I`ll be home tommorow so this will proably be my last entry, though I will try and remember to let you know I got home safely. It has been a busy couple of weeks since I last wrote and there have been lots of goings on. We haven`t had a lot of diving becasue there has been bad weather but I have added to our monitoring effort, had a few more fun dives and taken a few more pictures, I have completed my caverner course and visited three cenotes, one of our boats capsized, and we had our exciting final party.
With regards to the monitoring I really haven`t contributed nearly as much as I hoped to in my time here and if I did something like this again (wehich I would very much like to do) I think I would have to do it for longer than 5 weeks as it is just not enought time, what with all the potential problems (e.g. engines and compressors breaking). I have managed to do 5 or 6 transit monitors (the ones I explained before) and one rover (where we swim in an expanding square and note down everythign we see). The staff did however say I was the quickest person there to start monitoring which is pretty cool, and many of the other five weekers either did one monitor or none at all.
The fun dives have been plentiful recently, when the waves are too rough to allow us to do the shallow monitoring sites (we have sites at 5m, 10m and 20m and we only have the 5m ones left now). There are some really nice places to go diving around our base, and the places we go monitoring are not always the nicests ones (becasue they are the ones that need monitoring!!) so the fun dives are a real treat. In total I have seen about 5 sting ray, and a Barracuda (which was chasing its potential dinner at the time). Haven`t actually managed to have my camera on any of those occasions though as we are only allowed cameras on fun dives and we are usually monitoring or planning to monitor.
The caverner course was amazing, it was done in the Two Eye Cenote (Dos Ojos, it sounds better in spanish) we did 3 dives as part of the Caverner Course and learnt to tie of lines - which was pretty cool, and to floow lines really fast with our eyes shut (in case our torches don`t work). We are now cirtified to dive in caverns with just a Buddy and no instructor though I think it would be pretty scary and I wouldn`t try it before having more experience!! But it was amazing down there, it looked like something out of a film, it was creapy and wonderful at the same time and it was like nothing I have ever seen before, it was soooo beautiful. I will definitly be going cavern diving again, thought they say that there is no where else in the world where you can go cenote diving - only Mexico, only in the Ycatan Peninsula. That is why 4 of us decided to pay for an etra cenote dive at the weekend, with one of the local dive shops in Tulum. We actually went on these dives before the caverner course (and I am glad we did as Dos Ojos was more impressive and it was nice to do them in that order). Car Wash Cenote and Grand Cenote were the two we went to on a weekend and they were both very different, Car Wash was a deeper dive and Grand Cenote was beautiful and perhaps more like Dos Ojos. All three were awesome and in amazing settings.
With everything I have done here I will be coming home a fairly quailified diver!! My dive cards with include PDAI Open Water, PADI Advanced Open Water, PADI Cavern Diver and PADI Coral Reef Specialist. Pretty impressive collection for 6 weeks!!
So, last in the excitment, the boat. Nothing to be worried about, I wasn`t on the boat at the time it sank and none of the people who were were hurt but, it was kinda scary not hearing from them and waiting to see what our rescue effort came to. Basically a huge wave came into the boat and the boat sank due to taking on too much water. The captain and passengers (bar one) were thrown out of the boat when the wave struck, the one guy (Luke), who managed to stay in the boat whilst it was sinking, saved the radio and most of the dive gear. The radio did not work as they were out of range and therefore it was two hours before the rescue boat arrived (we waited an hour for them to potentially be driving back and then it took the rescue boat an hour to travel the 14km to where they were). The guys who were on the boat were still swimming to shore when the rescue boat arrived, as with the kit and with the waves and the current it was a long swim. The guys were exhausted, some (those who salvaged their flippers) made it to land just as the rescuers were arriving and they were taken back in the car, the others were picked up by the rescue boat. But everyone was fine and GVI is now going to reevaluate the idea of allowing boats out of radio contact!!
So, an exciting couple of weeks, the final party was on Saturday (lots of alcohol all round) and since then we have been sad becasue we know we are leaving :( - and becasue we have been clearing up!! I have had an amazing time here and met a lot of really cool people and am actually really sad to be leaving. This is the first time in my travells that I do not feel ready to go home, I really wish I had more time to spend in this place with these people doing the work we are doing.
But hey, that is not to say I am not looking forward to seeing all you lovely people at home!! And will hopefully be seeing you sooner rather than later. Am flighing home tommorow and will be back early Friday morning.
Hope to see you guys soon,
Be in touch.
xx
Wednesday, 19 December 2007
Sunday, 2 December 2007
Pez Maya, Mexico
So, it is now the middle of week three of my time with GVI. (No I am not mad, I know it is Sunday but GVI weeks run Wednesday to Thursday, I do not know why).
It has been an exciting week this week, both in good and in bad ways. During the week I did more fish spots and did my first practise transit, I also got to go to Tulum and visit the GVI Teaching Project officially. Sadly, whilst I was in Tulum, Kate - one of my freinds from the project - swam up too fast during a dive and then had to be taken to a decompression chamber (she is ok now!!). Lastly, to end the week on a good note, we spent the weekend in Playa del Carmen partying and doing fun dives (Kate even managed to party with us for a bit!!).
So, to start at the beging of my narrative, we all know what fish spots are becasue I have told you about them before (this week I saw sting ray on two separate dives - they were amazing to see!!). A transit, however, is something new, it is a type of monitoring technique where we lay out a thirty meter tape and note down all the fish we see whilst swimming along that line. You have to swim really slowly and note down fish in a cirtain vecinity. You do it will two people, person one notes down the adult fish and person two lays down the tape, then you wait 5 minutes (for the fish to settle down again) and then you swim back and person two notes down the baby fish and person one reals in the tape. It is actually quite hard to swim slowly, in a straight line and at a good distance from the bottom and write down fish all at the same time. We are still only getting one dive everyday at the moment becasue of all the problems around base (the compressor and the engin on one of the boats being broken) but hopefully by next week things should speed up if we manage to get two dives a day. Meaning I will be out monitoring (doing what I came here to do) soon!!
