Wrapping up our wonderful adventure in Guyana!

By Kerry Nicholas
THIS is the final installment of our threepart series. British tourists Kerry and David Nicholas wrap up their exciting adventure in Guyana, a place which they quickly realised holds extreme beauty and magical wonder.

We checked back in to the SleepIn Guest house on Church road. Bliss. Good wifi, great air con and friendly faces. We met up with our friend Akash from the Guyana Chronicle at Nicky’s fish and chips in Durey Lane. We told him about our adventures.

“So you guys have already been to regions four, five and six, nine and ten” he calculated. “Only one, two, seven and eight to go. I bet you could get to all the regions in Guyana before you leave next week. Not many foreigners have achieved that. In fact, not many Guyanese probably either.”

The challenge was on.

We thought we had region eight covered already. In the first week we had put our names on the waiting list with Air Services Ltd to go on the day trip to both Kaieteur Falls and Orinduik Falls. The helpful lady on the phone told us we were eighth and ninth on the list and the plane would only go if it was full – 13 people. We told her we were going out of signal for a few days but would definitely be there and would call in friday to see if they had enough people. But on our return we called to find out that, yes, it was definitely going, but not with us on it. They had bumped us off again. The same nice lady cheerfully told us that she couldn’t get hold of us so she had sold the tickets to somebody else.

After a couple of consolatory rums and Canada drys in the Palm Court (great wifi) we realised what we kept doing wrong. Hang the 4%! We booked our plane tickets for the next Kaieteur Falls trip by credit card that evening.

Luckily the plane to Kaieteur Falls goes even when its not full. There were six tourists on the plane that day to see Guyana’s biggest tourist attraction: the highest single drop waterfall in the whole world. Kaieteur Falls has about the same amount of tourists in one year as Macchu Picchu has in one day. And unlike Niagara Falls in the USA or Iguassu Falls in Brazil with their barriers and huge hotels and tourist boats – there was absolutely nothing except nature for miles and miles – as far as the eye could see. We could walk right to the edge of the canyon – trembling knees for me – and watch the water chasing itself over the edge of the cliff till it splashed in a billowing circle into the plunge pool 741 feet below. How lucky are we to have found it now, this gem of Guyana isolated in the remote pristine forest. But how long will it stay that way?

According to the Guyana Tourism Authority, visitor numbers have increased by 11.6 percent in the first nine months of this year. We had a taste of how Guyana is trying to carve out a niche as an eco-tourism destination, but there was also a record 102 percent increase in visitors in May for Guyana’s Golden Jubilee celebration, which might distort figures. Last year 206,800 people visited Guyana, spending enough to represent eight percent of Guyana’s Gross Domestic Product. Only about 2,500 tourists were from the UK which, to me seems staggering as Guyana is the only country in South America where English is the first language. Its a shame that London doesn’t have direct flights to Georgetown like Paris has to Cayenne in French Guyana.

Back to our regional challenge. We knew that Akash’s colleague Alva Soloman was from Mabaruma in region One in the north-west of the country. Alva had interviewed us for an article he wrote for the Chronicle two weeks earlier. We picked his brains on buses and speed boats and places to visit and then we were off. In order not to miss out on region 7 we took a detour to the mining town of Bartica which is just inside the zone.

A sense of loss and despair permeated Bartica. Bored prostitutes sat in dingy bars tapping their hand-helds. “We buy gold” signs hung over darkened stores. Boom time seemed to have long gone.

BARTICA THEN ESSEQUIBO!
Dinner was simple but delicious. A sinuous street vendor with a bright blue wooden cart served lumps of fresh floured fish, succulent peppered chicken and newly-cut chips straight from a wok of boiling oil to a line of waiting customers. He replenished our plates with extras when we thought that we had finished. I thought his name was Dr Woody as he had hand-written the words on his cart. David thought it was a Guyanese brand. Its easy to get things wrong when you’re just passing through.

We finished our evening with a quick drink at the Morroco hotel bar. We had fun trying to understand three men and a woman who were talking fast and excitedly but had trouble standing up. “Leave that poor couple alone” sighed the bar lady. “They’ve only come in for a quiet drink. They don’t need you leaning over them like that”.

We didn’t mind.

