Journey to the Lost World
Trip Start
Jun 11, 2005
1
9
25
Trip End
Jun 05, 2006
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Roraima, Gran Sabana,
Venezuela
Tuesday, August 2, 2005
Simply for the challenge of exploring the great unknown, and because it was there, we decided to conquer it...
(...And it's easy to get to, the 10 tour companies in town run excursions there every week.)
What would we find? Pterodactyls? Tyrannosauruses? A group of English school girls saying "Top Banana" a lot? Who knows...
We were to be three tepuy-conquering musketeers for the 6-day trek: Andrea and I, and our muchacho Dave, a fellow volunteer from York, who had arrived in Santa Elena at the same time as we had, and was also staying 2 months. We painstakingly looked around town and rated the tour companies for quality of equipment, tour guide ability, level of spoken English etc. and then shrugged in unison, and went with the cheapest.
The trip didn't start off in the best circumstances, at least for me.
Alien Landscape
A couple of days before we set off I developed a grumbling stomach (which was later diagnosed as gastritis) and the day before, I developed a cold, with the full works - sore throat, aches and pains etc. We called the tour guide and asked if we could postpone, his response, a very sympathetic 'no' as he had made all the arrangements, bought the food etc. and there were 3 others accompanying our group.I had been assured by all that the first day was a relatively flat 4 hour stroll, and so would ease me into it. I was feeling marginally better than the day before. What the hell. As it wouldn't be fair for me to have a worse time than everyone else, I set out to whine as much as I could to bring everyone's enjoyment levels down to match my own.
The start of the trek was a 2 hour jeep ride from Santa Elena, the first hour on road, the second on bumpy dirt track. Our trekking companions were Lissandro, a Venezuelan from Caracas and Condor and his wife (I forget her name, so for the purposes of clarity, I will call her Imogen) from Spain (or more precisely, the Basque country). We also had a guide, Trevor (who, despite the promising name, didn't speak much English), a young protégé Samuel accompanying him, and Smithton, an English speaking porter from Guyana (formerly known as British Guyana (The country that is. As far as I know, Smithton was always called Smithton)).
Parantepuy, where we bade the jeep farewell, was a small indigenous village, and the start of our trek. Roraima loomed on the horizon, looking ominous and cloud covered, clearly a futile attempt to put us off, but we just scoffed.
Trevor arranged some other porters for our trip from the village, and after a few biscuits and an application of sun cream, we hoisted our rucksacks and with a jaunty click of the heels, we were on our way.
30 minutes in we were at the bottom of a reasonable climb, and I was struggling, visions of lying on a sofa wrapped in a duvet watching Series 1 and 2 of the Office on DVD dancing round my mind.
Andrea Takes a Break
It was hot, my rucksack felt heavy and I was not feeling good. I made it to the top of the hill, and some time after that, after the ground leveled off, and with a nice view of Parantepuy a short way back, we stopped for lunch.I dropped my rucksack, and sank onto a rock, where I noticed my legs were shaking. I began to doubt whether I could carry on, but after a nice lunch of ham and cheese salad sandwiches, and a couple of glasses of lemonade, my spirits lifted a little. I had been told that there was only one big hill, and that it was pretty flat after that.
Getting going again was a bit of a chore, but once we'd started moving, I got into quite a nice rhythm, and the rest of the walk was not too bad. It took us about 4 hours to reach the first night's camp, and the walk was a pleasant one. The scenery was mainly rolling grassy hills, not unlike some British vistas. Apart from the massive lump of rock blocking out the sunlight, that was.
There were a few buildings at the camp, made in the local indigenous style: wooden frame covered with mud, and a thatched palm-leaf roof. This was the 'canteen', and Trevor set about making us dinner while we put our tents up. Dave was using one of the tour company's tents, Andrea and I had borrowed a tent from Nijole, one of the other PVF volunteers, which we thought would be lighter and better than the rental ones. As it turned out, with me feeling so ropey on the morning we set off, we paid for an extra porter between us who carried the tents, a luxury we would otherwise have probably done without.