On Wednesday (mine and Jons two year anniversary) I got to go into Tulum (the near by town) and experience a day in the life of the GVI teaching project. We went to a TEFL session in then morning, which was really cool, we joined their EMs for a lesson in how to teach English. We then had a load of free time so we went to the internet and got nice food (I ate far too much). In the afternoon we went to a spanish lesson (which was way to advanced and went right over my head), helped with a little of their lesson planning and then went and watched them teach a lesson, which was pretty cool.
We arrived back at base really late on Wednesday night but one of our instructors picked us up in the car and told us on the way home about Kate. Whist out on a dive earlier in the day she surfaced too fast and had a pain in her chest whilst she was comeing up. Ohand, the staff member who picked us up, was also the staff member who was on the boat when Kate surfaced and he said he had never driven the boat so fast in his life. Kate was given oxygen as soon as she was on the boat and was driven straight to Playa del Carmen and taken to a decompression chamber, she is fine now but she cannot do anyhting strenuous for the next two weeks and she can never dive again, which is very sad becasue like all the people at Pez she loves it. Just incase you are worried I would like to assure everyone that my dive computer beeps furiously when I go up too fast, I keep a close eye on it and I tend to be one of the last people to surface. Everyone is different and there are never any garentees though, diving is a dangerous sport and insidents like this make you undersatdn that more and understand why we have the rules that we do.
So, to cheer us up after a week with half the number of dives than usual and the insident with Kate we all went to Playa Del Carmen for the weekend. A group of us went for the dive on Saturday with a dive center in Playa, which was really cool and then we went out drinking Saturday night. Sunday was spent with a loing lie-in womething impossible in Pez even on a Sunday becasue the huts get so hot, it was lovely having a fan in the room.
The dives we went on on Saturday were amazing. We went on two dives, both very different to anything I have done with GVI. We did a drift dive, meaning we just drift along in the current, which was awesome. It was so cool to not have to do any work but at the same time it was kind scary to not really be able to go where you wanted - if you tried to swim into the current you would get no-where fast. We saw loads of fish, but more impressively we saw loads of turtles, something we generally don`t see in Pez. It really was amazing. And then at the end of the 40min dive, when we surfaced, the sun was setting overhead and making the horizon a beautiful orange whilst we were floating in the water, it was so pretty. We then got back into the boat and froze our arses of going to the next site, the site for our night dive. The night dive was also pretty cool. We saw laods of fish, though it was difficult to tell what they were becasue of the light, we also saw a sting ray and an octopus. The Octopus was brilliant and facinated us for ages, it was constantly moving and changing colour (it really looked like it was the inspiration for alien, Ed even said he felt like it was going to just on someones mask at any second). It was really strange not being able to see very far, and only being able to see the others on your dive from where there tourches are shinning, but it was very very cool.
After the dives we went back to the dive center and had a BBQ which was very very yummy, loads of chicken wings and some really good fish and some really good veggies and bread too, I was starving (as I am sure you can imagine). I shared a bottle of white wine with one of the guys, Tim, which was quite a luxury. At about 9pm we headed back to the hotle where I had my first shower in 3 weeks (don`t worry i had been washing with a bucket, well once a week anyways). But the shower was heaven, warm powerful and relaxing. When we had all showered and changed we had a drink in the hotel bar (another glass of wine for me) and then moved onto a sports bar down the rd where we drank some more and chattered away (I drank 2 Capirinha`s, not as good as the ones in Brazil by a long way but they were passable). I decided that was probably a little too much alcohol for me as we made our way to a place we could dance so I didn`t drink anymore, and a good thing two coz I have a cracking hangover this morning (or I should say this afternoon now!!) I was meant to be getting up early and doing christmas shopping today, thought I would say that was lready out of the window after the wine!! But it was a good night and a very good day yesterday.
It has been an exciting week this week, both in good and in bad ways. During the week I did more fish spots and did my first practise transit, I also got to go to Tulum and visit the GVI Teaching Project officially. Sadly, whilst I was in Tulum, Kate - one of my freinds from the project - swam up too fast during a dive and then had to be taken to a decompression chamber (she is ok now!!). Lastly, to end the week on a good note, we spent the weekend in Playa del Carmen partying and doing fun dives (Kate even managed to party with us for a bit!!).
So, to start at the beging of my narrative, we all know what fish spots are becasue I have told you about them before (this week I saw sting ray on two separate dives - they were amazing to see!!). A transit, however, is something new, it is a type of monitoring technique where we lay out a thirty meter tape and note down all the fish we see whilst swimming along that line. You have to swim really slowly and note down fish in a cirtain vecinity. You do it will two people, person one notes down the adult fish and person two lays down the tape, then you wait 5 minutes (for the fish to settle down again) and then you swim back and person two notes down the baby fish and person one reals in the tape. It is actually quite hard to swim slowly, in a straight line and at a good distance from the bottom and write down fish all at the same time. We are still only getting one dive everyday at the moment becasue of all the problems around base (the compressor and the engin on one of the boats being broken) but hopefully by next week things should speed up if we manage to get two dives a day. Meaning I will be out monitoring (doing what I came here to do) soon!!
On Wednesday (mine and Jons two year anniversary) I got to go into Tulum (the near by town) and experience a day in the life of the GVI teaching project. We went to a TEFL session in then morning, which was really cool, we joined their EMs for a lesson in how to teach English. We then had a load of free time so we went to the internet and got nice food (I ate far too much). In the afternoon we went to a spanish lesson (which was way to advanced and went right over my head), helped with a little of their lesson planning and then went and watched them teach a lesson, which was pretty cool.
