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| Finally left Potosi after 5 very happy, emotional and
interestingly traumatic at times months... the day after my birthday we were leaving to go to Santa Cruz where pedro's sister lived to relax for a week before I took off to brazil where I would spend a week with Luka and then to Sao Paolo for my flight home... We found the house a while after arriving and finally I met the rest of Pedro's family, great girls, Carmen is dead nice and calm, married with an excitable young son and his other sister Mariza was brilliant, lively and happily curious about everything. Carmen insisted we sleep in separate beds but in the end we managed to at least get the same bed, albeit we had to share with Mariza too!!! The next morning Carmen announced that that night everyone would sleep together in the same bed, to separate us even further! By chance that was the day that we were leaving (wink wink) ! So off we went to town, bought tickets to go to Trinidad (Beni) in the amazon basin and left that evening leaving most of our stuff at Carmens house. Beni was gorgeous, hot and tropical, everything I love. We found a wicked little hotel after being turned away by everywhere else in town, i felt like Mary adn Joseph! Ours was a nice little hotel if you didnt mind taking the toilet door with you every time you went to the loo. Most of the hotels rooms were occupied by the brothers too who seemed to love taking a little rest before their little rest from working which was also mainly resting! Had no money to take a tour of the Amazon so we went on motorcycle taxi to Puerto Almacen which is on the banks of the river Mamore. Very very nice place, gorgeous, hot, exactly as you’d imagen the Amazon to be. The next day we went off to a little village much deeper into the jungle. We took the bus which was a little pick up with wooden planks in the back. For more than 3 hours we rode deep into the jungle and about halfway through, inevitably I fell of when the bus bumped so much the seat fell down and me with it,everyone else sensibly had been holding tightly onto the roof, everyone except me. The scenery for the most part was wonderful, loads and loads of interesting gorgeous colourful birds, large ones, small ones, butterflies, other larger animals, tons of deep deep forest. then at times, sadly, it seemed like a construction zone, huge areas of land burnt and razed to the ground, vast plots of land used purely for cattle grazing. We came back to Santa Cruz, collected our stuff and finally left on the train at 3pm, Pedro’s first time on a train ever and despite the melancholy mood between us he was nevertheless extremely excited. The train was slow, very very hot and packed with people. Vendors walked up and down the aisles from 3pm until well into the night selling everything you could possibly imagine from cold drinks to half dead brightly coloured birds. We tried sleeping for some of the journey amongst the numerous incredibly large insects and what was honestly the biggest most ferocious mosquito I have ever seen land on Pedro’s neck, brushing it off I am convinced I saved his life! The landscape as we went was incredible, illuminated beautifully by the moon, flat at first with mountains rising up from time to time in the most bizarre haunting shapes, tall towers, jutting faces, animals, mythology and legend were rife in areas like this. That night I had my first dream in spanish, very impressed with myself for that one! The train didnt arrive until about 11am the next day, 15 hours they had told us...my bottom! Pedro immediately bought his ticket back to Santa Cruz and we got a taxi to the border. My bus on the other side left at 3pm too so we hung around for a bit and soon enough the sad time came to say goodbye. All that done with I got in a taxi and we went... straight past immigration! A few minutes later I told the driver we had to return and we did. The bloke in immigrations immediately saw a chance to get some cold hard cash and asked why, if I wanted to leave was the car facing the other way, as if it were entering? Then he realised that the extension stamp on my passport was on the wrong page where it said exit instead of entry and his eyes lit up... ‘problem’ he told me. After having to leave Pedro I was in no mood at all for this, so immediately I began arguing and telling him there was no problem and he was the one with the problem and that he was just looking for excuses to take money from me, that I wanted to talk to the boss, that I wanted him to call or let me use the phone, of course he was ‘the boss’ and conveniently the phone ‘didnt work!’ He wanted me to pay 10 Bolivianos for every day I was in Bolivia! In the end he told me to go to the police, ok then I told him, where are they? In brazil he replied! But I asked if I could cross and he said yes so I went with the taxi driver and we went all the way there while he told me that when I arrived I should leave my stuff there and get a motorcycle taxi back because it was cheaper, at this point I got a little suspicious and asked him to wait for me but he said he couldnt because he was from this side and would get into trouble. We arrived almost there at the police / immigration / bus station (all in one place) I asked the driver the time and he told me it was about 14.45. It was a race against time, ‘turn around’ I told him, take me to the station and put your foot down. Passing Immigration I stuck two fingers up at the window while the driver shouted to the other taxi drivers what had happened and what a ‘bastardo’ he was. I arrived at the train station just in time to get the train but the ticket window was closed so I thought I’d just take my chances and get on the train anyway... I was frantic, half crying and searching frenziedly for Pedrito. He saw me first and we got on the train. We payed the guy next to him 10 Bolivianos to move (about a quid!) Then just before we left the real boss of immigration came along and started shouting at me for having entered Brazil without being stamped out so I explained everything to him and that his employee was trying to get money out of me. In the end he told me there was no problem and I could cross but by now I didnt want to so I said thanks but no thanks and we went. From Santa Cruz I bought tickets to pass through Paraguay, I was told the road was good, quicker and cheaper than going through Argentina. Good then, ticket was bought for 2 days later. more to follow!!! _________________________________________________________________ Help STOP SPAM with the new MSN 8 and get 2 months FREE* http://join.msn.com/?page=features/junkmail |
