Venezuelan rollercoaster trip

So this trip had some major ups and downs. Here's the e-mail I sent back to my family upon my arrival at Monica's:

Hey all,

I am in Venezuela, and all is well except that I suspect that my checked luggage is still in Miami. It´s kind of a bummer, as my tent and sleeping bag were in there, but I was wearing my hiking boots, and had a blanket and layers and a rain poncho and Nalgene and malaria meds in my carry-on, so I´m actually in pretty good shape considering. We reckon we can fit 3 people in one of the tents here, and borrow a sleeping bag off someone, and I´m good to go. We did a super express shopping spree as soon as I arrived, as it was 5pm on NYE, and everything was closing. First stop was to get a bathing suit, as that was apparently the most important thing I lost. Underwear, socks and such followed. I can borrow some other clothes off the other girls here.

Ok, so we may have a mobile while hiking, the # ---. Not sure if we'll have reception though.

K, that's it for now. Laters,

Things improved after that. So the point of this trip was to go hike up Mt. Roraima, which we did. It was amazing.

So here are Ariane & Monica after about 20 min of hiking:

And Antoine & Julien fixing their packs outside the hut with satellite tv:

And some amazing photos from the hike:

Mt. Roraima:


There are a bunch more photos if you're interested here.

The other downers on the trip were that a bee stung me on the inside of my mouth when we were at the beach on the second last day, and I was robbed by the police in Caracas. Tough country. But the beach was still great, and as I'm not allergic to bee stings, I'm still alive. Also, Monica's mom is an amazing cook, and New Years in Puerto La Cruz was fun and interesting. And I got to brush up on my French. All in all, a great trip.