We arrived back at base really late on Wednesday night but one of our instructors picked us up in the car and told us on the way home about Kate. Whist out on a dive earlier in the day she surfaced too fast and had a pain in her chest whilst she was comeing up. Ohand, the staff member who picked us up, was also the staff member who was on the boat when Kate surfaced and he said he had never driven the boat so fast in his life. Kate was given oxygen as soon as she was on the boat and was driven straight to Playa del Carmen and taken to a decompression chamber, she is fine now but she cannot do anyhting strenuous for the next two weeks and she can never dive again, which is very sad becasue like all the people at Pez she loves it. Just incase you are worried I would like to assure everyone that my dive computer beeps furiously when I go up too fast, I keep a close eye on it and I tend to be one of the last people to surface. Everyone is different and there are never any garentees though, diving is a dangerous sport and insidents like this make you undersatdn that more and understand why we have the rules that we do.
So, to cheer us up after a week with half the number of dives than usual and the insident with Kate we all went to Playa Del Carmen for the weekend. A group of us went for the dive on Saturday with a dive center in Playa, which was really cool and then we went out drinking Saturday night. Sunday was spent with a loing lie-in womething impossible in Pez even on a Sunday becasue the huts get so hot, it was lovely having a fan in the room.
The dives we went on on Saturday were amazing. We went on two dives, both very different to anything I have done with GVI. We did a drift dive, meaning we just drift along in the current, which was awesome. It was so cool to not have to do any work but at the same time it was kind scary to not really be able to go where you wanted - if you tried to swim into the current you would get no-where fast. We saw loads of fish, but more impressively we saw loads of turtles, something we generally don`t see in Pez. It really was amazing. And then at the end of the 40min dive, when we surfaced, the sun was setting overhead and making the horizon a beautiful orange whilst we were floating in the water, it was so pretty. We then got back into the boat and froze our arses of going to the next site, the site for our night dive. The night dive was also pretty cool. We saw laods of fish, though it was difficult to tell what they were becasue of the light, we also saw a sting ray and an octopus. The Octopus was brilliant and facinated us for ages, it was constantly moving and changing colour (it really looked like it was the inspiration for alien, Ed even said he felt like it was going to just on someones mask at any second). It was really strange not being able to see very far, and only being able to see the others on your dive from where there tourches are shinning, but it was very very cool.
After the dives we went back to the dive center and had a BBQ which was very very yummy, loads of chicken wings and some really good fish and some really good veggies and bread too, I was starving (as I am sure you can imagine). I shared a bottle of white wine with one of the guys, Tim, which was quite a luxury. At about 9pm we headed back to the hotle where I had my first shower in 3 weeks (don`t worry i had been washing with a bucket, well once a week anyways). But the shower was heaven, warm powerful and relaxing. When we had all showered and changed we had a drink in the hotel bar (another glass of wine for me) and then moved onto a sports bar down the rd where we drank some more and chattered away (I drank 2 Capirinha`s, not as good as the ones in Brazil by a long way but they were passable). I decided that was probably a little too much alcohol for me as we made our way to a place we could dance so I didn`t drink anymore, and a good thing two coz I have a cracking hangover this morning (or I should say this afternoon now!!) I was meant to be getting up early and doing christmas shopping today, thought I would say that was lready out of the window after the wine!! But it was a good night and a very good day yesterday.
Saturday, 24 November 2007
Pez Maya, Mexico
Thought I`d do the update a bit different this time seeing as I can`t really update you on where I have been and what I have been doing is pretty similar each day. I thought I would start by giving you an update on my diving status (I am getting good!!), then giving you an idea of my average day out here in Pez.
So I am just finishing my PADI Advanced Open Water Course. I have been on 5 adventure dives for that. They were Underwater Naturalist where we looked at fish and coral and underwater animals, Underwater Navigation where we were shown how to use an underwater cumpas, then we did The Deep Dive which was really really cool, where we went down to 30m to see if we got nitrogen narcosis (which is like being drunk) but i didn`t get it :(, we also did a boat dive (but every dive is a boat dive), and we then did Peak Performance Boyancy (which is about floating underwater) whwere we swum through hoops and did an egg and spoon race typy thing and floated with our heads down. The whole course was really really cool and good fun (appart from when i was sea sick), I still ahve to do the exam but appart from that am all set to start doing reef serveying (which is what i am here to do after all).
As for a day in the life of, well Monday to Friday we get up at about 6:00am and do chores, we do chores per hut and they are on a four day rotation so we have kitchen (which is all the cooking), grounds (racking and tolet cleaning), boat (getting the boat stuff togetehr and checking it and filling the gear wash bins with clean water) and comunual (cleaning the comunual area, sweeping, wiping tables etc.). At 6:30 we have breakfast (obviously the breakfast people usually get up before 6:00), at 7:00 we have boat push where we push the baots into the water and then at 7:30 the first two dives go out, the next two go out at 9:00 and then lunch is at 11:30 after lunch we have four more dives, two at 12:30 and two at 14:00. Usually this doesn`t all go to schedule but most people will be on one or two dives every day. We then have dinner at 18:30 and go to bed when ever we please, which is usually early. Saturday we have a fun dive in the morning and then have the afternoon off, staff cook dinner and we have a Pez Party Night, Sunday is a day off - suposedly this is to recover from diving (to get rid of the nitrogen in the boady) but for most people this ends up being to get over the drinking form the night before!!
