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Feb. 16, 2008 Around the beginning of last July, when I still had a solid month on my Peruvian visa, I decided to migrate to Iquitos. In July, Lima is cold and cloudy, but Iquitos, beyond the Andes from Lima, in the heart of the Peruvian jungle, is warm and sunny almost every day of the year. Unfortunately there are no roads to Iquitos. Access is by ship or plane. So I flew. Iquitos is at the confluence of the Ucayali and Marañon Rivers, the very source of the mighty Amazon. I would just enjoy the delectable warmth until the expiry of my visa. I had sailed the Amazon upstream from Belém, at the estuary, to Manaus, the metropolis of the Brazilian jungle, in January, 2006. It took 5 days to sail 800 miles. Now I would be sailing 1000 miles downstream from Iquitos to Manaus, so I was gearing myself for 7 days aboard a slip. Then I learned in Iquitos that there were swift launches that could navigate the 1000 miles in 40 hours. This cost about US$250. On August 2, I boarded a launch at Embarcadero Hueiquitos in Iquitos, and in a mere 10 hours, we had made Santa Rosa, Perù. This is a point where there are three towns in three different countries, separated by rivers. With Santa Rosa, there are Leticia, Colombia and Tabatinga, Brazil (say Tabachinga, if you want to sound Brazilian). I went by small wooden motorboat from Santa Rosa to Tabatinga, where I had to report to the Federal Police with credentials. On the 4th, I was on another launch: on the 5th I was in Manaus. I love hilly, slummy Manaus. It’s 85º degrees almost every day of the year. I don’t think it ever got below 73º during my six-month stay. With the help of a Trinidadian solicitor working the sidewalks in Manaus, I managed to get a very nice room for $10 a day: spacious, clean, 3 beds, balcony, television, refrigerator, air conditioning. It would have cost at least $40 is Los Angeles. I did take a jungle excursión up the Rio Negro, where I saw alligators and dolphins, but I missed the monkeys and the anacondas that live there. In October, I was gratified to obtain a 3-month extension of my original 3-month Brazilian visa. The extension expired on January 28, with no further extensions available. So I bought a bus ticket for the trip from Manaus to Puerto La Cruz, Venezuela. I arrived on January 26, after riding through intermittent jungle and savannah for 40 hours. Next day, I bought a ticket to Caracas, my present location. Almost immediately, I met a group of Palestinian Arabs resident in Caracas, and I sold them much-sought-after US dollars at a rate very favorable to them. I know they could probably resell them at a handsome profit on the black market. But they had agreed to help me get situated in a very nice room in a secure neighborhood for $US267 a month, so I gladly let them have the bargain dollars. They live in the same building, and my acquaintance with the Arabic language and Egyptian culture makes us friends. The bulding is a white stucco building with a terra cotta tile roof and a high wrought iron fence all around. It is in a very handsome neighborhood called El Paraíso-La Paz. All the houses have high walls or high fences, very elegant, and the streets are often lonely. The owner is a Venezuelan doctor, with a lovely sister 32 years old. At the end of April, I will be moving on. Trinidad? Colombia? Costa Rica? I don’t know. But by October, I want to be back in Argentina. I have pictures at my website of some of the spots I have mentioned in this article. ------------ About the author Thomas Keyes: I have written two books: A SOJOURN IN ASIA (non-fiction) and A TALE OF UNG (fiction), neither published so far. I have studied languages for years and traveled extensively on five continents. Visit my website here. Email: udikeyes@yahoo.com Comment on this article here! ------------ All articles are EXCLUSIVE to Useless-Knowledge.com and are not allowed to be posted on other websites. ARTICLE THIEVES WILL BE PROSECUTED! |
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