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| Playa Grande |
Happy Pearl Jam/Paul McCartney CD release day.
Another day another dollar down here.
60ish days until the semester breaks and we just rode out the fall break into Monday's second quarter.
To celebrate/relax/forget quarter one, ten of us went to a little place called Chroni (my students laugh at my pronunciation), a nice little beach community hidden behind snake's den of windy mountain roads (not win-dy, wine-dy).
Thursday
On the drive to Chroni, Jon's car gets pulled over and is forced to pay 1000Bs. It was a poker game of sorts. The officer threatened to have it towed, Jon countered with calling the school's lawyer, and the officer returned fire with waiting for the tow truck and other scare tactics. Having a car full of gringos and his son, Rexin, they paid the fine and were on their way (after about 30mins or so of a hold up).
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| McD's, aka civilization. Menu here is a little different. |
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| Peter Parker? Nope street art. Creepy though. |
After that brief pit stop we took to the mountain roads. A Dramamine endorsed two hour drive brought us to the Matchbox roads of Chroni. These things are just big enough for 1.5 Venezuelan cars, or 3/4 a a big Iowa truck. We were lucky enough to get caught behind a garbage truck in town for several blocks [extends hand for a high five] before reaching our Posada.
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| The posada's lobby. You can't see it, but there's no water. |
This posada was a cool, two floor motel type number with a restaurant that wasn't open and a hammock. It also didn't have water for most of our stay (hey it's not the Hilton). We didn't stay long, as we packed our stuff and headed to the beach.
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| Don't look at the shadows...got ya! |
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We ventured into town to get some fish to eat and then hit Playa Grande (beach). We hung out and relaxed until dusk. It was barren. Most Venezuelans go to the beach on the weekend, so we had one day without the madness. Once night settled in we returned to our waterless posada and then had some pizza at a local spot. We all called it a night before 11 or so. Yeah, we're old.
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| Dusk settles in. |
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| I'm still an artist. Lines, angles, shading. $32 dollars for the photo. Any takers? |
Friday
Early morning departure (I think 8). No alarm clock needed because Rexin was up chatting it up and chasing Jon which stirred some of the masses. Didn't wake me up, I was out until "Stairway to Heaven" impeded my brain.
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| Cruzito and Jon. They make the road look small. |
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| Closer to the water, the more it's hopping. Sabula on steroids! |
We walked back through town and hired a boat man, Esteban de la Cruz (not making that up) who said he also went by Cruzito. Guy was a solid captain, who was joined by a Somali as his first mate. Nice guys. One would think being out on a 15' or so boat with a 70 horse motor in the ocean would be cause for alarm (not yet) it was smooth sailing.
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| Biggest snake ever. |
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| Jon and Maya discussing the intricacies of teaching and boating. |
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| This was Disney's inspiration for the Little Mermaid |
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| My shirt: The Quad Cities are twice as nice as the Twin Cities. And some fishermen. |
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| That there is a flotilla of fishing! |
We wasted the day on Cepe (the beach) and in the water. At one point the beach community received its shipment of beers, all 3,000 plus of them. Insane amount of beer bottles. The beach had some small shops and such, but few were open. We found one that served Red Snapper, which we made short work of.
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| Cepe, it rhymes with "Hey, why don't I just go eat some hay, make things out of clay, lay by the bay? I just may. What'd ya say? |
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| Good thing Jon teaches Calc and could computer the number of beers on the beach. My singing of 99 bottles of beer wasn't working. |
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| Load'em up. |
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| I know what you're thinking, but yes it still runs. No gas gauge or speedometer. |
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| 1/3 Jon, Rexin, and some gypsies. |
The ride back with Cruzito reminded me of the time you got on a friend or relative that just got his or her boat. They know what they should do, but the just don't have the skills yet. We blasted off a few waves and some rough landings. Jon and I decided to give the captain some rum. A few times I saw the navigator shoot Cruzito a look like, "Easy Pops". A little more eventful, yet kind of fun. We rewarded him with the remaining booze in the bottle.
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| I have no idea what is going on, but shortly after this picture Jon and I have to help push a boat into the ocean. |
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| Boat in ocean, beer in hand. Simon Bolivar approves! |
We retreated to the posada where Eric and his wife Fanny joined us. They also were stopped and charged a 1000Bs bribe, but the relented and paid only 800Bs. We grabbed some dinner and hit the hay.
