We sadly had to miss out on the whole of Brazil, only being about to afford a quick glimpse of it's landscape from the plane window, having had run out of time and almost out of money. We had been told that it wasn't possible to change our return flight location so we made a rash decision to book a domestic flight straight from the South to North part of Brazil, to get to Venezuela with enough time to catch some sun before heading off back home. From Manus, (north of Brazil) where we finally experienced our first bit of hot weather we'd had in months, we caught a coach: a short journey of 33 hours(!) to Venezuela. Stop for lunch or dinner, not sure what time it was as sense of time and day is now be-on us! We finally saw the famous Tucson birds that so many people associate with South America, I'm now glad I can go back and say I've seen one! There were some patriots which one of the guys let me and Ant hold whilst Emlyn went off to inspect the food buffet. On the coach Ant met an Irish women, which kept him entertained, discussing Irish politics: which certainly given us further evidence that the Irish (and Ant in particular!) tend to be quite passionate about their native land! At another stop some hours later, we ordered four 6packs of beer to help us overcome the bumpy ride and uncomfortable seats: Ant and Emlyn downed "10 or more each" according to them: leaving them a bit tipsy and very sleepy (which was the general idea!) whilst I I picked up a conversation with a gay man from Argentina, who couldn't really speak much English so we had an "interrupter", a 13 year old girl from Venezuela to help us out! A lady from Colombia with much better English joined the conversation, which made time fly a bit faster. We arrived in Venezuela and got the taxi with the Irish women to the harbour to catch the boat to a beautiful Island, Isla de Manrgarita, we were informed that the boat was delayed by 3 hours but we enjoyed a snooze and I went off for a walk along the harbour soaking up the sun and the beautiful blue sea. Minutes before departing we decided we were hungry, so left our backpacks with the Irish women and went to order pizza whist the boys checked out the football results on the internet. We ran (as fast as we could go with massive backpacks on our backs) to the boat with pizzas in one hand and our bags in the other managing to catch the ferry with plenty of time to sit and eat our pizzas. The boat journey certainly brings to mind the quote "its not the destination, it's the journey" we had an amazing ride, beautiful breeze and the sun shining down on us, Ant with his head in a book, me and Emlyn taking in the views of the islands we passed on the way. We were pleasantly surprised to see dolphins, and we asked one of the other passengers if we could take a wee peep in their big binoculars. Not spotting anything, it seemed the dolphins had gone, but a few minutes later we were delighted to witnesses that a school of dolphins had popped up next to the boat and we had a jaw dropping view of them dancing in the waves. Emlyn was busy with his eyes in the binoculars and was still trying to focus the lens to find where the dolphins where when too late he got knocked by some common sense: that it was better not to use them as they were very close anyway and but had already missed the whole show! Tuks! On arriving we grabbed the next bus to Porlmar, the Island's biggest city, on the way the bus blared loud Latin American music which got our foots stomping and our butts moving to the rhythm: but somehow Ant managed to sleep through the whole way! On arriving we met a deaf boy almost straight away, but we were all tired and sticky in desperate need for shower so we arranged to meet for the next day. We woke up early off to meet the boy, Kelberto, we met the night before and find a place to hire scooters, as the idea was to spend a day scootering around the island, finding isolated scratches of beach to stop off on, basically to enjoy the freedom of no taxis and the wind in our hair. The scooter place wasn't open so we opted to go to a near by beach as the island was not short of beautiful beaches, wherever you were. Spent the day splashing around and soaking in the sun, just chilling out. Too tired to go out and we went back to the hotel, having said our goodbyes to the Kelberto. In the morning we went off to see if we could hire a scooter (Emlyn and Ant planned to share one, with me having my own! "I'm not sharing with anyone!" just to prove a point that I'm perfectly capable to drive the scooter myself, not that I'd ever driven one before, but here's to hoping!). Because there were only two one-seat scooters available to hire, Ant decided he would prefer to stay behind and go to one of the near by beaches while me and Emlyn zoomed off to a beach 45 minutes away, which came highly recommended by the Lonely Planet guide. Arriving at the beach, Emlyn looking impressed I'd managed to drive all the way without a crash, not sure exactly what he was expecting, but the boys had been warning me all day and the day before " It's not easy, you have to be care" there is no gears on the thing so how hard can it be? On the beach we chilled out, enjoying the waves after a while I spotted some jet skis