March 08
Wednesday we completed a 22-hour busride from Puerta La Cruz, Venezuela, to Boa Vista, Brasil. Jon and I have an ongoing bet as to the number of hours we will spend on a bus in the next six months. For clarity´s sake, I am going to publish the bet here, so we can all know the vast seriousness of its stakes:
The Prize:
One meal at Famous Dave´s Barbeque & Grill, in MPLS, MN, which must include a selection of deliciously barbequed foods and their delicious barbeque sauce counterparts.
The Bet:
Megan: 175 hours of bus travel
Jon: 176 hours of bus travel
*the bet only includes those bus journeys between large cities, and does not include the use of a lotaçao, por puestos, or tuk-tuk type vehicle.
So anyway. Yes. We spent almost a whole day on a bus. It cost us only $75 each, and although it had air-conditioning and nicely reclining seats, there were some very important things to note from the journey.
Puerta La Cruz (00:00 into the journey): Upon boarding, our bus was pulling out of the parking lot when it was flagged down by a very sweaty man who crawled on to the bus breathing heavily. As he was wearing spandex shorts and a Adidas vest we though, oh, perhaps the nice man jogged to the bus station? Perhaps he´s a fitness guru and loves pounding the pavement? As he sat down in the seat adjacent to ours, we noticed a young woman, a child, and two other men boarded (unsweaty) after him, and they were all chatting like old friends. Our man jogger then pulled out two cans of Red Bull, drank them within a couple minutes, and started sucking regularly on his teeth. As the bus began it´s epic journey, Mr. Red Bull´s bus-ride participation began a regular cycle of sweaty banter with his cohorts, lots of teeth-sucking, then falling asleep into the LOUDEST SNORING I have ever, in my life, witnessed. By the second hour or so, Jon and I concluded he perhaps had a nice stash of something in his teeth, which he liked to suck out and then chat, and then come down into a shallow fit of sleep. We quickly decided to move to different seats, in the back of the bus.
Cuidad Bolivar (04:00 into the journey) Around the time we got to Cuidad Bolivar, we noticed a strange white dude, in his 40s, was seated a couple rows in front of us. We mostly noticed him because he stared at us with wide-eyed wonder, and Jon noticed that actually he had a glass eye. When we stopped briefly to get a drink & dinner, this man ambled around next to us, not saying a word but staring at us intently. We decided to ignore him. He will come into our story, later on.
Somewhere Between Cuidad Bolivar & Cuidad Guyana (about 08:00 into our journey): I awoke from a daze to hear the screeching of tires and a thump-thump-thump. We blew a tire directly under my seat, and we disembarked from the bus onto the side of a motorway, where the two pink-shirted (and I mean that literally) busdrivers stared, perplexed, at the remains of the tire. Thankfully our bus included a fanny-pack wearing German with a wicked work ethic (and a flashlight), and soon the drivers were using tools and getting the tire sorted. Mr. Red Bull, at this time, had wandered down the side of the road with the young girl and her child. Meanwhile, Jon was helping some squat Brazilian lady find her high heeled clog, which had flown off when the bus screeched to a halt. He crawled under all the bus seats, until he eventually spotted it. My hero.
Cuidad Guyana (12:00 into our journey):The main stop at Cuidad Guyana was met with relief, as I noticed our relocated seats, however quiet, were beginning to stink. Every once in awhile, I got a sickening waft of pee, and I took to covering my face with my fleece. Jon, who has a cold, couldn´t smell anything, so I started whining, which usually helps. We also had the company of a Very Stereotypical English Traveller, who was wearing a woven cowboy hat and made lots of remarks about "backpacking scenes". He was nice, though, and it gave me something to do when I wasn´t complaining about the pee.
Somewhere between Guidad Guyana and Santa Elena (14:00 into our journey): The smell got worse. Like, so bad. Like, so awfully horrible that I started to gag at frequent ocassions. Jon got sick of hearing my throat constrict (as I got sick of hearing "C´mon! It´s not that bad!"), and switched seats with me. I then got a bit of a breeze drifting down from the front, and was satisfied that he understood the Power Of The Piss, as emanating from directly behind my former seat. We both covered our faces with my fleece, and fell into a terrible sleep, while bombing down the motorway in the pitch darkness of rural Venezuela.
