There and back again
Trip Start
Apr 16, 2009
1
124
Trip End
Ongoing
What I did
Cower
Macuto, Central Venezuela, Venezuela
Monday, April 26, 2010
We're afraid we don't have much good to say about our experience in Venezuela. Maybe we weren't really up for it as it was an enforced overnight stay inbetween us getting home, but we reckon even on balance it wasn't a particularly pleasant experience.
We just had the one night here after re-jigging our flights, and after discovering that the airport was a couple of hours from Caracas (in good traffic) up on the Caribbean coast, we opted to stay in a little seaside hotel 20 minutes from the airport in Macuto. We had booked and were to have a driver collect us at the airport. Seemed simple enough.
Now Venezuela is one of those places with a lot of false markets paid for by its oil revenues, e.g. petrol prices and the official Bolivar exchange rate. The black market exchange rate was anywhere from 10-50% better than the one used by official channels (like banks and credit cards) so we had plenty of USD cash and we were looking to swap with locals. This does set up some awkward circumstances whereby you don't know how legal the whole thing is, and plenty of your potential money-changing partners are characters of questionable salubriousness.
Our driver kept us waiting at arrivals for about an hour while we wandered aimlessly around, attempting to casually signal to any non-official looking locals that we had hard currency to change simply with a a smile and slight roll of the eyes. It worked quite well surprisingly and when the driver eventually did turn up we had a few rates, the baggage porters quoting the most aggressive prices. Our driver was surly, demanded payment in dollars immediately, and proceeded to take us to our hotel via a 20 minute wait at a petrol station (he did fill up his SUV for about £3.20, so no wonder there was a queue). The hotel was pretty grubby, and we settled down in the restaurant for some heavily over-priced and under-flavoured food. The romantic post-dinner stroll along the Caribbean waterfront was not to be - the streets were dark and empty and from what we'd heard of Venezuela we didn't want to chance it without knowing the area better. So for our last night of the trip we headed back up to our bedroom, read, and watched some Spanish tv. Nothing like going out with a bang.
In the light of day we risked a quick stroll around the environs. 'Caribbean' conjures up certain images which this waterfront unfortunately fell some way short of. There was a tatty restaurant, a beach of sorts (it may have just been a sandy car park near the sea), and an oil tanker sitting at anchor just off the coast. St Lucia it was not.
More than ready to get back to the airport, we were picked up by grumpy driver once more and arrived with ample time to spare. We sat in the departure lounge with faces glued to the windows waiting for our Iberia-sponsored rescue plane to land. We were by now very excited about getting home, seeing our family, friends, and Nan, again.
The journey back went well, our overnight Iberia plane was last furbished in the 1970s, but aside from that it was all smooth with a short connection in Madrid. In the clear skies over the English Channel we were even able to spot Southampton, the Hamble, and Ritchie's parent's house. Ritchie's dad was on hand to collect us at Heathrow, and he whisked us back to Hedge End. We were home.
THE END.
