8 days kajaking in Orinoco Delta

---

Now I'm going to tell you about the most wonderfull trip I've ever experienced! It was the last of all and brought us to orinoco delta, northeast of Venezuela. We had to get up at 4o clock in the morning. on a monday, had a short breakfast, get our drybags with all the stuff for 8days ready and tied the kajaks on the roof of the Jeep. We drove around 5hours to a place called .... where we got everything ready and had lunch. Unfortunately our guids realised by then that we forgot the bread for the sandwiches. A young lady heard that and shared her fresh bread with us, which her father just bought for them! It's unbelievable how helpfull people are here. Afterwards we started paddeling gently down the stream- the beginning of 160km paddeling! It was kind of a small river, floating plants called bora on the sides and calm water. After around 5hours we arrived in the first camp, which was a roof made by palmleaves and branches. We hung up our hamocks and a mosquitonet around it. As soon as you get on land, the mosquitos start to eat you. So we had as soon as possible to wear longsleeved shirts and pants and take a bath in mosquito repellent! The guids told us then that there are usually more mosquitos in this area, we would be lucky! I wondered how I could have survived more, I already got crazy by how it was! After dinnerwe could go baba hunting (baba's are like small crocodiles) with the small wooden boat which carried our food to all the camps. It was a wonderful hour on the river!! No mosquitos, stars all around you, some soft pink clouds infront of you still from the sunset before and a skyline of palmtrees at the riversides! After some unsuccesfull tryings, we finally caught a small baba! We observed it a bit and let it back to the water afterwards. Back at the camp we got ready to go to sleep (what includes going to toilet in the bush which causes mosquitobites on unfortunate places). Finally lying in the hamock, thinking back to a thrilling day, listening to all the sounds of the nature around you- all this makes you just very happy and gracefull!
We spent the next day in the same place! A guide hung up a robe with a stick in the middle to a tree over the water! An other girl and I took our "morning shower" by climbing up the tree, holding on the stick and swing and jump in the water. After breakfast and a mosquito repellent bath, we went in the jungle to collect wood to build a table. We had to cut some small trees witha big and sharp knife! We girls felt so strong after this manly exercise! 😊So finally on lunch time, we were able to prepare the food on the just built table! I even learned to open cans with a big knive without cutting off the fingers.. 😉We spent the whole afternoon by playing with the robe and the stick in the water. We enjoyed the time there so much we didn't think about time at all. I realised how much fun you can have with so simple things in nature and that's exactly what I want to learn the kids from the generation nowadays! That was an other great day!After breakfast of day three we paddeled further for around six hours. The next camp was in a lagoon, with very warm water and sweet water dolphins, which are actually quiet ugly.. 😊 I had already a lot of bladders on my hands from paddeling and playing with the robe the day before. But i still enjoyed kajaking so much. It's a special feeling sitting on the surface of the water, being part of the whole nature around you, watching the papagays flying over you, listening to the tucans and sayi g hello to the monkys! The nightstay was an old rosty roof and exactly as we wanted to eat there was a whole popularion of mosquitos attacking us. So we all eat dinner in our mosquitonet and called it a day. We were all exhausted and knew that we're going to stand up at three the following day, so it wasn't a problem to sleep already at 6 o clock! Quite scarying here was as I took my clothes out of my drybag I saw something brown in it. As I looked more precise I realised that it was a scorpion. Luckily I didn't touch it as I took out the clothes... Like I just said, we got up at in the middle of the night on day four and started paddeling with the nightsky around us! I loved all the stars and the moon, which hung the other side round, like a smile, in the sky! After the sunrise we had breakfast on the kajaks floating down the river, all tighten together. Then we had to continue paddeling for hours and hours till we had lunch and then further again! We kajaked 10 hours this day- started in the dark and arrived in the dark! It was one of my best days though, full of emotions! We slept in a school this night with a family who had their hamocks next to ours! I was wondering how they can just live in the school, but the guid told me that they think: oh a building, so we can sleep here! Why not.. The next morning we paddeled shortly across the river to a posh lodge. It was quite strange to see here such a clean place and I realised that i prefered it much more how we travelled and slept. We experienced things that those tourists couldn't get the chance to. From this place we only had to paddle an hour further to the next nightstay. It was with an indigen family and we had our small roof on the river. It was the lovliest stay of all! Imagine you wake up in your hamock, seeing the sun rising infront of you, over the river you sleep above. It was incredible nice and I can't really express how I felt in this place. We stayed there teo nights without kajaking. So the next day we enjoyed with swimming, fishing, trying to make fire with wood, listening to the story of the indigen grandmother and just having a relaxing day. During the trip we always had to filter some riverwater in a kanister, where they put chlortabs in it, that it gets drinkable. It was quite interesting to drink brown and strange tasting water.. 😉 The second last day we paddeled against the stream to the next camp. It was an incredible hot day and quite exhausting till we were finally there. Everyone was tired and wether red ore brown from the sun.. This small village was already a bit mor civilised and nobody really liked it. There was a lot of garbage everywhere and that's it. We had some pasta, watched the sunset and went to hamock again. We started paddeling in the night again the last day. It was emptymoon, but again thousand of stars.. You feel so small down there in the river when you see the enormous starsky all around you! Wow and this time the sunrise was amazing! The sky was all red and the sun came like a red fireball over the riverside infront of us! All this very special and different moments during the whole trip makes you feel overwhelmed by all the emotions coming up in you. It's like in a different world where everything is alright. Maybe like paradise.. Unfortunately the city where the jeep was going to pick us up came closer. Our guides waited there for us with a cold beer as we arrived! We all hugged us, being proud of surviving 160km of kajaking together.. I will never forget about this very best trip.....

---