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La Playa Grande beach, Puerto Colombia
The most gorgeous carribean beach in Latin AmericaI caught an overnight bus from Merida in Venezuela north to Caracas, and met two nice travellers to start off one of my more unusual travel tales. It was a good feeling to be in a city right near the caribbean coast of South America, having travelled to the southern most city in the world Ushuaia in Argentina during 2003. Perhaps it doesn't have the same ring to it as Cape Town to Cairo, but nevertheless I felt it was a memorable achievement. In a bizarre twist I stayed in Caracas for only five minutes, and my story follows...
The travellers were in transit at the Caracas terminal, dear reader, and we parted company as I caught a taxi to Sabana Grande and on to a recommended hostel at 9:00am. The owner didn´t have a room till 7:00pm and suggested I try down the road. I noticed two policemen had jumped off a motorbike and were searching a sketchy character as I passed. They patted him down and soon relieved him of a knife. I´m sure Crocodile Dundee would have said 'that´s not a knife' but the size of his weapon certainly caught my attention, as the coppers dropped it
Simon Bolivar Plaza, Merida
Check out the beautiful christmas decorations on the pavement with a clatter. As an aside I took a taxi ride in Merida earlier, and the cabbie asked me where I was from. When I said Australia I was surprised to learn that he didn´t know a thing about the country, and asked is it cold (I think that may be Austria), where is it, what countries is it close to (he didn´t know New Zealand either), what language is spoken, and what is the population? I responded dutifully but finally got a positive response when I mentioned kangaroos which were, in response to a further question, plentiful and good tucker. It certainly puts things in perspective but as my friend correctly informed me ... your country is very far away!
Conversely another cabbie discovered I´m an Australian, and immediately piped up with a Crocodile Dundee analogy. Yeah, that´s right I thought, after all what else is there in Australia! As a further aside Venezuela is rich in oil reserves, and petrol is so cheap most of the taxi drivers have big old banging Chevy sedans. Any further asides and I may be in danger of sliding off the web page, so it´s time to get
back to the story! OK then, the next hostel had a sign stating no rooms were available, so I went on to a third, and on finally a fourth hostel on the street with no luck. There was a taxi right in front of me, and with no disrespect to the Venezuelan capital and it's inhabitants I was faced with a stark choice. I could either struggle in getting settled in another big city after an inauspicious start, or head out to the caribbean coast which has been a dream of mine since watching the Windies play cricket in the caribbean as a kid. Er, take me back to the bus terminal, thanks driver!
So I headed on to Puerto Colombia on the caribbean coast, and La Playa Grande beach is the most beautiful piece of paradise I've experienced on the trip. The resort town is all coconut palms, sunshine, white sand and warm caribbean waters. I've found going for walks in Venezuela features a surplus of natural beauty. In fact I feel like a judge in a beauty pageant here in Venezuela, but it's not as easy as you think with so many beautiful contestants! There are stunning
Cartagena Old town
Gotcha! I waited for the right moment to capture this horse and buggy natural beauties everywhere in Venezuela, with the women famous for their many triumphs in international beauty pagents.
They say travelling in South America is not all mangoes and sunshine, and my next commute was an arduous thirty hours west along the caribbean coast. I recrossed the border before finally arriving in the northern Colombian city of Cartagena. Instead of overwhelming you with too much detail, suffice it to say I contended with a combination of winding roads, cramped seats, blaring music, several bus changes, overpowering pollution at the terminals, air conditioning set at close to freezing, with seats not reclining on one bus then stuck on full recline on another. My travel experience also included throwing up three times, and up to ten passport checks by soldiers manning military roadblocks close to the Venezuelan border. Clearly they take their job protecting the province against the threat of Colombian guerillas seriously!
Finally I had to face up to a soldier with a large rifle on the Venezuelan border, who took my German travel friend and I into a room, before locking the door and emptying out our bags. A rough English translation of what transpired follows. Soldier with rifle
¨Drop ya daks sport¨ Me ¨What?¨ Him ¨Yar strides cobber, lose ´em¨ Me, looking at gun ¨Er, goodo.¨ The amazing part of travelling is how quickly you recover from these little trials after getting settled in a new destination, and it's wonderful to be in the legendary colonial city of Cartagena during christmas. Before long I checked into a top hostel full of very friendly, helpful and informative travellers.
In summary, Colombia and Venezuela are wonderful travel destinations. They have a different vibe to the countries further south, but are very rewarding because of that difference. I'm hesitant to give a general recommendation because of ongoing security concerns in Colombia stretching to the border with Venezuela. However, providing you take into account the importance of personal security, basically all of you should be here now!
The earth turned to bring us closer. It turned on itself and within us, until it finally brought us together in this dream." Eugenio Montejo
As I continue my travels, until next time it´s signing off for now
Tom
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Anita
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Happy Christmas
Hey, how you going. Shaun and I in BA for xmas, nice but just like a big european city. Hope you have a great xmas mate. Anita x