Andrea With Pick Axe
Kamadac had offered us a big black plactic sheet to throw over the tents in the likely event of Venezuelan-style torrential rain, an offer we thought was wise to take up. Our tent was a little cramped for 2, Dave, having more room in his, graciously stored on of our rucksacks in his tent. It was good to be in the camp, no more walking to be done, the only downside being the large number of 'puri-puris' the local brand of midges. They were so bad that it was hard to concentrate long enough to put the tent up, as they would land on any available piece of skin, lips and eyelids included. Liberal coatings of repellent deterred them a little.
Before dinner, we chatted to some walkers from another group, including an Israeli guy we'd met in town a few days earlier. He and his group were on their way down from the mountain, this being the night-stop for both Days 1 and 5. He raved about the experience, and suggested that we ask our guide to take us up two stages the next day, so that we have more time at the top. We decided to ignore his suggestion. One piece of good news that he passed on was that there were far fewer midges higher up. Woo hoo! With his group was an energetic Australian, running around in a silly hat being 'wacky' and 'spontaneous'. He even had a rubber chicken. I think we were all lucky that he was not in our group, as I fear he would have been pushed off the top, rubber chicken following.
Our dinner was plain and simple, chicken and rice for the meat-eaters, chicken and rice without the chicken for the veggie.
Base Camp
Bland, but there was lots of it.It got dark as we were eating, and we sat around for a while with head-torches on, but soon retired for an early night.
Day 2 - Uphill Trudge
I was counting on a good night's sleep to restore my energy, but didn't get one. The camp had been quite noisy till late, and I tossed and turned for as long as I could remember. Day 2 was 'The Hard Day', and I was not looking forward to it.
We packed up our tent, asked the midges to send our regards to the next group, and left the camp. Today was a mostly uphill 4-5 hour walk to base camp, at the bottom of the wall. We had to cross 2 rivers early on, a little tricky, owing to the rucksacks and lots of rainfall recently. The stones in the river were slippery, but was made easier by wearing socks, a local top-tip for extra grip, and made it across both with little drama. As soon as any new bare flesh was exposed, the midges seized their opportunity. I stood in my shorts filming one crossing with the video camera, and 30 seconds later looked down to see about 30 insects feasting on my shins.
As we got higher, the views got better, but after a couple of hours I was really feeling the pain. I kept my head down, and just put one foot in front of the other, trying to place my thoughts elsewhere. Andrea later told me that at one point she had tears in her eyes looking at my pitiful progress. What a brave little soldier I am...
Roraima base camp was a very welcome sight, but had taken us closer to 6 hours than 4.
Dave Gets the Ludo Out
Trevor was making salad sandwiches by the time we arrived. After one very welcome sit down, and a few hastily scoffed sarnies, we put our tent up, and went down to the river for a wash. Dave had already gone down to the river, and was coming back as we started off. He said that Condor and Imogen were down there already, and that Imogen, he gleefully warned us, had 'got her baps out'. As we sat around washing, things almost took a Carry-On turn when Imogen slipped on a rock and toppled towards me. I was just working out where I could possibly put my hands to catch her without jeopardizing my marriage when she managed to regain balance herself. Dave was delighted with the tale when it was later recounted, but cursed his early return to the camp that caused him to miss it.After a delicious siesta, it started raining, then we sat around in the hut eating spaghetti as it got dark. After some very welcome hot chocolate and rum, we went to bed.
This time, I am very, very happy to report, I slept like a log.
Day 3 - Summit Attempt!
We got up about 7 for an early breakfast, and I felt approximately 237% better. This was lucky as today was another up-up-and-more-up day, but was shorter, Trevor assured us. We were packed up and ready to go by 8.30ish, and set off into the jungle. From base-camp we could see the path that we needed to take to get to the stop. It looked pretty steep, but very inviting.
