I left Caracas and was heading towards Merida. Getting out of the city was easy enough and the weather was okay so I wasn’t dressed for rain. Not long after leaving I stopped to take a photo of this tunnel. It wasn’t remarkable or long but as I exited out the other side the weather was crap. I and many others took shelter under a couple of trees to repack gear, or in my case, put on my wet weather gear. Once dressed for the weather I headed on. It wasn’t long before the rain got so heavy that it was starting to hurt. Luckily a petrol station turned up and everyone on a motorcycle turned in to shelter for a while. After about 15 minutes it died off and we all continued. Not much further down the road was a long traffic jam. I weaved my way up to the front and found that it was an accident and the road was closed while it was cleared. There were a couple of guys on big bikes in the queue that I chatted to for a while. Like the rain that cleared too and we were off again. I didn’t get far and felt it was time to eat. I went for the arepa and coke deal for $8AUD. It was a meal and probably the best (stuffed) arepa that I’ve had in Venezuela. 

I didn’t expect to get all the way to Mérida in one day and the Puerto la Cruz guy had recommended the Hotel Campo Bello just outside of San Filipe. To get there I had to pass the cities of Maracay and Valencia which sounded interesting but were just busy roads that looked similar to so many cities that I had passed through. I arrived just before dark and after his last recommendation which had been so good I was expecting more greatness. But I was a little disappointed. 

The people were lovely and my bike got a nice space for the night, next to the owners bike. My room was pretty ordinary but okay. And the wifi only worked in the common area. And they had no food or beer, and it started raining again. So I had coke and biscuits for dinner. A bit later an Argentinean rider showed up. He spoke a bit of English which was nice. The bed wasn’t particularly comfortable but I slept okay. 

Next morning as I was loading my bike, they asked me to leave my handprints in concrete down the back. They also told me there was no charge for the accommodation as Moto riders like me can stay free for 2 days. Suddenly the room seemed a great deal. The sprawling complex that the hotel was on had a big camping area and pool. I imagine it’s very popular for groups. They had a lot of handprints and apparently one other Aussie. But the slab said he was Canadian and there was a maple leaf in the corner so despite their insistence I’m claiming to be the first Aussie. Hands down. I put a one dollar coin in my slab just to confirm my nationality. A bit time consuming but quaint. My slab was pretty wet. I hope it dries okay. 

My late departure and more rain meant that I wasn’t going to make it to Merida and so I aimed to reach Barinas that night and then a short day the following day. The roads were very hilly at first. No. Not hilly. Mountainous. And lovely views. And then some nice flat stuff. I arrived at the Hotel Barroco with plenty of time for a walk around. I’d found it on google maps which is probably one of my most common sources of accommodation in Venezuela. It reviewed as pretty ordinary and lived up to expectations. The aircon was either on or off. But at least it had some because it was warm and at $25USD it was fine. I wandered around after I arrived and then a bit later because I felt like an ice cream. The shop where I bought the ice cream from was a guy from Jordan and his wife was from Syria. His dream is to own a cow farm in Australia. He was happy to get an opportunity to practice his English. He still had a long way to go. But a real go getter. 

The ride to Merida meant going back up into the Andes. I’m always impressed by their size. Such amazing views. I found a nice place where the intercity buses stop and had a delicious fresh empanada while I watched a few passengers admire my bike. 

Not far out of Mérida I stopped in a small town to take a look at a small stone church in the middle of the road. This must also be the town you come to if you want to buy a new puppy. I saw several people selling them. 

I arrived in Mérida and found a nice hotel at a great price. The reviews red well. The Hotel Plaza. $45AUD a night. I think I got an upgrade to a corner room which was nice. I stayed 2 nights. Mérida had a lovely feel about it and was pretty touristy which meant better hotels and lots of nice places to eat. Its claim to fame is its Teleferico. It was a short walk from the hotel to get there but a bit confusing once I arrived and I couldn’t get in to buy a ticket. I found a nice cake shop nearby and sat down with a cake to try and book online.  No luck with that, but the cake was great. 

Back at the hotel I found out they could book it for me if I paid them the $40USD in cash. So I did, and next day they had my ticket ready and after my nice, included hotel breakfast, I was on my way. 