and felt tempted to go on one. Emlyn looking like he'd rather sit back and chill just shrugged "maybe". I went off in with a mission to search for a body board, if jet skiing isn't going to be on the agenda, I'm going to find something else to do, sunbathing just wont cut it: before I made off Emlyn obviously getting bored of "chilling out" told me to find out where the jet skis could be hired. Yehy! I know I could have gone on my own but this is one thing I needed a boy for, I was too chicken to jet out into the ocean without fearing I'd break down or crash (into what, I don't know, another boat?!) or bump into a shark. Finding the jet ski place I went back to drag Emlyn up across the beach, lifejackets on (Emlyn HAD to ask "Do I really need to wear that?!"), smile for the photos and off we went, zoom: FARRRRRRRR out into the sea with me squealing and gripping on to Emlyn as hard as I could! After a while I relaxed and started to enjoy the ride until Emlyn stopped "Right, your turn!" Shaking my head, "no, I can't" wails! Pushing me in front I reluctantly started the engine, few seconds later I couldn't believe I nearly didn't drive, It was amazing, wikked! My driving was obviously not fast enuff for adrenaline-junkie Emlyn who was lying down at the back soaking in the sun's rays and enjoying the cool splashes, no matter how hard I tried to throw him off, I couldn't the jet ski was too slow and there were not enough waves to make the jet ski jump! He asked me to stop so he could get out and swim for a bit, I think I unnerved him as the Jet Ski floated off (I didn't have the engine on) "come back!" he called, panic washed across his face for a second til he caught hold of the back and climbed back on with me laughing my head off. We swapped, only to have our attention caught by one of the hire-shop workers that time was up: nooooo!!! Jetting back behind the guy, he pointed for us to carry on ourselves so we naughtily grabbed the opportunity to spend a bit longer on out and jetted right passed the bay where we were supposed to go back to. Turned back, trying to find the yellow and red boat that marked the location of the jet skis (note:that its hard for me because I need glasses!): after squinting our eyes we spotted a boat were we were to dock, then Emlyn messed around for the final time, nearly throwing me off (I would have taken him with me as I was gripping on that hard!). With big grins on our faces, we docked the Jet Ski on the beach, the onlookers seemed amused by us, we thought it was because they saw us messing around moments before but a loud shout from the guy on the jet ski wiped the grins off our faces. We'd docked the jet ski in the wrong place! Ops! Cringing with embarrassment, we realised why the spectators where looking so amused! Oh dear! Emlyn had to walk back but I jumped on the jet ski and went back with the guy: we were pretty far off the mark to where the actual docking place was! We decided we'd entertained the people on this beach enough and took our scooters off along the road: on the way we passed the guy from the Jet Skis, he waved but I cant help but think he was wishing us luck on our scooters, having judged from our incident on the Jet Ski! On the way we spotted an opening in some trees to a small stretch of beach and decided to park the scooters, have a look and go for a quick swim. There were some local boys peering over a bucket and seemed to be engrossed in whatever was in there, curious I walked over to have a peek: massive crabs! Where had those come from? An older local boy demonstrated how to catch a crab, two seconds later he'd caught one which left Emlyn in doubt if he still wanted to go for that swim! I still went in, Emlyn followed using the local lad as protection against any crabs. Chicken! He'd never looked more like a girl then than he did that moment, arms waving in the air with a panic-stricken face! After a bit he calmed down and started to swim a bit, then a sudden "SCREAM" came from him "Ow! Ow, eh!" laughing but concerned something had hurt him I asked what was wrong: something had brushed pass him. What a girl!! He had the local lads and me in fits of laughter! Enough for poor Emlyn, time to get back! We arrived back in town, looking for the bank we asked some policemen on bicycles where to go, after they had lead the way we set off back to the get some food but not before I made a fool of myself by waving and nearly crashing into the back of one of the buses! Parking to check up on our emails and grab something to eat, I came back to find my scooter wouldn't start, thinking that I wasn't starting it up properly, Emlyn rolled his eyes and shoved me over and tried to start it: but nothing: dead. We tried everything, filled it with petrol, checked the oil, nothing. Emlyn gave me a lift back to the hotel where we phoned the hire shop to come and fixed it. Hours of waiting Emlyn went off with the deaf guy Kelberto who had showed up to meet us, to check on the bike: the mechanic and his family were all there, he already started fixing the bike and was ready for Emlyn to drive back. Relief! Driving back, Emlyn got stopped by the police who were bored and were trying to find ways of amusing themselves by stopping random tourist, 15 minutes