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| The sun sets. |
Saturday
Saturday morning we took Cruzito's boat to Chuao. The boat ride was the longest of the weekend, probably close to 30mins. It was a fresh morning with lots of traffic getting into the boat and to the beach.
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| I'll give you a dollar if you can tell me what is painted on the building to the left. |
We dropped off Jon and Rexin and the rest of our traveling brigade hit the pavement to walk through the chocolate plantation to a small pueblo. Ryan was almost killed by a random falling fruit bomb of death. I felt like I was watching real life Angry Birds. No casualties. Once there we hired a guide, a small, slightly limping older man and his eight year old granddaughter. Armed with what looked like a broomstick handle and a machete, Jose took to point and guided us up the mountain.
Up, under, around and over various trees, rocks, and climbs we scuttled. We even got to stop to have Jose open a chocolate seed/pod/holder of goodness (which was white, weird I know) to enjoy while we walked. A couple really fun parts like crossing a river (21 times) and wading through it with bags overhead. Ryan and I tried to take off off our shoes for each river and then put them back on, but that lasted about three crossings. Roughly two hours and change of wet feet we arrived.
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| It's alive (my blister)! And no, I don't need a pedicure. |
We waded in the water near the falls, and hung out on some smooth rocks to rest from the hike. An array of other travelers were up there as well eating and drinking. They were local (the thong bathing suits for women and Ronaldo hair cuts for guys gives it away) and enjoying themselves.
We made better time on the way down, and the granddaughter (first time up the mountain) never fell or slipped once. Ryan rewarded the young mountaineer with some cookies and a 20 or 50 Bs tip. Jose didn't charge us, but told use to give us whatever we felt. We gave him a sizable fee for the job. The real treat was to see the look on the young girls face. Which was followed about 47 steps later with her throwing the cookie wrapper on the ground (smh).
We caught a taxi, and by taxi I mean an old work truck with welded fencing on the outside of the bed and a pole parallel to the bed to hold on to. We had to duck and evade branches and leaves the whole way back.
After the taxi, we found Jon who was now joined by Eric and Fanny. We waited about thirty minutes until Cruzito got there.
We packed that boat to max capacity with about 14 people and hit the tasty waves. I was on the outside of the last row and just getting blasted with was from the boat. I also noticed that we sat significantly lower in the water than any of the other rides. I also was aware that we were much further out coming back, there was some white tips to the waves, and the sea was in a joking mood. We caught some big "hump" waves (my definition). A few times old Cruzito had to back way off the throttle to time approaching a wave or speed up to out run one. We were bouncing around pretty good until we hit one pretty hard.
I started to lean in towards the middle of the boat to think it would help (a physics teacher I am not). Plus if we did capsize (which I found out that not only was I thinking about it but so were Maya and Jon's wife Randi), it would be a hell of a swim in. The rocky cliffs weren't the answer, so the swim to the beach would be several hundred meters. While leaning in old Cruzito saw my body language and gave me a hard time. Now I speak about 2% Spanish, so I had no idea what he was saying, but what I could tell by his tone was that I was not a sailor and a sally.
True.
After hitting another wave pretty hard, I looked over at Ryan and he specifically told me to not look back as the wave was bad. I did catch a glimpse of it. Had to be 20+ feet and, here comes the scary part, was over the boat. We were in a low spot, it was high. Granted it was behind us, but that was not a cool visual. I made some mini check points along the way home to be goals for me to aim for. We got off the boat, into town and back to the posada.
That night we got some food and went to watch some gypsy drumming and check out their wares. The gypsies come from Argentina and Columbia and they had some really cool stuff. I wandered about practicing some Spanish and buying some things.
The drumming was good, but short lived. As they were followed up by several local rappers that actually were pretty good. Our crew didn't stay long and we retreated for the posada knowing that the drive tomorrow would be long and full of crazy bus traffic.
Overall not a bad trip. Relaxing and interesting all at once.
Sorry no pictures from the hike, I didn't want to risk bringing my phone through the water and the forest.
Hope you enjoyed your weekend and laughed at mine.
Until next time,
KRS
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