The walking, although steeper - a lot of it being a scramble - was far more pleasant for my recovering legs, and we made good progress on the way up.
In the Jungle
The jungle was thick in parts, but we followed a well trodden footpath. In the steeper areas, steps had been cut into the ground, and sometimes there we had to clamber over loose rocks, but for the most part the ascent was straightforward. We walked under a waterfall at one point, and stopped for lots of photos, taking our time.We reached the top shortly after mid-day, and were greeted by an eerie mist. This was it - the Lost World. There weren't any pterodactyls to be seen, although a powerful pre-historic smell rose up from my boots.
The best word I can use to describe the top is 'weird'. It was mostly rocky, with formations scattered and piled on top of each other like a surreal alien landscape. There was lots of vegetation between the rocks, mostly cactus-like plants, or scrub-like grasses.
A lot of the plants here are apparently unique, in other words, they can't be found anywhere else in the world, so with every glance you might spot a flower that you would never have seen before. I was amazed by this, and set about discovering new species, but then realized that I am not the most ardent observer of flora, so a trip to the average British back garden would probably find me discovering flowers I had never seen before.
Dave and Alessandro had reached the top some time before us, and had gone off exploring, so we sat around eating sandwiches until they returned, and when everyone was fully satiated, we walked about half an hour across the top of Roraima to our camping location.
Off we set...
The walking was a little tricky, as we sometimes had to hop from rock to rock, and little pools of water gathered and made everything slippery. It was quite like hunting for crabs in rock pools on a rocky beach after the tide had gone out, but instead of crabs, we found lots of tiny black frogs, that walked everywhere instead of hopping. Their cunning defence mechanism when you got too close was to - stand still ! Ingenious. We thus had no trouble collecting loads of them, and enjoyed a huge black-frog stew that evening. Ok, not really.We were camping at one of the 'hotels' on the top. These are big overhanging rock formations, some of which are large enough to host tents underneath, providing some protection from the rain. After setting up the tents, we went exploring for a while, then sat around reading and playing some nail-bitingly competitive games of travel-Ludo until it got dark. We were sat perched on a rock ledge about 2 metres off the ground, and every time Dave got up or moved about, Andrea and I held our breath, as he had demonstrated an amusing clumsiness several times since we had got to know him. It got quite chilly as the night arrived, and sitting around on cold rock didn't help. By the time dinner arrived we were chilled through, and it took steaming mugs of hot chocolate to warm us up again. After chocolate, we headed for the warm refuge of sleeping bags, and a night's sleep. Dave went for an early night too, as he was planning on getting up at 5am to watch the sunrise over the Gran Sabana.
Ready to Return
We were doubtful, but he was adamant, claiming several spectacular South American sunrises already under his belt from previous trips.Day 4 - On top of the (Lost) World
To our surprise, Dave made it out of bed on time, but he informed us that a few minutes into his quest, he fell over in the dark and hurt his arm, so gave up and went back to bed.
After breakfast Trevor took us all on a walk, to see some of the more unusual features on top of the mountain. Also, we wanted to see if we could get some views from the side, over the Sabana.
The weather would change quite quickly on top. Starting off with clear blue skies the clouds would seep over the side, an eerie creeping mist that would smother the mountain top in grey palour, and a few minutes later we would be completely in cloud.
We saw lots more freaky rock formations as we walked, and lots of giant quartz crystals. There were also some carnivorous plants, which I'd been looking forward to seeing. They were, disappointingly, only about 3 inches tall, and looked a bit like lilies. I had been expecting 12ft tall triffid-like creatures that would chase us round, dribbling slime. With hindsight, this may have been a little unrealistic.
We saw some mini-waterfalls, and paddled in an icy cold rock pool, only Imogen brave enough to fully submerge (baps in this time). Trevor, we had soon realized, either lacked any knowledge about the mountain, or lacked any interest in passing any of his knowledge on to us.
Setting Up the Tent
For example "Do you know how old these rock-pools are?" Dave asked. "Umm... eighty million years" said Trevor.
