Salto El Sapo

After flying to the indigenous Pemon village of Cainama, we checked into our lodge and sat down for a group lunch. We began talking to a very cute couple from Brazil sitting across from us. It took us about 10 minutes of conversing to realize that they were driving the Americas, and that they had a blog we’d recently seen: 1000dias.com. Our buddy Luis sent us a link a few weeks ago. Well, there you go. It’s way easier to meet unplanned! I suppose that if you travel long enough, you will eventually cross paths with everyone else doing it.

Ana and Rodrigo have been traveling for 1125 days (they too are taking a bit longer than they expected) through all the Americas – from Brazil to Alaska and down again (including the Caribbean, Iceland and Greenland). They are incredibly cool and nice and it was a real treat to randomly meet them in the rain forest. Funny side note – the only place they had trouble with crime… the U.S.

After lunch, we took a boat ride to see the 7 waterfalls pouring into the lake on the edge of town. From there, we hiked about half an hour to Salto El Sapo, a waterfall that you can walk behind. You don’t do this easily;  it is a slick, rocky, 100% too dangerous for U.S. parks type of walk. Bode was leading the hike, and Jason barely caught up with him before he headed under. Mom and I were nearly last, but had sense enough to leave our things on a rock before going behind the falls.

Although it was quite difficult to maneuver, and I added worrying about Mom to my normal parental worry, we all rocked this hike. I think I was the only one that slipped and fell. We were awed by the thunderous power of the water, and on the other side we had a quick swim.

Happy birthday, Mom!