Not everything is going to plan currently, the compresser is boken again (the thing we fill the scub tanks with) and one of our boats is also broken meaning we can only put one dive out at once so we are not all getting as many dives as usual. There is also a lot of bad weather as it is winter here and all in all I have only done 12 dives in the 3 weeks I have been here. Hopefully it will get better though, 12 dives is still a reasonible amount and i am still having fun, and learning new stuff. Have passed my fish test as I might have meantion before and now need to do underwater tests and do the fish juviniles. But have also been doing a lot of relaxing and reading, so I have been enjoying myself - it is not all work. I also had my first thanksgiving last Thursday!! We cooked (or i should say got cooked) a full thanksgiving meal, not completly authentic but it was still great and we got meat middweak which never happends as we dont have refrigeration (due to the lack of electricity) we normally only have meat on a saturday so this was a real treat!!
So I am just finishing my PADI Advanced Open Water Course. I have been on 5 adventure dives for that. They were Underwater Naturalist where we looked at fish and coral and underwater animals, Underwater Navigation where we were shown how to use an underwater cumpas, then we did The Deep Dive which was really really cool, where we went down to 30m to see if we got nitrogen narcosis (which is like being drunk) but i didn`t get it :(, we also did a boat dive (but every dive is a boat dive), and we then did Peak Performance Boyancy (which is about floating underwater) whwere we swum through hoops and did an egg and spoon race typy thing and floated with our heads down. The whole course was really really cool and good fun (appart from when i was sea sick), I still ahve to do the exam but appart from that am all set to start doing reef serveying (which is what i am here to do after all).
As for a day in the life of, well Monday to Friday we get up at about 6:00am and do chores, we do chores per hut and they are on a four day rotation so we have kitchen (which is all the cooking), grounds (racking and tolet cleaning), boat (getting the boat stuff togetehr and checking it and filling the gear wash bins with clean water) and comunual (cleaning the comunual area, sweeping, wiping tables etc.). At 6:30 we have breakfast (obviously the breakfast people usually get up before 6:00), at 7:00 we have boat push where we push the baots into the water and then at 7:30 the first two dives go out, the next two go out at 9:00 and then lunch is at 11:30 after lunch we have four more dives, two at 12:30 and two at 14:00. Usually this doesn`t all go to schedule but most people will be on one or two dives every day. We then have dinner at 18:30 and go to bed when ever we please, which is usually early. Saturday we have a fun dive in the morning and then have the afternoon off, staff cook dinner and we have a Pez Party Night, Sunday is a day off - suposedly this is to recover from diving (to get rid of the nitrogen in the boady) but for most people this ends up being to get over the drinking form the night before!!
Not everything is going to plan currently, the compresser is boken again (the thing we fill the scub tanks with) and one of our boats is also broken meaning we can only put one dive out at once so we are not all getting as many dives as usual. There is also a lot of bad weather as it is winter here and all in all I have only done 12 dives in the 3 weeks I have been here. Hopefully it will get better though, 12 dives is still a reasonible amount and i am still having fun, and learning new stuff. Have passed my fish test as I might have meantion before and now need to do underwater tests and do the fish juviniles. But have also been doing a lot of relaxing and reading, so I have been enjoying myself - it is not all work. I also had my first thanksgiving last Thursday!! We cooked (or i should say got cooked) a full thanksgiving meal, not completly authentic but it was still great and we got meat middweak which never happends as we dont have refrigeration (due to the lack of electricity) we normally only have meat on a saturday so this was a real treat!!
Sunday, 18 November 2007
Pez Maya, Mexico
So have now been in Mexico for two weeks and I have been in Tulum and in Pez Mia (or Pez as we tend to call it).
I started in Tulum, where I did my Open Water diving course in Casa Cenote. It was beautiful and I didn`t have to deal with any sea sickness becasue it was fresh water, as calm as anything and we didn`t have to go anywhere on a boat, and on top of that the location was amazing. There were a few fish down there, and there were also some cave systems which we explored a little as well - which was really cool. I was the only one on my course, so I finished all the skills and everything pretty speadily and was able to spend quite a lot of time exploring the underwater area which was a lot of fun. Having stayed in Tulum for 4 days at the GVI base there (the GVI teaching base) I then moved down to Pez (the GVI diving base), which was about an hours drive away in a collectivo.
Pez is litterally just the GVI base on the beach, it is pretty much in the middle of no where, and has no real electricity and no running water, we make do with a generator that is usually on for two hours a day and a well with a bucket! The place we are staying in, is actually a converted set of luxury villas from the 70`s. The place was abandonded becasue of hurrican damage, and trust me - it is far from what I would call "luxury" now, it is however a v. beautiful place!! As I said it is right on the beach, the sand is lovely underfoot and we dont need to wear shoes at all. We say in bunk beds in little huts of six people, getting up at 6am to do chores everyday. Breakfast is at 6:30, boat push is at seven (pushing the boats down to the waters edge), there are then two dives, lunch is at 11:30, followed my another two dives (you normally go out on one or two or the four dives mentioned), dinner is at 6:30 and lights out is usually between 8:30 and 9:00, or whenever the Generator (or Jenny as she is called) goes out, at which point we all head to bed feeling utterly shattered. It is a very hecktic schedual, and in between diving chores and eating we have to study and obviously socialize a little!!
I started in Tulum, where I did my Open Water diving course in Casa Cenote. It was beautiful and I didn`t have to deal with any sea sickness becasue it was fresh water, as calm as anything and we didn`t have to go anywhere on a boat, and on top of that the location was amazing. There were a few fish down there, and there were also some cave systems which we explored a little as well - which was really cool. I was the only one on my course, so I finished all the skills and everything pretty speadily and was able to spend quite a lot of time exploring the underwater area which was a lot of fun. Having stayed in Tulum for 4 days at the GVI base there (the GVI teaching base) I then moved down to Pez (the GVI diving base), which was about an hours drive away in a collectivo.