"Did you just make that up?" countered Dave.
"No."
And that was the most information Trevor gave us about anything on the whole trip.
The cloud was still heavy when we reached the side, but we did get some tantalizing glimpses of scenery through the grey nothingness. Also we stood out on an overhanging ledge, a thousand metres above the jungle, Andrea needing a little persuasion to shuffle out for photos.
That afternoon, we lazily sat around waiting for dinner, and played lots more Ludo, probably what Conan Doyle's explorers did when they got to the top of their mountain.
After dinner, the skies cleared and the starlight was spectacular, without a doubt the best I have ever witnessed. It seemed like the whole sky was glowing. The Milky Way was clearly visible, and very dramatic, and I kept being overwhelmed by the sheer number of stars. On a mountain, 3 days walk and 2 hours drive from any light pollution is definitely the place for stargazing. The Southern Cross, clearly visible most evenings in Santa Elena, despite being north of the equator, was almost lost in the thousands of other stars that surrounded it. 'I find that there's nothing quite like looking at the stars for putting life in perspective, and making you feel humble in a beautiful universe,' said Dave.
Day 5 - The Knee Killer
Day 5 walk is the sections of Day 2 and Day 3 combined, but in reverse of course.
The Hat
It was to be the longest day's walk, about 8 hours in total. It was definitely easier coming down than going up, but towards the end we were all mighty tired, and it was with shaky knees that we arrived at camp. The midges were pleased to see us back, at least. Lissandro joined us for Ludo in the canteen after we'd put the tents up. Some other groups arrived to camp for their first night, looking young and green, the way we must have looked a mere 4 days ago, and we were able to sit around with granite eyes, looking wise and weathered, passing on morsels of wisdom and experience. "When you're on top, don't go too close to the edge," said Dave to one young girl "Or you might fall off."
"Top banana," she replied.
That night was a bit stormy. The wind combined with the weight of the black plastic sheet caused the sides of our tent to cave inwards, causing Andrea to leap up from sleep in comical confusion. It rained quite hard for some time, but not all night. All in all we'd been extremely lucky with the weather, other trekkers having told us tales of walking all day in the rain, tents becoming sodden at night, so we didn't complain too much.
Day 6 - Back to Civilisation
Another nice sunny day for our walk home. This section of walk was much more enjoyable than it had been on Day 1, with me feeling almost right again now. My level of complaining was correspondingly lower, so it was also more enjoyable for everyone else. We arrived back in the village at early afternoon.
There were hot dinners of chicken and rice waiting for us, but nothing vegetarian for poor Andrea. "You could just eat the rice," Dave helpfully pointed out. I wasn't that hungry but had 2 or 3 glasses of Coca-Cola, which I had been dreaming about for the past few miles.
As our jeep back to civilization waited for us, a ranger from the Park service came to check our luggage. Apparently it is not permitted to remove any artifacts from the region, or any gold/diamonds etc, you may have discovered. Dave stood around looking a bit agitated, and quietly explained that he had brought a little rock of quartz down with him. I told him not to worry about it, as the ranger wasn't doing a thorough job of checking, then when Dave wasn't looking, I tried to explain to the ranger that we had a thief in our midst, and to pay close attention to the big guy with the bouffant. Alas he didn't speak any English, so after unzipping a few pockets on one or two of the rucksacks, he let us go with a disinterested wave.
Juanes, Colombia's hottest rock superstar, blasted out on the jeep's stereo as we bounced our way down the track and back to the real world.
Epilogue
Lying on the thin mattresses on the wooden beds back at the guesthouse felt like jumping onto a mountain of feathers. I couldn't believe how soft they were. I don't think I've ever slept so well. Over the next few days, as blisters and aching joints set about mending themselves, we reflected on a wonderful trip. So much Ludo, so much weird scenery, and to top it off, a nice case of amoebic infection for Andrea from drinking the river water. Buonissimo.
