday. The dealership’s manager however was incredibly helpful and promised to have a diagnosis complete before his guys went home for the weekend. It turned out that the problem required a part be flown in from Sao Paulo but the good news was that my bike would definitely be ready by Tuesday.
9-13 October (Brasilia, Brazil)
Four days in Brasilia. That’s about three days too many for this colorless capital. I’ve spent my days catching up on films at the local cinema and improving my Portuguese with the locals. That's it for now. My next post will be from Buenos Aires.
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