of frustrating interrogation they let them drive on. This seemed to be a common theme on the island with the police, the same happened when Ant went out to get something to eat later on that night, got stopped by the police, when they asked for his passport, which he'd left at the hotel, they demanded to be paid: but Ant refused to pay up but gave them a choice to follow him back to the hotel to collect the passport but they just left him to carry on. Tuk! Me and Ant stayed up gossiping about our day whist Emlyn who had been busy with my scooter, bless his cotton socks, fell asleep! Next morning woke up later than planned quick shower then dash off to take the scooter back to the hotel we hired them from. When we arrived we found we had no helmets (we usually put them in the seat), the manager wasn't there so we decided to set out to go back to collect them, I turned the engine on without the breaks the scooter went "whoosh, crash" into a flower pot, I was okay and got the scooter back standing but not quick enough before the manager saw the whole thing: the look of thunder clouded her face, oh dear! Short for time, Ant arrived to meet us whilst Emlyn went to look for the helmets, Emlyn came back looking none-too please, he couldn't find the helmets so I had to pay for the lost. Taxi back to the hotel we grabbed our backpacks whilst clever old Ant went to ask the manager if the helmets were anywhere and came back grinning with both our helmets in each hand. Back to the hire place, cancelled the debt and off in the taxi, the taxi driver speeding as fast as he could so as not to miss our boat which was due. We arrived at the port only to find that the boat was apparently "broken". Next boat wasn't due til 7pm, now it was only 1 o'clock. Hot sun and heavy backpacks we walked to the nearest bit of "beach" which did not compare the beach we'd been on the other day, it was covered in rubbish, dead fish and shells with lots of dead fish floating about in the water. Local fishermen sat near by enjoying the shade and surely laughing at us! Emlyn went off into the sea doing his girly arm-waving thing jumping when he stood on something slippery! I laughed, but when it was my turn I felt yukky seeing dead fish floating about round my legs, so it was Emlyn's turn to laugh! Ant was the most amusing, lifting his shorts as if they were a skirt, the look on his face "I cant do it!" the prize of who was the most girly about going in the sea goes to *drum roll* Ant! After our 'lovely' swim, and feeling a bit fishy we went off to meet our boat. Whilst waiting on the boat I saw some local boys as we had seen when we first arrived jumping off some of the highest parts of the boat into the water, which had me chewing my nails and holding my breath when they jumped off as they could have easy banged into the small bridge between the boat and the land, mad, the lot of them! We witness the sunset and the stars come out, up on the top deck, lying on our backpacks we took in the view, where I fell asleep. Waking up I saw that us three and an old man snoring away peacefully where the only ones left on the boat, I peered over the side and after moments of confusion I jumped up waking the boys up. We'd already arrived. Sleepy we caught the taxi to the bus station and the next coach to Caracas, which was a short 5 hour journey which we spent most of the way snoozing. Not realising we'd arrived, I asked the driver for 5 minutes and ran off to pee, returning the boys were off the coach tending our backpacks: informed me that this was in fact Caracas! I left my plastic bag with mine and Emlyn's Bocca Junior hats and some other things in on the coach, didn't realised until the coach had gone out of sight. Too tired to bother to go to the next bus station we took the taxi to the centre. The journey held familiar sights of when we arrived 3 months ago, we booked into the same hotel for some sleep before the flight in the afternoon. Woke up and went to grab something to eat (In McDonalds of course!), in true style we were late, the taxi driver tried his best to be as fast as possible but there was loads of traffic and a tramp in the middle of the road (how I'm going to miss South America!). We arrived with enough time to have a fag and a couple of beers before boarding. To celebrate our trip we drank the trolley dolly's cart dry off alcohol and annoying the air hostess by beeping to be re-filled until they told us off and to go to sleep! Frankfurt, we were still worst for wear and tired, had to wait for 4 hours. Emlyn found a British newspaper and was overjoyed it was his favourite paper "The Sun" mhhh wonder why, anything to do with what's on page three perhaps? No, no of course not(!) Flight back to Manchester we were in high spirits but tired. Arrived in Manchester for Ant to realise that he'd left his now favourite coat on the plane! Finally! After months of me and Emlyn being the forgetful ones! We were greeted by my Dad in the arrivals, I was so please to see him, but sad to see the boys go. After saying our goodbyes we went our separate ways, it didn't hit me until I got home that it will be a while until I see them again, strange! But what an adventure, and (sadly) finally over and back to reality, it is! B xxxx