Pez is litterally just the GVI base on the beach, it is pretty much in the middle of no where, and has no real electricity and no running water, we make do with a generator that is usually on for two hours a day and a well with a bucket! The place we are staying in, is actually a converted set of luxury villas from the 70`s. The place was abandonded becasue of hurrican damage, and trust me - it is far from what I would call "luxury" now, it is however a v. beautiful place!! As I said it is right on the beach, the sand is lovely underfoot and we dont need to wear shoes at all. We say in bunk beds in little huts of six people, getting up at 6am to do chores everyday. Breakfast is at 6:30, boat push is at seven (pushing the boats down to the waters edge), there are then two dives, lunch is at 11:30, followed my another two dives (you normally go out on one or two or the four dives mentioned), dinner is at 6:30 and lights out is usually between 8:30 and 9:00, or whenever the Generator (or Jenny as she is called) goes out, at which point we all head to bed feeling utterly shattered. It is a very hecktic schedual, and in between diving chores and eating we have to study and obviously socialize a little!!
Wednesday, 7 November 2007
Playa del Carmen, Mexico
Blogg entries will become more scarce after this, as I start my diving project tommorw, but before we get to that I have more to tell you about Venezuala. I have the fishy wonders of Santa Fe to relate, followed by my impressions of Caracus and my sad farewell to the rest of my tour group before I hopped on the plane to Mexico!!
Santa Fe was another lovely little beach town, with not a lot to show for it appart form a few restaurants and hotels lining a very beautiful bay. The one day we spent there was spent snorkelling, along some of the local reefs. It was amazing, I saw loads of fish AND I knew what most of them were, which was prety cool!! I took my fish book along for the ride and looked the fish up afterwards to show my friends and to confirm my findings. During the day everyone kept popping their heads up out of the water and going "Amy come over here!! What is that one", "Amy, I saw a big yellow one, what is it", "Amy look at this, I think its another...", etc. was fun to be in the know!! We stopped at five different locations during the day. The first was just for dolphine spotting and we saw the largest pod of dolphines we have seen so far and it was super close as well. The second spot was for swimming over a small reef and for fish watching. The third and the fourth were small bays, with reefs along the edges - here, some of us continued to snorkel and fish spot and some relaxed in the sand. The fith and last location was a ship wreck and it was huge - it was really amazing and so close to the surface, I sooo wished I had had my underwater camera then (I bought one today, 5 days too late for that one)!! Some of us dove down for a coser look (I knew my snorkelling lessons would come in handy one day!!) It was majorly cool, coral had started growing on the wreckage and it was home to loads more fish and the structure and appearance of the sucken ship was both erry and awesome at the same time, it felt like something from a film.
Caracus was the next and also the final destination of our tour. And we did mainly erands in the day and a half we were there, rather than sight seeing. Caracus doesn`t have a brilliant reputation, so we spent most of the time in shopping malls (apparently an important part of the culture) and in internet cafes (an inportant part of my sanity whilst travelling). On our last evening we went out to a salsa club, but it was nothing like at home and not in a good way. It was very couply (so I danced only with our tour guide and not with any locals) and there also wasn`t even any impressive salsa to watch (as there always is at home), as most people slow danced the whole time.
Leaving Caracus was hard, whilst I didn`t like the city overly much, I was leaving the people rather than the place. I met some really good people on that trip and a few tears were shed before I got on the plane. The tears were short lived however, when I got bumped up to business class!! Apparently something to do with weight distribution (as if I cared about the reason!!) it was soooo cool!!!
As previously stated I am now in Mexico, in Playa del Carmen. And it is the most touristy place I have been in this trip so far! I thought some of the places we stayed at in Brazil were tourity, but on the main street in Playa del Carmen I have spotted 2 Starbucks, 2 Hargenda`s Ice Cream, 2 Burger King, 2 Subways Sandwich Shops and 1 MacDonalds!! It is a little excessive!!
Yesterday and today I have seen a lot of the city, but only really form inside the shopping malls. I have been on a spending frenzy, trying to get everything I need for diving before I start tommorow. It has been crazy. I finished at about 8pm this evening and finally I feel a little more relaxed!! I wasn`t compleatly sure I was going to find everything in time!! But all is set now and I start diving tommorow - I am so excited I have wanted to do this for so long!!!
Wish me luck!!
xxxx
Santa Fe was another lovely little beach town, with not a lot to show for it appart form a few restaurants and hotels lining a very beautiful bay. The one day we spent there was spent snorkelling, along some of the local reefs. It was amazing, I saw loads of fish AND I knew what most of them were, which was prety cool!! I took my fish book along for the ride and looked the fish up afterwards to show my friends and to confirm my findings. During the day everyone kept popping their heads up out of the water and going "Amy come over here!! What is that one", "Amy, I saw a big yellow one, what is it", "Amy look at this, I think its another...", etc. was fun to be in the know!! We stopped at five different locations during the day. The first was just for dolphine spotting and we saw the largest pod of dolphines we have seen so far and it was super close as well. The second spot was for swimming over a small reef and for fish watching. The third and the fourth were small bays, with reefs along the edges - here, some of us continued to snorkel and fish spot and some relaxed in the sand. The fith and last location was a ship wreck and it was huge - it was really amazing and so close to the surface, I sooo wished I had had my underwater camera then (I bought one today, 5 days too late for that one)!! Some of us dove down for a coser look (I knew my snorkelling lessons would come in handy one day!!) It was majorly cool, coral had started growing on the wreckage and it was home to loads more fish and the structure and appearance of the sucken ship was both erry and awesome at the same time, it felt like something from a film.
