So we booked a small cottage in Oistins, Barbados and arranged to return to Georgetown on the same LIAT flight as the kids. Going out to Barbados, we booked a really cheap flight with the Caribbean's new budget airline - Red Jet - which several volunteers had used and found very good.
One week before we were due to fly out, Red Jet went bust.... and we had to book another flight with Caribbean Airlines along with everybody else who'd been let down. Alternative flights on the day we were due to travel were ludicrously expensive so we lost a day's holiday and still payed more than double the Red Jet fare to depart the next day. Score 1 - 0 to the airlines.
Still we got there:
Outside the cottage
which proved to be our favourite of all beaches we visited. It was used mainly by local Bajuns and wasn't infested with plastic sunbeds..
For the arrival of Anna and Kaz, we hired a little mini-moke:
So, sandcastles were built:
We all then caught the LIAT airlines flight for the short journey to Cheddi Jagan airport, Georgetown. Unfortunately, Kaz's luggage - with his clothes, binoculars, computer parts, Marmite and other vital UK supplies - did not leave Barbados with us. The next 24 hours were spent in a state of some anxiety, awaiting the bag's eventual safe delivery, delaying any sight seeing as all the following day it was due to arrive (in the Guyanese phrase) "just now". Score 2-0 to the airlines.
The rest of Easter weekend was spent in Georgetown visiting the Botanic Gardens
and like everyone else in Guyana, flying our kite.
The Trans Guyana Airlines (TGA) ticket, website and leaflet all said that the departure time was 10.30am on Easter Monday. Staff at our first lodge - who would meet us off the plane at Annai airstrip - emailed that they would meet us from a flight that left at 7.30am - so we checked to find that TGA had indeed changed the departure time to 3 hours earlier, though no one had thought to let us know. 3-0 to the airlines - but we did manage to catch the plane.
We had thought we were staying in the annex to Rock View Lodge, but Colin Edwards, the charismatic, ex-VSO owner, met us off the plane and insisted we stay at the main lodge. View from our apartment:
A nearby village, Surama, was inaugurating their new airstrip, so we were invited to go to the ceremony. Eventually, we went off ("just now"), to be passed on the track by all the other invitees returning ... Never mind, we arrived in time to see the volleyball match and share a few beers with the villagers. Kaz joined in.
On returning to Rock View Lodge, Halina found that she knew one of the guests. Kaz and Anna are used to their mother constantly meeting people she knows in Bristol, but in the Guyanese interior?
Rock View has a well-constructed "panorama walk" and we climbed it next morning. From the top you get fantastic views of the huge Rupununi savanah:
The red line is the main but as yet unpaved road from Georgetown to Lethem (and Brazil).
To see and climb hills after 8 months in super flat Georgetown was amazing.
We went to see some burrowing owls - they could only be seen through a telescope:
On the way back, Gabriel, the guide, spotted a spider monkey.
Next up was a journey by jeep to Ginep Landing on the Rupununi River to make the two hour boat journey to Karanambu Lodge. On the way, we disturbed a rather large black caiman sunning himself on the bank:
He soon slid off into the river and vanished.
At Karanambu Lodge, we were welcomed by Andrea and Salvador, together with Diane McTurk who owns the former cattle ranch and is well known for her work rescuing giant river otters. See this link for an article about Diane: http://savingotters.wildlifedirect.org/tag/karanambu-ranch/
Whilst having lunch, one of the staff came to say a snake had caught a bird in the tree outside, so we watched as the still fluttering bird was ever so slowly turned into a snakey bump.
Nature eh!?
There were no giant otters at the ranch while we were there but we did go out in the evening with Salvador to a nearby lake to see the giant Victoria Amazonica lilies. The lake was accessed through a tunnel of trees off the river, then we were in a sea of enormous lily pads:
We then settled down to watch the flowers slowly open as the light faded, with the welcome addition of some of Diane's famous rum punch and biscuits.
Magical!
Next day it was up at dawn to search for a giant anteater out on the savannah. Just when it appeared that we'd be unsuccessful, one was spotted in the distance and two of the guides ran off to herd it towards the truck. Sure enough, a little while later it came trotting towards us:
What a sight!