Nearing Santa Elena (16:00 into our journey): Rise and shine, Buttercups! Awaken to the glorious sunshine of Venezuela! And also to an overflowing toilet! And an early-morning Police Checkpoint! Wooo! We all filed off the bus to where a number of soldiers were pouring through the contents of bags from the bus in front of us. We sat around, I checked out the toilet situation (UP TO THE RIM, PEOPLE, AND SPLASHING AROUND!), and finally the soldiers waved their guns around and we dragged our bags into separate queues for ladies and gentleman. The dour soldier and I had a nice time, as he pointed and frowned at zippers of my bag, and I opened them and removed all of my stuff. Dirty underwear, certain feminine items, books and, of course, all the valuable camera and electrical equipment I was hoping to hide from public eyes. He didn´t find any interesting drogas, however, and quickly moved on. Meanwhile, Mr. Red Bull was hiding out in a little cafe across the street. He didn´t get his bags searched. Hmm. We eventually reboarded the bus, and Jon was nice enough to let me move into an empty seat a couple rows up, while he braved the Pee Seat by himself. What a great companion. Around then, the scenery became amazing. It was something directly out of Jurrasic Park: huge boulders tumbled around a huge savannah, which was peppered with clear creeks and palm-studded oasis. The Lost World, surely.
Santa Elena (18:00 into our journey): We stopped and let out almost everyone in Santa Elena, where we breakfasted on sweet coffee, Jon on an arepa, and me on a large slab of pound cake. There, we also noticed that Glass Eye Guy was one of the only people left on the bus, and when the bus parked for awhile to get cleaned (AND THE TOILET EMPTIED!), he hovered around us for awhile. We finally asked him if he spoke English, and he muttered he didn´t speak much, that he was French, and didn´t speak Spanish or Portuguese either. Jon then spoked to him for awhile in French, and we gathered he was wandering around South America for the second time, by himself, for how long he wasn´t yet sure. Strange dude.
The Border (19:00 into our journey): We crossed approximately six separate checkpoints - three Venezuelan, three Brazilian - where we offloaded our luggage and stood in lots of queues. We read that at the border Venezuelan border guards often ask for "tourist fees", also known as "large bribes", but thankfully we paid nothing. We were asked to bring our bags, separately, through an X-Ray machine, by a tough Venezuelan guard, who then proceeded to try to chat us up in English. It´s certainly a strange way to practice the language. At the Brazil side, we were stamped and moved along, and almost asked to pay $300 to bring in a camera and laptop, until the customs lady understood that no, we hadn´t bought them new in Venezuela, and we weren´t bringing them in to sell. After a couple more stops to eat and offload passengers and generally mill around in the South American way, we were on the road again.
Arrival at Boa Vista (22:00 into our journey): When we arrived at the itty-bitty terminal to Boa Vista, the Frenchman asked to share a taxi into the centre of town. We said sure, of course, but unfortunately, we hadn´t exchanged many Real, so we had to wait in a queue at an ATM. Frenchman perhaps didn´t understand, or didn´t like that option, as when we went back to look for him, he had vanished. Vanishing French Man: Au revoire.
The End.
As an aside, and because Jon likes to cheat at bets, I´ve just discovered our "only option" is to take a 12-hour bus to Manaus in a few days, and fly from there to Fortaleza. I´ll just make sure he gets the Pee Seat for most of the ride, this time…
Posted by: megantidd in Uncategorized | Permalink
Comments
3 Responses to “In Which I Discover The Pee Seat And Other Bus Phenomenon”
Leave a Reply
Pee seat notwithstanding, I am still massively jealous. Bien viaje, hermanita.
The story I have been composing about my Mongolian Sushi Chef experience pales in comparison to Glass Eye Guy/Vanishing French Man and Mr. Red Bull (and the pee, of course). So far, it sounds like a great adventure!
So if the total bus time is 175.5 hours, who pays for dinner?
BTW, everyone needs a fanny-pack wearing German with a wicked work ethic. If you’re lucky, you can sometimes pick one up at CC.
Thanks for bringing your little travelogue to those of us with wanderlust. Living vicariously through the experiences of others, and having those stories bring up memories of your own (oh the buses I have been on! The border searches endured! The mezcal-drinking men with chickens!) is a real treat….
any pics?