The teleferico was originally built in the late 50’s as a way of the local mountaineers accessing the upper reaches of the Sierra Nevada Mountains which are nearly 5000m high. It became very popular but eventually got too old and had to be replaced. This was done by 2016 with the help of the German company Doppelmayr. It is the highest and second longest cable car in the world. Starting at 1600m and ending at almost 4800m. It has four stops to change gondolas. 

As expected, I hadn’t red up on it and thought I’d be up there and back for lunch. Even though I was on the first group when it opened there were a couple of special groups already inside and ahead of us. It took about an hour and we were on our way. The gondola holds about 50 people but it didn’t seem overcrowded. Or dangerous. Each section took about 15 minutes. 

The views were nice and the terrain changed as we ascended up into the clouds. At each station we were directed through the building to the next gondola and continued on.

At the top there was a big building with lots of windows and all set up with food and souvenirs. It was a nice place to hang out in, but, not being a lover of altitude, I was happy to check out everything quickly and join the queue to go back down. I went outside and was glad I’d brought a few warm things in my backpack. I didn’t bother stopping at any of the stations on the way down, which was an option. 

We had a young kid (maybe 5 or 6) in our gondola who was entertaining the crowd. I couldn’t quite get the Spanish humour but he was pretty funny.  His parents, nowhere to be seen. And then he farted. There was a prolonged silence as the smell filled the gondola then he made a comment that had everyone in stitches. I’m not sure if they were tears of laughter or gas poisoning but everyone was crying. Phew it was bad. By the time I got down it was past lunchtime, so I just went back to the same cake shop and repeated yesterday again. 

Merida had some nice old building. Lots of them were very big. And of course a fancy church. One evening I went to a buffalo wing restaurant which started out nice and then several families arrived and their kids were running amok through the restaurant, squelling and shouting and crawling under tables. Their parents and the restaurant staff seemed oblivious to it. I scoffed my nice wings and left. The second night I had a nice pizza which was too big for me but I ate it anyway.

I should add here that when you travel like me, you’re not always sure where you are going to stay or what it will be like. I use apps and google maps. Sometimes the reviews leave a photo which shows the room and if it has mirrors on the walls and ceiling then you can probably assume you can rent rooms by the hour. But in Merida, across the road from my hotel, there was a window display in the shop that was set out like a motel room with the prices displayed. 3 hours $13, Full day from 9 until 5 was $15, and 24 hours was $25. In South America children often live in the family home and probably share a room with siblings and so these hotels provide somewhere for young couple to go. And maybe scroll on their phones together? Or something? They are also used by work colleagues having an affair. Or so I was told. Discretely.

Next day I was off after breakfast. I was on my way to San Cristobal where I had started my second attempt at Venezuela. But I was going to split the 5 hour trip by stopping of in a small town called Pregonero. I had met a young couple when I had entered Venezuela and they said I should call in and look at the sunken church which was the town’s main tourist attraction. And seeing I like looking at churches I thought a sunken one could be different. I was still in the Andes and the road was interesting. There was one occasion at a police checkpoint where the police had the road blocked off but told me that I was allowed through. It must have been a shortcut up the side of the mountain. It was steep and under repair but doable with a bike. After about 5kms of wondering if I’d understood the cop correctly, I ended up at a huge pile of dirt blocking off the road. There was a side track for my bike, which I took, and then suddenly I was back on the main road again. I say main road, but that’s an exaggeration. I was high up at about 3000m and Google maps was all over the place. I stopped at a small shop at an intersection in the middle of nowhere and had a biscuit and coke and asked directions. I was going the right way. After about 20kms of pretty deteriorated downhill bitumen, the road got better for a while and then turned to crap again as I approached the town of Pregonero. And by the way, although this town looks about halfway to my final destination it took me nearly 4 hours to get there.

Originally I was supposed to be meeting the guy I’d stayed with in San Cristobal on my first night back in Venezuela. But that plan, and a few subsequent ones, failed. The short version is that some kind local got me to follow him on a bike to the lake where the church was but I missed the boat. It was a 20 minute ride. So we just rode back. I eventually caught up with the young couple who did the tours and then they found me a nice hotel. The Hotel Tierra Bella was a bit odd externally but lovely inside and at $35USD was a bit of a bargain. I am sure I was the only guest though.

The couple came back later in the evening and we went for a walk around town and then shared a pizza in the terrace bar at the hotel. Mainly in Spanish.

