"It can hardly be a coincidence that no language on Earth has ever produced the phrase, 'as pretty as an airport.' Airports are ugly. Some are very ugly. Some attain a degree of ugliness that can only be the result of a special effort."
-from The Long Dark Tea-Time of the Soul by Douglas Adams



I feel increasingly despondent about air-travel. The worst bit is airports. They are hollow, soul-less places. As I stood looking out of a house-sized pane of glass in Caracas airport, I watched the baggage handlers loading up the plane that would take me out of South America. I was watching for my bike, but I happened to notice that about half the suitcases whizzing up the conveyor belt were wrapped in cling-film. Indeed, as I walked in the airport I had been acosted by several people offering their services to wrap up my stuff in cling film. But why? For security, to protect your precious bag, for waterproofing? I don't see how it does any of these things really. This is a fairly new thing, which seems to be popular, but I'm pretty sure it is a swiz. A waste of time, money and, in the end, a lot of cling-film.

Wastefullness is part and parcel of air-travel. The microwaved food comes in disposable containers, with plastic cups and plastic cutlery which can all be ditched. The headphones, to listen to a film on a post-card sized screen on the back of the seat in front, are disposable. The plane itself is burning through who knows how many gallons of fuel, churnning out waste gasses.

I'm in Barcalona now. My bike (she's a hardy thing) and I survived an overnight bus, overnight flight, and overnight train. I will be glad to sleep in a bed that doesn't move.

I will take flights again. I like to travel and, unless I get into sailing in a big way, I will have to put up with air travel as a necessary evil.

After I got soaking wet yet again in a walk in the mountains I decided to sign up for a tour to Los Llanos. This is a flat land area with tons of animals and birds. First stop was Barinas to collect a Russian couple from the airport (strong silent types) and go rafting down a big bouncy river. Next morning we headed to the camp in Los Llanos but before we even arrived there were animals to spot.

Junior, our guide, spotted some howler monkeys in some trees. When we piled out of the truck to take photos. Later, near the camp, we saw a load of caimen surrounding a lake.

The camp was a collection of homely shacks with numerous children, an anteater and a very humourous parrot. We looked forward to slinging ourselves up in hammocks for the night but first we climbed on the roof of the truck to go caimen hunting. The goad was to catch a caiman: just for a laugh! Junior and Ali, his friend from the camp, set off into the fields, and after a few false starts came back carrying a bundle of baby caimen. We oohed and ahhed, took photos and had a little race. Then Junior and Ali (AKA the black dolfin) set off to find some bigger ones...

The following morning we fished for parahnas (despite looking really easy...I caught nothing), hunted for anocondas (and found a little one) and went on a fantastic boat trip to spot fresh-water dolphins, capivaras and many exotic and beautiful birds. Then back for an eight-year-olds birthday with dancing (for everyone), rum (for adults), piñata (for kids) and cake (for those who lasted that long).

After a painful attempt to hang on to a cantering (or trotting?) horse, we piled back into the truck and drove back to Merida.

I was lucky enough to have a fantastic group: the Belgium stallion, two chain-smoking Germans and a couple from the UK.
After all that excitement I ended up back in Merida, it was still raining so my hope to climb Pico Bolivar was out. I was thinking of having a day at a natural hot-spring, but a recent land-slide had filled it in...So I booked on another trip.





This time I had a pair of very pretty young German girls as companions and the trip was to see the famous Catatumbo Lightning. I guess it isn't that famous really. Odd though. We stayed in a house on stilts right in the middle of the lake and watched this silent lightning going on all night. We also took in a night safari on the speed boat and spotted loads of birds of prey. The next day we visited a village built on stilts. This was a real highlight for me, a very strange and wonderful place of fishermen and more children than you would imagine. They all get about by boat. Kids paddle around on bits of polystyrene, plastic buckets or anything else that will float. There are two pubs, a church, a school, shops and about 800 people live there. There is also a power plant which fires up in the afternoon for the telenovelas (soap opreas) and then in the evening for the lights.