Big skies and Amerindian reservations

Trip Start Jun 27, 2007
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Trip End Sep 14, 2007


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Flag of Brazil  ,
Monday, September 3, 2007

The 12 hour overnight journey to Boa Vista, was typically Brazilian. The bus driver (read: boy racer) roared down the largely asphalted road in his souped-up 44 seater coach, every now and again slamming on the breaks to avoid a car-sized pothole, sending anything or anyone in the bus flying who wasn't holding on for dear life. Sleep as a result was not easy to come by, although the dense moonlit jungle, lakes, and rivers we were passing by was a welcome distraction.
We (I had picked up a couple of other travellers heading in my direction) pulled into Boa Vista at first light, and headed off to find some basic digs for the night. From all accounts, Boa Vista is a quiet, unattractive place with little to attract the casual traveller, but it was a convenient stopover before heading into Guyana.
It is the capital of the small northern state of Roraima, a state sparsely populated by Amerindian tribes who have rejected integration and live in their own vast reservations among the jungle, grasslands, rivers and hillocks in this breathtakingly empty and hot region with vast fluffy cloud-filled skies. (I don't know why in some places the sky seems vast, it's the same sky all over the world, but in some places it just seems gigantic and endless).
Boa Vista is the only sizeable city, a purpose built administrative centre along the banks of the Rio Branco. It is much like what I imagine Brasilia to be like: symmetric, spread out, suffocatingly hot, and lifeless on Sundays and in the heat of the day.
We found an extremely basic hotel in the centre and headed out to try and find some breakfast. There was little open but we wandered around the 'historical centre' (about five buildings of any considerable age), the waterfront promenade and jetties, and into a slum (by mistake). The supermarket seemed a good, air conditioned option to get something to eat. We killed this Sunday on the internet and wandering around the deathly quiet park, catching a long siesta in between.
In the evening things livened up a bit when we headed down to the fantastic waterfront development - two jetties on different levels suspended over the banks of the river, connected by a walkway, with a selection of bars and restaurants. An enormous and spectacular tropical storm suddenly hit the city, and we sat out on the jetty under the roof with an ice cold beer watching the sky lit up by constant and ferocious lightning bolts over the river and jungle.
There was little else going on though, so we headed home once the storm had finish to get some sleep before an early start the following day.
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