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Stabroek Market
Unintentional vignetting; my camera lens fogged up!
Hotel: Sleep Inn International, Georgetown, Guyana, $65
Flight: Trinidad (POS) to Georgetown (GEO), Caribbean Airlines Woke up at 5 am, our flight wasn't until 7:45 but we wanted to be there a bit before (Our other Caribbean flights had actually been leaving early). There was noone in checkin line, and we went to have a breakfast of a muffin and juice. They started calling our flight, with nearly 2 hrs before departure! We went upstairs where there was a long line to pay departure tax. My passport had been stamped 'transit', so I didn't need to pay it! Still we were in the departure gate over an hour and a half before departure, yet they were already announcing boarding! We all boarded, then proceeded to sit on the ground for an hour! The plane was quite full, it had come in overnight from New York. Not too many tourists, if any onboard. The flight took a little over an hour; we flew in over Guyana, viewing vast forests and the huge Essequibo delta. Hardly any sign of development anywhere; even as we were approaching landing we were flying over rainforest. Stepping off the plane the air was refreshingly cool;
Fish market
Inside Stabroek Market, mainly catfish a surprise from the Caribbean where it had been quite hot. Still humid, it had been raining all morning. Immigration and bag check went quickly and we found a taxi to take us into town, about an hour away. On the way, we passed lots of sugarcane fields, and Dutch-style canal gates. As we approached town, the driver stopped at someone's house for us to change money, which seemed a little dodgy. The guidebooks always warn you Georgetown is dangerous, period. Basically says, don't enter certain parts of town, always take taxis even if only going block, etc. Not reassuring. Guyana seemed a bit of a ramshackle place, many buildings were dilapidated or crumbling, but there were plenty of brand new houses and cars as well. There is a huge population of Guyanese living in New York and elsewhere that send money back. Most of the tourists (and very few), were all originally from Guyana, but now lived (or had lived) overseas. Guyana was originally Dutch, then British until they gained their independence in the 1960's. After slavery was abolished in the mid 1800s, many East Indians were brought over as indentured laborers to work the canefields, this makes for
a unique blend of cultures similar to Trinidad. The Guianas are more Caribbean than Latin; most cultural and transportation links are with the Caribbean or their former colonizers, Holland and France.
I had reserved a hotel in Georgetown, the Sleep Inn had good reviews, but I'd never heard back from them. We went there anyway, and they did have my name. It was a very nice place, just a few blocks from the market and other historical buildings, with free breakfast and internet for $65/night. Scott opted for a room with a fan, while Dean and I shared a double A/C room. We were about to go out and look at the town when it started raining again. After awhile it slowed down, and we got in a taxi to go check out what tour options were available. We went to the Le Meridien hotel to Shell Beach Adventures. I had wanted to go on a tour to the Kaieteur Falls, supposedly the highest single drop waterfall. The tour companies only go if they get enough people, 8 usually, but the plane only holds 10 including the pilot and guide. So they need 8 and only 8 people. It's
St Georges Cathedral
Supposedly the tallest wood building in the world tough to get a tour going midweek, especially during slow (rainy) season. D&S wanted to do a river tour, but we didn't have any luck with that either. We then went to lunch at a place recommended by the LP. It had closed/changed names, but was still very good, the owners were Venezuelan and Belgian. Prices seemed to have gone up, taxis were 300 Guyana dollars ($1.50) when the book said they should have been 0.40. Food prices were a bit more as well, I think lunch was $6 when it should have been $4. Not complaining too much 😊 We walked down through town to the next tour company, only to find out that a trip to Kaieteur had just left that morning, with 2 empty seats!!! Doh. We wandered by St. Georges cathedral, supposedly the tallest wood building in the world. At that point it started pouring rain again, so we holed up in the church until it subsided. We walked back to the nearest hotel to catch a taxi back to our hotel for a bit to regroup. Our taxi driver, Roy, had lived in New York and Suriname, we got his number as he knew the
Inside the cathedral
Magnificient! We came in to escape the rains procedure for getting to the Suriname border. After resting a bit wethen went out again, this time to the Stabroek market. The LP guide describes it as a den of dope smokers, thieves, and other unsavory characters, but it was afternoon and the market was pretty quiet. The market has a huge gingerbread clocktower which dominates the Georgetown skyline. There are no high-rise buildings here and doesn't really feel like a city. Things are somewhat functional, there are traffic lights (new), apparently these were only just put in recently, until then there wasn't a functioning traffic light in the whole country. We saw lots of money had been put into preparation for the Cricket World Cup, lots of brand new hotels and a huge new cricket stadium, but the crowds just never materialized. Someone made some money somewhere though. We stopped by a bar to have a rum&coke and ended up having a long talk with some Guyanese at the next table. One had just come in from New York, he hadn't been back to Guyana since he was 15. That evening, we went out to the Dutch Bottle Cafe, in an old colonial house. Excellent food but service was
Traditional wood buildings
This is a good one; there are lots of gorgeous old wood buildings in town a bit slow. Georgetown is quite dark at night, there are lights on the houses, but no streetlights and no sidewalks. There was also quite a bit of flooded streets/drainage ditches because of the rain. The city sits 7 ft below sea level, and the pumps can't keep up. Just like New Orleans, in fact Georgetown felt much like New Orleans in many ways, but without the French influence.
5-23
Hotel: Sleep Inn International, Georgetown, Guyana, $65 The next day looked much better, the clouds started clearing a bit. We walked around town some more, going back to the market in the morning. A little more activity here, the fish were in (mainly catfish) and fruit sellers. We didn't feel threatened at all, but there were three of us together. Not sure if I would have felt the same going there alone. Back to the tour companies to check on the situation. They had 5 people total (including us) for tomorrow, and needed 8. Maybe they go, maybe they don't. We then caught a taxi out to Splashmins, one of the 'jungle resorts' for tourists around the country, but one of the few accessible by road. Just spent 30
High Court and Town Hall
Queen Vic statue is to the left minutes there taking photos before back into town. We went and had lunch at a Brazil churrascaria, all you can eat meat and a beer for about $12. Yum. We walked through town a bit to the seawall, by this point the sun was out and quite nice. The seawall was deserted except for a few bums sleeping. Someone passed by in a car and told us to be careful. We were really close to the Le Meridien again, walked down there and checked with them. Still only 5 tourists and they were about to cancel the tour the next day. Dejected, we went back to the hotel. We were about to go out again when the tour company called, they had managed to get 8 people together for tomorrow, but we had to go by their office by 5 pm to pay! Luckily it was a short walk away. Afterwards, we went to Pizza Hut for dinner! No McDonalds here, but there is KFC, Church's Chicken, Popeye's and Pizza Hut. But no beef or pork on their pizzas, it was chicken or turkey only. We had the veggie only, but wasn't too great.
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hauteboy
jordan hargrave
I think some people have taken issue with my description of Guyana. There is not a lot of information available either in guidebooks or on the net, and we were there just a short time, so true we weren't able to get an in-depth view. I will say we did really enjoy our visit in Guyana, everyone we met was friendly and the food was very good. Also I loved the old architecture, wooden buildings, etc. The guidebooks do warn about the place, but I think that's unfounded. Regarding the seawall, the LP guide warns against going there or to the Stabroek Market, it but we went to both places anyway just to see for ourselves. While we were at the seawall someone drove by in a car and told us not to hang around there. It was a gorgeous sunny day and noone was around, so we didn't see the reason for their warning!