almost a lap of South America

So, the decision was made, and off to Venezuela we went. As we approached the border from Colombia, we started to see how poor the area right by the border was. We understood a lot of Venezuelan refugees were living in makeshift houses that they built from stocks and stones. Some of them survived from fuel smuggling from Venezuela as it's so much cheaper there.

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The finished item....
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oil industry executives...
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Fuel forecourts.....
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Even though Chavez is long gone, his image is still all over the place.
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The large roads had a funny feature, it was like there used to be toll booths that got removed, but they left the main structure on the road.
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Sarah getting a hundred questions from some kids. They dont see too many tourists on the route we took, which was to avoid all the large cities.
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For the first hundred km or so into Venezuela there were shortages / delays at the fuel stations.
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We did love seeing the old cars.
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I remember these in Ireland as I was growing up.
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We had a fairly quiet time going through Venezuela. We were there a little over a Month I think. We did spot just the one protest.
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but once they saw the Irish flag on our truck we got a huge cheer and wave. When we turned off the main road in the photo above, we did run into some semi-harmless road blocks that we cleared and went through. No one said boo.
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Did I mention Chavez's image was everywhere?
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Anyways, We spent a few days up north at a few beach spots which was lovely, but not really our thing for more than a few days at a time. We decided to and see Angel Falls, one seriously tall waterfall. It's a bit of a haul to get there as it involves a small plane and boat trip into the rainforest. The trip took about 5 days. This is the boat...

We got the back seat in the plane so we got to side beside each other AND have a window each.
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This brings you to the town of Canaima, Canaima is based on the edge of a stunning lagoon, complete with sandy beaches. It’s not what you expect in the middle of what is thought of as Venezuelan Jungle, but there it is. There is a lot more farming going on around this area than we had understood, but I guess that’s progress, of sorts. Most of the tours include a trip behind one of the waterfalls that feed the lagoon, and it’s a great way to cool down! and grab a shower!
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Then it was off to the falls
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There were a few spots the water level was low so the guides hopped our of the boat to guide it by some rocks manually.
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We should have guessed from the way the river was very low and the boat had trouble getting to the falls, but in the dry season Angel falls is more of an Angel Dribble....
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but when you hike in under it, you can see why the water disappears as it falls, the waterfall is about a kilometer high!
We had to spend the night in hammocks by the falls and go back the next day as travel on the river is pretty slow. That was great other than a Russian guy on the trip with us who could snore for Russia. We got spoiled sleeping in our own truck as we did not have to put up with other peoples noises.

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Then it was back to civilisations, and the job to try refill our larder that was running low....

If we wanted hair gel we were all set. or fizzy drinks.
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Soap? As with many products, there was either none or a lot of them but zero choice.
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The town of Cuidad Bolivar is colorful!
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Sorry for the long gap, sometimes work gets in the way of a decent run of forum posting!

So, at this stage were are leaving Venezuela, and travelling down through the Northern part of Brazil. You can drive South as far as Manaus, but after that it gets tricky. In the dry season it's possible to cross the Amazon and take some dirt roads south, but if you are anyway unsure, or in the wet season there is a great "cheat". And we took it. Ourselves and the germans booked our trucks onto a commercial barge to go from Manaus 1500km east to the City of Belem which is by the coast. And all 1500km is on the Amazon. It took about 5 days, and was superb. We could bring food and water for 5 days easily, but if your on a bike with no fridge, it could be rough going.

Anyways, this is what we saw.

We left Manaus at Easter. We remember this as the easter religious parade went right by our truck where we parked for a few days sorting out the barge.
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Sarah at the wheel. For about 200 metres in front of the pusher boat, all you could see was 40 foot truck trailers.
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Once out on the open Amazon, We got to appreciate just how big this river is. We saw loads of local traffic which came to trade with us, fish and fruit for cash or fizzy drinks
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Larger boats used as river taxi's
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and full sized ships delivering cargo. These ships were just dots until you got closer which gave us a great sense of scale.
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There were loads of little homes and villages by the shore.
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We got our trucks loaded right at the front, with about 2 metres clearance from the front edge, and that's where we saw, bbq's, had meals, took photos from. As we were at the front we could not hear the pusher boat, so it was 5 days of just hearing the water lap by the edge of the barge. Brilliant.
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The few truck drivers on board really took it easy, hammocks under the trailers and slept for 5 days.
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we got to stop off for a few hours at a little town in the middle of nowhere. No roads in or out, but they had a few cars and bikes for the 40km of local roads.
This was their jetty and one of the bars.
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This shop had a modern pc, and a relic of a cash register.
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The school "busses" made me smile.
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This barge got us to Belem, and this is the end of the spin on it. Strongly recommended as a fun thing to do.
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Thanks for posting up, and as other s have said superb photos.:thumby:

regards
Gren
 


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