Next morning I was up and ready to leave by 8:00am. The local guide picked me up and we rode our bikes the 14kms out to the lake, which is named Honda, but called Uribante Reservoir. It’s manmade and built between 1976 and 1986 and part of a small group of water storage dams for a hydro power station. What I didn’t realise was that the church was up the other end and it was a one hour boat ride to get there. My guy was just a guide. There were two other guys who rocked up on the one motorbike and carrying an outboard motor, and it was their job to take us there. Sometimes I think I should just ask questions instead of just going with the flow.

The boat ride was slow but the rain held off and we made it to the church. Before we got there, we passed the old cemetery (which was half in the lake). It was originally the church for the town of Potosi which had 1500 inhabitants until the dam rose a bit higher than expected and forced the removal of everyone. Even those who said they were refusing to move. The church now is mostly submerged but occasionally is totally exposed depending on the volume of rain in different seasons. I got a photo off the guide that was taken earlier this year. They had to extend the spire with a stick so it was still locatable when the dam was full. At the rear of the exposed facade, you pass over the walls of the building which were down about a metre and very visible in the clear water. I guess it was all kind of cool. It was obviously Gods will. I can’t imagine it would be approved in Australia.

On the way back we stopped off at a pretty, little waterfall and then chatted to a couple of local fishermen who had caught a couple of nice fish. When we got back to our bikes, they put the boat away and then loaded the motor on to the small motorbike, comfortably between the rider and the passenger. And the oar as well. Halfway back my guy ran out of fuel, so we had to drain some out of the boaties tank to get him mobile again.

We also stopped off at a nice little park and walked up to a lovely waterfall.

Back in town our mutual friend from San Cristobal had sent a message to say he was finally on his way, and we agreed to meet for lunch when he arrived. We then rode the bikes up to some sort of Christian Mission thing which had a nice view over the town. We also went and got some fuel.

Our friend arrived and we had lunch but then he discovered his quick trip to drop something off was not going to be as quick as he had hoped and he was going to have to stay the night. I was all packed and ready to leave, physically and mentally and so it was decided that I would go to San Cristobal and stay in his house by myself and that he would return next morning. It was then I discovered that despite looking like I was only a couple of hours away, the city of San Cristobal was a good 4-5 hour ride. Thanks to the Andes. And my late departure meant I would be arriving there in the dark.

It was a great ride with amazing views and lots of washouts and potholes and fun things if you are on a bike. Not great in a car. I also got to ride across the dam wall of that drowned the church. I arrived in town just on dark and with several wrong turns and blinding headlights, I finally made it to his house almost an hour later. Slow and safe. His dog was excited to see me and I was happy to be back in familiar surroundings.

My plan was to spend the night and head off in the morning to the nearby border and cross back into Colombia. Then I find out that the building that does vehicles is closed on Sundays. So I was going to have to stay a second night. My friend was supposed to return that morning from Pregonero but on the way home he snapped his clutch lever in the middle of nowhere, on a Sunday. But some nice mechanic found him a Chinese one and rigged it up so he made it home before dark.

I had been out walking and found an interesting restaurant cooking up a Sunday feast and so I returned there and partook. I didn’t realise that partook was actually a real word. Looks weird. Anyway it was a nice atmosphere with lots of families and loud music and the meal was huge and delicious. The soup was questionable but tasted nice. I took half my meal home and when my friend arrived back late, he was delighted to have a meal ready to go after his big day. We had a couple of beers and a chat, and both retired early.

Next morning he gave me a new buff with his company logo, which was both a nice gift and a nice buff. We said our goodbyes and I was off for a one hour, thirty five kilometre trip to the border.

As I was leaving town there was a huge traffic jam in the mud due to road works. I got to the front and it was gridlock and not even the bikes were getting through. There was one gap I could see with a big hole and a mound that looked almost doable on my bike. In a moment of insanity, I went for it. The back of my bike started fishtailing around and flinging mud behind over everyone behind me, but the bike pulled itself and me and all my luggage up over the mound and we were free and back onto an empty road. What an awesome bike. But a stupid rider. It could have ended so badly. I hope I didn’t cover too many people in mud.

I made it to the border just before 9:00am. It had taken me 10 hours to get through on the way in, but I was hoping it would be much quicker leaving. It was. 15 minutes. It took even less than that to clear immigration into Colombia and my bike is Colombian so it didn’t need any paperwork or permission. Venezuela was done. No more accidents and I was back in a country where I had travel insurance and some familiarity. Only 11 more days to go until my flight out but I had lots to do before that.

KMS 49164