Caracus was the next and also the final destination of our tour. And we did mainly erands in the day and a half we were there, rather than sight seeing. Caracus doesn`t have a brilliant reputation, so we spent most of the time in shopping malls (apparently an important part of the culture) and in internet cafes (an inportant part of my sanity whilst travelling). On our last evening we went out to a salsa club, but it was nothing like at home and not in a good way. It was very couply (so I danced only with our tour guide and not with any locals) and there also wasn`t even any impressive salsa to watch (as there always is at home), as most people slow danced the whole time.
Leaving Caracus was hard, whilst I didn`t like the city overly much, I was leaving the people rather than the place. I met some really good people on that trip and a few tears were shed before I got on the plane. The tears were short lived however, when I got bumped up to business class!! Apparently something to do with weight distribution (as if I cared about the reason!!) it was soooo cool!!!
As previously stated I am now in Mexico, in Playa del Carmen. And it is the most touristy place I have been in this trip so far! I thought some of the places we stayed at in Brazil were tourity, but on the main street in Playa del Carmen I have spotted 2 Starbucks, 2 Hargenda`s Ice Cream, 2 Burger King, 2 Subways Sandwich Shops and 1 MacDonalds!! It is a little excessive!!
Yesterday and today I have seen a lot of the city, but only really form inside the shopping malls. I have been on a spending frenzy, trying to get everything I need for diving before I start tommorow. It has been crazy. I finished at about 8pm this evening and finally I feel a little more relaxed!! I wasn`t compleatly sure I was going to find everything in time!! But all is set now and I start diving tommorow - I am so excited I have wanted to do this for so long!!!
Wish me luck!!
xxxx
Thursday, 1 November 2007
The Gran Sabana and Angle Falls, Venezuala
Our departure from Brazil was sad and heart felt but we entered Venezuala hopeful and / becasue we went without our tour guide (he was pretty useless anyway so we were so sad he couldn`t get his visa).
We arrived in Venezuala late afternoon and people cahnged some money. Reals (Brazillian money) and dollars brought twice the offical rate when changed on the street, and Venezuala is meant to be one of the only places where it is both safe and common practise to change money on the street. Unfortunatly, curtacy of our previous tour guide unwillingness to part with information, I took only 10 real / 2.50 pounds in cash into the country). It also turns out that in Venezuala it is a pain to get money out of an ATM with a foriegn Visa, even worse than Brazil (and trust me that is saying something, Brazil wasn`t a piece of cake). So yeah even less happy with Jose (our previous tour guide) - his tip just went down again if he ever comes back.
Anyways, the following day our new tour leader (Terry) arrived bright and early, before the start of our tour of the Gran Sabana. He introduced himself, made us vote on night-bus / day-bus and then when we chose night-bus made us do a mad packing sess (to vacate our hotel rooms) before leaving for the 9am tour (needless to say we didn`t quite manage to leave at 9am).
The tour was pretty awesome though. We saw three different water falls which were all gorgeous, no. one were a set of pretty falls that were floored with a red semi precious stone, no. two we almost walked behind (but then another tour agency told us off half way there), and no. three was where we went swimming and went and sat under the spray of the falls (it was so cool). We saw a small local village at one of the falls, and at another village where we ate a late lunch and bough handicrafts. We walked and drove through some gorgeous scenery through out the day, both between water falls and between villages, there were around 25 table top mountains making the surounding area unique and facinatingly beautiful. We found out about the trees of life, so called becasue the people use them to make the roofs for thier houses, the hammoks they sleep in, the juice they drink, the handi crafts they sell, and even the bread they eat.
Our driver had his foot to the floor trying to get back form the tour in time for us to jump on the night bus to Bolivar. The day following the night bus was spent rushing round all the banks in Bolivar (trying to get money together in order to go to Angle Falls), and reading my new Marrian Keyes book (it is pretty good).
Before I before beginning the narration of the Angel Fall epic let me vent my fustration at my lack of American dollars in the corrupt-ness of Venezuala. In Venezuala they cannot get dollars easily so, unfortunatly for the rest of the world, they LOVE them. My tour of Angel Falls cost me 200 pounds, it cost my freind 250 dollars. In case you are unfamiliar with the current exchange rate and do not understand how shit this is (I apologise for my laguage but it is) let me explain: currently, 1 pound is worth 2.05 dollars - i.e. my friend paid in dollars and thus spend on 125 pounds, whilst I spent 200 pounds. CORRUPTION & ANOYMENT.
Anyways back to more interesting and fun stuff - Angel Falls was pretty amazing. It was a three day trip and the National Park is in the middle of nowhere and is only accessible by plane, so we flew in on a cute little six seater plane. The plane ride in itself was pretty amazing, flying over acers and acers of national park and the national park in Venezuala (also including the Gran Sabana) is apparently bigger than Belgum. On arrival we almost imediatly set off on our Angle Falls excursion. This included a five hour boat ride on a tiny boat, sitting on hard, wooden, sore-bum-inducing seats with no backs. Needless to say it was an uncomfortable ride, fortunatly for us we had a lot of distractions including: more amazing scenery, a lot of splash and some scary rapids that our guides expertly navigated. On arrival at the falls we had a good view from the boat but we also hiked a trail to take us closed to the base of the falls and it was pretty impressive from close up. On the way back down this little trail the heavans opened on us and we got drenched, by the time we got back to our camp at the base of the falls it was pitch black and still tipping it down. We ate a gorgeous BBQ chicken dinner and settled down to sleep in our hammoks at a frightfully early hour (9:30pm) but we were all straight to sleep as we were pretty shattered. On the second day I awoke to the sight of the falls from my hammok, it was amazing. Having arrived in the dark the night before, I had no idea what I was going to see when I woke up the next day, but I had by no means expected that view from my bed!! We had an early breakfast and took the boat back arriving in time for lunch and our second tour. The second tour wasn`t quite as hard core and only involved 20 mins boat (thank the lord for saving our sore bums) and a couple of hours walking, but we got to see five or six more water falls and got to walk behind one of them, which was super cool. We slep the second night at the logde in Canimer, the village we landed in when we flew in. On the third morning we wandered the village looking at local handi crafts, and got the plane back in the early afternoon, arriving back in Bolivar at about 3pm. It was an amazing three days.
