Los Frailes Merida

... churches, museums, small modern buildings, a university and a cathedral. A number of leafy plazas dot the city where locals sell products and produce in booths or loiter. Sometimes a person plays the pan flute along to tunes by the Beatles, Bryan Adams, Scorpion, and a bunch of 80's tunes. The streets are relatively clean. It's easy to find garbage cans, and there are cleaning crews, the first we have seen in Venezuela. We also have seen ...

... the airport to the hotel, with a local that was picking up a friend from Huston, she was extremely sweet, she drove around Caracas abit for me, and gave me some history on the city. They are very poor here, the government say´s its o.k to start building this huge office building then they run out of money half way through, its very ape rant that the government has no organizational skills whats so ever. so if you look around ...

... people. We were still able to get a few beers though for as the shopkeeper pointed at the sign saying no booze was to be sold, he reached behind it to grab us a few bottles anyways. After saying goodbye to rainy Merida I found myself on my final long distance bus of my journey to the sweltering and dirty oil capitol of Venezuela, Maracaibo. One day was certainly enough as I prepared to reenter my dear Colombia and her more ...

... and son on a self-maintained and self-sufficient plot of land...where they grow all their food. They decided to cut themselves off quite significantly from society, and are followers of Sai Baba - a Hindu spiritual teacher/leader. I couldn´t believe that in all places, I found devotees of Sai Baba in a small mountain village of the Venezuelan Andes. I had a tough time explaining to her what the NGO I will be working with actually do...as she was very ...

Merida is one of those mountain towns where you can do all kinds of active things, but another attraction is Lake Maracaibo and the famous lightning storms that take place almost every night during the wet season. We were just outside the rainy season but we nipped over to take a look, staying at a traditional village in the lake (but perched on stilts) with an uninterrupted view of all the places where the lightning turns up. More on that later. The ...

... have their pictures taken with the stupid gringos wearing T-shirts and shorts so we kindly obliged but seriously what was all the fuss about? Back down in Merida we managed to get some food inside us for the first time in a few days as we were both looking a bit on the skinny side with Garvo nicknaming Carly stickleback!Carly did retort and our tour names our now Stickleback and Skeletor!

... ked sme ho stretli cestou na stanicu. Cesta pralesom bola podla mojho nazoru menej dobrodruzna ako cesta taxikom tam, hudba hrala naplno, ludia prijemni, pohoda lesy :) V Maracay sme si kupili listky do Meridy v najkomfortnejsom type autobuse (Bus Cama) s polohovatelnymi sedackam ktore sa daju zlozzit do takmer vodorovnej polohy. Cesta do Meridy trvala asi 13 hodin, prebiehala by pokojne a nudne keby cestou nepristupil skolsky vylet ...

... getting closer and closer until finally, he pulled his boat directly in front of ours, completely blocking our sunrise. I mean, we could practically reach out and touch the other boat. And it wasn´t like the lake was small, he could´ve parked anywhere. Our guide just shook his head, muttering ¨estupido,¨ before calmly moving our boat back, then pulling it right in front of theirs. It was hilarious. I kept waiting for the other ...

... en kabinelift op paa toppen af Pico Bolivar, det hoejeste punkt i Venezuela(5.007m). Saa sne for foerste gang i aar. Om eftermiddagen var det mere adventure med pendule. Pendule minder lidt om elistikspring. Vi stod paa en offenlig bro (ca. 40m) hvor man blev bundet fast i et tov og skulle kaste sig ud fra broen i en slags hovedspring. Forskellen fra elistikspring er, at tovet ikke er elastisk saa i stedet for at springe op igen, svinger man ind under broen, og ...

Ahhh feeling very chilled out and Caracas feels like a bad dream now. This is our Third day in Merida and the initial good vibes that we experienced on our first day haven´t diminished. After arriving we popped out to a nearby pizza place whose walls were covered with Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (Sth America is permanently stuck in the eighties). And like true brits abroad we went to the local offy to stock up on beer and liquor for the week. We ...