That evening, we went out again on the river with Diane and watched spellbound as the bats and lesser nighthawks swooped about in the twilight catching insects. Go nighthawks! you can't eat enough of them. The local menace is the kabura fly whose bite really itches for days. Halina's ankles will vouchsafe this. More rum punches and cakes, then a gentle return for supper.
Kaz had a surprise when getting ready for bed; moments after he'd used the washbasin, a snake eased its way out of the sink overflow! Anna was dispatched to get help - "Salvador, snake!" - and Salvador caught the offender, "only mildly venomous", and returned it to the bush. The bats in our ceiling seemed small beer by comparison (but did they have to poo everywhere?).
Next day we took our leave of the lovely people at Karanambu:
and we transferred by boat to Caiman House, further up the Rupununi River. The big attraction here is their night-time caiman catching, but sadly the river had risen nearly 12 feet in the last few days which meant no caiman catching. We did go out in the evening though, in the large dugout canoe:
and sailed quietly along seeing brown capuchin monkeys, river bats, numerous species of birds and lots of caiman eyes.
Caiman House is in the Amerindian village of Yupucari. We stayed in the lovely guest house:
which is part of Caiman House's brilliant project - Rupununi Learners. More about this on http://www.rupununilearners.org Mike, the staff and guides are great hosts and very knowledgeable about the savanah and its flora and fauna. Caiman House also hosts other researchers. During our visit, the researcher on river turtles had a hatching:
Leaving Caiman House and the Rupununi proved more difficult than we imagined. We had arranged to be picked up by Trans Guyana Airlines (TGA) at Karanambu airstrip, a bumpy, 45 minute drive from Caiman House. The Georgetown to Lethem flight can, if booked, make two stops at Annai and Karanambu to pick up or put down passengers, either inbound or outbound, and communicates by email with the lodges to let passengers know the pick-up time. No phones out here, and most villages still rely on radio communication.
We arrived at the appointed time to find that our plane had already been and gone - a change of routing without informing customers. 4-0 to the airlines
We bumped along back to Caiman House, and were told by email that TGA had sold our seats in Lethem but the only other plane out that day had four seats if we could get to the airstrip on time to meet it. We raced out to the airstrip and...
we saw no planes, though this must count as one of the best views from an airport waiting "lounge". 5-0 to the airlines.
Caiman House kindly accommodated us for another night, and all the local lodges then began asking their guests to swap flights to secure us seats on a plane to Georgetown before Kaz and Anna were due to fly back to the UK - in 2 days time. TGA were saying they had no seats for at least 3 days... 6-0.
Later, TGA offered one seat on the next day followed by three seats the day after. We accepted with the thought that Halina could return to Georgetown first as she needed her medicines. The next morning, we went again to the Karanambu airstrip but we took all our luggage with us ... just in case. A plane arrived - our first in three visits to the airstrip! - with only one passenger aboard, who was visiting Karanambu Lodge. All those empty seats - but it was headed outbound to Lethem. Andrea and Salvador had come down and together with Mike from Caiman House, persuaded the pilot to take us all to Lethem. After an anxious wait at Lethem airstrip, the pilot managed to get us seats on his trip back to Georgetown, which we delightedly accepted, so we returned only 24 hours later then scheduled. 6-1.
A little more sightseeing in Georgetown and it was time for Kaz and Anna to get the early LIAT flight back to Barbados, with an 8 hour wait for their connection to Gatwick and a cunning plan to escape to the nearest beach for a last few hours of sea and sun. The LIAT flight took off on time - but landed 5 minutes later back in Georgetown. The initial small technical hitch became a large one - and Kaz and Anna were stranded yet again.
LIAT said that it would get them on a Caribbean Airways flight leaving soon (it didn't), would get them some breakfast (it didn't), get them on another LIAT flight going at mid-day (there wasn't one) and get them on an afternoon LIAT flight (which left too late to connect with their BA flight to the UK). However, as they landed in Barbados, there was the BA plane, also running late, so after a quick dash across the tarmac, they were at last on a plane to England. Their luggage though - house keys, phones and warm clothes - stayed in Barbados for several more days. Probably 7-1 to the airlines by now.
During our exciting week in the Rupununi, Guyana was hosting a major conference on...Sustainable Tourism. Despite all our plane problems, we would encourage people to visit the interior of Guyana. The people, the wildlife and scenery are amazing, and we are all still smiling. |
A belated happy Easter!
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