We arrived in Venezuala late afternoon and people cahnged some money. Reals (Brazillian money) and dollars brought twice the offical rate when changed on the street, and Venezuala is meant to be one of the only places where it is both safe and common practise to change money on the street. Unfortunatly, curtacy of our previous tour guide unwillingness to part with information, I took only 10 real / 2.50 pounds in cash into the country). It also turns out that in Venezuala it is a pain to get money out of an ATM with a foriegn Visa, even worse than Brazil (and trust me that is saying something, Brazil wasn`t a piece of cake). So yeah even less happy with Jose (our previous tour guide) - his tip just went down again if he ever comes back.
Anyways, the following day our new tour leader (Terry) arrived bright and early, before the start of our tour of the Gran Sabana. He introduced himself, made us vote on night-bus / day-bus and then when we chose night-bus made us do a mad packing sess (to vacate our hotel rooms) before leaving for the 9am tour (needless to say we didn`t quite manage to leave at 9am).
The tour was pretty awesome though. We saw three different water falls which were all gorgeous, no. one were a set of pretty falls that were floored with a red semi precious stone, no. two we almost walked behind (but then another tour agency told us off half way there), and no. three was where we went swimming and went and sat under the spray of the falls (it was so cool). We saw a small local village at one of the falls, and at another village where we ate a late lunch and bough handicrafts. We walked and drove through some gorgeous scenery through out the day, both between water falls and between villages, there were around 25 table top mountains making the surounding area unique and facinatingly beautiful. We found out about the trees of life, so called becasue the people use them to make the roofs for thier houses, the hammoks they sleep in, the juice they drink, the handi crafts they sell, and even the bread they eat.
Our driver had his foot to the floor trying to get back form the tour in time for us to jump on the night bus to Bolivar. The day following the night bus was spent rushing round all the banks in Bolivar (trying to get money together in order to go to Angle Falls), and reading my new Marrian Keyes book (it is pretty good).
Before I before beginning the narration of the Angel Fall epic let me vent my fustration at my lack of American dollars in the corrupt-ness of Venezuala. In Venezuala they cannot get dollars easily so, unfortunatly for the rest of the world, they LOVE them. My tour of Angel Falls cost me 200 pounds, it cost my freind 250 dollars. In case you are unfamiliar with the current exchange rate and do not understand how shit this is (I apologise for my laguage but it is) let me explain: currently, 1 pound is worth 2.05 dollars - i.e. my friend paid in dollars and thus spend on 125 pounds, whilst I spent 200 pounds. CORRUPTION & ANOYMENT.
Anyways back to more interesting and fun stuff - Angel Falls was pretty amazing. It was a three day trip and the National Park is in the middle of nowhere and is only accessible by plane, so we flew in on a cute little six seater plane. The plane ride in itself was pretty amazing, flying over acers and acers of national park and the national park in Venezuala (also including the Gran Sabana) is apparently bigger than Belgum. On arrival we almost imediatly set off on our Angle Falls excursion. This included a five hour boat ride on a tiny boat, sitting on hard, wooden, sore-bum-inducing seats with no backs. Needless to say it was an uncomfortable ride, fortunatly for us we had a lot of distractions including: more amazing scenery, a lot of splash and some scary rapids that our guides expertly navigated. On arrival at the falls we had a good view from the boat but we also hiked a trail to take us closed to the base of the falls and it was pretty impressive from close up. On the way back down this little trail the heavans opened on us and we got drenched, by the time we got back to our camp at the base of the falls it was pitch black and still tipping it down. We ate a gorgeous BBQ chicken dinner and settled down to sleep in our hammoks at a frightfully early hour (9:30pm) but we were all straight to sleep as we were pretty shattered. On the second day I awoke to the sight of the falls from my hammok, it was amazing. Having arrived in the dark the night before, I had no idea what I was going to see when I woke up the next day, but I had by no means expected that view from my bed!! We had an early breakfast and took the boat back arriving in time for lunch and our second tour. The second tour wasn`t quite as hard core and only involved 20 mins boat (thank the lord for saving our sore bums) and a couple of hours walking, but we got to see five or six more water falls and got to walk behind one of them, which was super cool. We slep the second night at the logde in Canimer, the village we landed in when we flew in. On the third morning we wandered the village looking at local handi crafts, and got the plane back in the early afternoon, arriving back in Bolivar at about 3pm. It was an amazing three days.
Thursday, 25 October 2007
Manauas, Brazil
Manauas is where I am now and is the last stop in Brazil and this entry should be a short one as there have only been two real events since last I wrote. We have yet to discuss the rest of the amazon river tour and then our jungle trip.
The remainder of the boat trip was mostly uneventful. The end of the third day (after the stop in Santarem) was spent reading, eating studying and the like. We stopped at another small town for half an hour on the fourth day and in the afternoon we saw a lot of dolphins and a lot closer than before. On the evening of the fourth day myself and Shelia had a few words with the captain of the boat, who was actual an America guy who was glad to practise his dormant mother tongue and told us aboiut his life and his family and also, lastly informed us that the boat would in fact arrive at middnight the following day and not early afternoon as we origionally thought. Apparently the way we had originally planned to go was too shallow and we had to take a longer route to get to Manauas. So we went to bed knowing we had a fith full day of boat, everyone else in our group however woke up happy, knowing we were getting off soon. They were soon made miserable agaain though, with the new information that arrival would likely in fact be at 2am (if not later) meaning we would be spending another night on the boat. People were not happy that our last night in civilization before the jungle trip was going to be another night of boat! As far as I am conserned it is a bed! I am only going to sleep in it after all!!