We passed by the Morroco on the way to catch the first boat to Parika at 6.15am and it was still open. Customers looked up at the dawn sun with milky eyes.
The speed boat did not leave the dock until it was full at 8.30am. It sped on up through the Essequibo islands, past what we were told was Eddy Grant’s mansion on two connecting rocks (an odd place to get some privacy) and on to Parika. Then another speedboat across the Essequibo to region three. The taxi drivers at Supenaam fought noisily for our trade, all the time pulling at our racksacks:

“$2000 two people”
“Charity $2000”
“Taxi ready to go. Come now”
We chose badly. As he turned his engine on, the driver announced it would cost us $4000 because he didn’t have any other passengers. We told him we’d wait.
The boat ride from Charity to Kanuka was exhilarating then magical. We dutifully put on our lifejackets as we passed through the checkpoint into region one. Once past the mouth of the choppy ?? River we skimmed along thin avenues of mangroves and eased through creeks heavy with floating vegetation.

We clambered onto the tiny wharf and checked in at the Acquero Guest House. We were the only guests. They weren’t expecting us so had no food. We got talking to locals over cook-up back in town and asked about what we could visit. We heard about the Santa Rosa Mission and an Arawak village with a harpy eagle’s nest and blue butterflies. Captain Johnnie who runs Chelsea’s boats and his wife were at the wharf. They didn’t know where the harpy eagle was, but Johnnie told us about his father spearing fish from huge rocks in the lake. He gave us numbers for a road trip to Kwabanna.

“Hey, were you in the Guyana Chronicle last weekend?” His wife asked. “The British couple?”
Fame at last.

ON TO WARAPOKA
We decided against getting into a bus to Kwabanna and opted to hire a boat deeper into the Maruca and Waini rivers. We negotiated with Neal Norton on the quayside and he kindly cancelled his other plans to take us to Baramami lake and Warapuka village. We entered a shady creek lined with huge trees bending together over it.
“Ninety-nine turns” he said. We didn’t bother counting. We just enjoyed the sway of the boat and the peace and isolation as the outboard twisted through the creek.

The approach to Warapoka is like an enchanted scene from a fairy tale. The sign at the entrance says: “WARAPOKA The village of huge rocks and beautiful sand”. The creek meanders darkly. Huge interconnecting roots rise up out of the water to guard its banks. The forest looks impenetrable. Then, the creek ends abruptly and there is the little wooden dock, the village houses laid out on a sunny hill and those enormous smooth boulders rising out of the soil.

The toshao, Mr Newton Wilson, came to meet us at the dock. We shared lunch together and he told us that his ancestors had lived here for 5,000 years. I could see why. I told him it looked totally idyllic.
Newton agreed. He then said Mr Sydney Allicock, Jacquie’s father, and the Minister for Amerindian affairs, had visited only three days earlier.
“He told us that our village has everything that would make it a perfect place for eco-tourism”. Newton said. I asked him what he meant.

“Well he thinks that people would pay to come and see our beautiful village.. the strange rocks here, the roots in the creek, the cave, the vast area of forest, and the Harpy eagle. You want to see the harpy eagles? They have been nesting here for 15 years. My neighbour saw them nesting when he was building his farm so he didn’t cut the tree. And we have a wild pig that the children play with. Would you like to see the pig?”

I certainly did, but first I asked if the whole village was enthusiastic about inviting tourists in.
“Oh yes, we have all talked a lot and we all agreed that we should explore this more. We are getting ready. We have built this guest house, already. You are most welcome to come and stay. Mr Allicock suggested ways we could improve it, and we will do it.”
Yes please.

Newton introduced me to his family and took me to meet “Piggy” and the children. It was a bit too far for David to walk to see the harpy eagle, but I was sure that bird-watchers the world over would be happy to crawl on hands and knees to see these birds at close proximity. They just need to find out, I suppose. And it sounds like Mr Allicock and his ministry are going to find a way to tell them.

WHAT WE LEARNED
It seems to me that the great advantage of Guyana is it still has two tourism development pathways open to it. It does not have to “re-wild” as many countries do. Nature and traditional communities are still here for people to experience and admire. The first few tentative steps are being made to develop payments for ecosystem services, and conservation-linked businesses.

Guyana must be congratulated. Its Government has recognised the global shift towards understanding and maintaining ecosystems, and is actively putting its country in the forefront of this global movement. The Guyanese people are some of the most warm and welcoming we have ever met on our travels.

Let’s hope all parties will be able to keep their independence as this beautiful country’s tourism develops.