The next morning we dropped our bags at the hotel, and then set out into the jungle. The three day jungle trip was amazing, as was our jungle guide Ruban and our floating lodge accomodation. The best thing about the jungle trip however was the complete absence of mosquitoes, thats right - we were in the middle of the amazone jungle and there were no mossi´s. On top of that, we saw so much and did so much whilst we were there. We went Pirhan fishing and I caught my first fish (it does still count if I catch it but am then to scared to pull it out of the water right..), we went aligator spoting and not only saw the red eyes of the alligators from a distance but also saw a baby alligator up close when Ruban caught one!!
After a night floting in our lodge beds we spend a morning on a jungle trekk. Here Ruban taught us how to climb tall skinny tress with no branches with a special foot clamp type thing (the boys then had a go), he showed us how to make the local woven handy crafts, he caught a huge tarantual for us, he showed us a fluffy, feathered bug that looked more like a bird, he showed us a rubber making tree (and make us some rubber) and he showed us a tree you could cut a branch from and drink water out of. We found ants you can rub into your skin for mossi repellant, a plant you chew for malaria prevention and little white bug lave that are meant to be good to eat (I didn`t try one). The experience was amazing, I never expected to see so much on a two hour trek!! In the afternoon we then went canoeing (which we got bored of speedily) but Ruban, forever the entertainer, had more planned. He found a sloth, high up in one of the trees and we had a walk bare foot through the jungle and then wait at the bottem whilst he climbed an impossibly high tree and brought the sloth back down to us (wrapped in his t-shirt, clutched in his teeth!!). The sloth was AMAZING!! It was so slow and so interested in us it was just so cool. We then had to rush back becasue a storm was coming, but becasue we are lazy we didn´t manage it and we got caught out it in, but it was pretty cool being out in the canoe in the pouring amazonian rain.
On the final day we we went to see a local village before going home and on the way through the village we saw a church (which only opens once a year), a school, a few homes, a bar (in which we drank our first Capirinhas in quite a while) and another sloth!! On the way back it was in the heat of the day and after the rain the day before it was baking hot and we all jumped in the river fully clothed, it was so cool, we got too hot again five minutes later, but it was fun for the time we were in the water. On our return to the lodge we spent more time swimming and eating lunch before returning to Manauas and to reality!!
The remainder of the boat trip was mostly uneventful. The end of the third day (after the stop in Santarem) was spent reading, eating studying and the like. We stopped at another small town for half an hour on the fourth day and in the afternoon we saw a lot of dolphins and a lot closer than before. On the evening of the fourth day myself and Shelia had a few words with the captain of the boat, who was actual an America guy who was glad to practise his dormant mother tongue and told us aboiut his life and his family and also, lastly informed us that the boat would in fact arrive at middnight the following day and not early afternoon as we origionally thought. Apparently the way we had originally planned to go was too shallow and we had to take a longer route to get to Manauas. So we went to bed knowing we had a fith full day of boat, everyone else in our group however woke up happy, knowing we were getting off soon. They were soon made miserable agaain though, with the new information that arrival would likely in fact be at 2am (if not later) meaning we would be spending another night on the boat. People were not happy that our last night in civilization before the jungle trip was going to be another night of boat! As far as I am conserned it is a bed! I am only going to sleep in it after all!!
The next morning we dropped our bags at the hotel, and then set out into the jungle. The three day jungle trip was amazing, as was our jungle guide Ruban and our floating lodge accomodation. The best thing about the jungle trip however was the complete absence of mosquitoes, thats right - we were in the middle of the amazone jungle and there were no mossi´s. On top of that, we saw so much and did so much whilst we were there. We went Pirhan fishing and I caught my first fish (it does still count if I catch it but am then to scared to pull it out of the water right..), we went aligator spoting and not only saw the red eyes of the alligators from a distance but also saw a baby alligator up close when Ruban caught one!!
After a night floting in our lodge beds we spend a morning on a jungle trekk. Here Ruban taught us how to climb tall skinny tress with no branches with a special foot clamp type thing (the boys then had a go), he showed us how to make the local woven handy crafts, he caught a huge tarantual for us, he showed us a fluffy, feathered bug that looked more like a bird, he showed us a rubber making tree (and make us some rubber) and he showed us a tree you could cut a branch from and drink water out of. We found ants you can rub into your skin for mossi repellant, a plant you chew for malaria prevention and little white bug lave that are meant to be good to eat (I didn`t try one). The experience was amazing, I never expected to see so much on a two hour trek!! In the afternoon we then went canoeing (which we got bored of speedily) but Ruban, forever the entertainer, had more planned. He found a sloth, high up in one of the trees and we had a walk bare foot through the jungle and then wait at the bottem whilst he climbed an impossibly high tree and brought the sloth back down to us (wrapped in his t-shirt, clutched in his teeth!!). The sloth was AMAZING!! It was so slow and so interested in us it was just so cool. We then had to rush back becasue a storm was coming, but becasue we are lazy we didn´t manage it and we got caught out it in, but it was pretty cool being out in the canoe in the pouring amazonian rain.
On the final day we we went to see a local village before going home and on the way through the village we saw a church (which only opens once a year), a school, a few homes, a bar (in which we drank our first Capirinhas in quite a while) and another sloth!! On the way back it was in the heat of the day and after the rain the day before it was baking hot and we all jumped in the river fully clothed, it was so cool, we got too hot again five minutes later, but it was fun for the time we were in the water. On our return to the lodge we spent more time swimming and eating lunch before returning to Manauas and to reality!!
Subscribe to:
Comments (Atom)
