15 months in South America | part #2 | Beautiful Venezuela and the crazy hyperinflation!

I was in Colombia after flying there from Cuba. A friend I met told me about a blog from a guy who went to Venezuela while the inflation had gone through the roof. It sounded insane that you could take in 50 USD and get a bag full off money and just live like a King. So I went to find out. I heard bad things about Venezuela, but it seemed to be in certain parts of big cities, like most of the Continents crime, so I wasn't too worried but I had to be cautious.

I bused it in from Cartagena in Colombia overnight and turned up at the border in the early morning. The visa was smooth and I knew the black market rate from dolartoday.com so I got an okay rate just to make sure I had some cash on me when I get into town. The bus carried on but I missed my transfer in Maracabo and ended up getting on a smaller local bus towards Merida.

We went past many military checkpoints but everyone seemed happy and cheerful, they checked my passport and all the IDs of the other locals on the bus. Smooth sailing, but it seemed I wasn't going to get to Merida in time so I ended up getting out in the middle of nowhere at night in a bus station a few towns short. I was a little worried at first but I met a guy from Panama who helped me find accommodation that night and in the morning I got a shared taxi to Merida.

Officially the Venezuelan Bolivar was 6 to 1 US Dollar. The blog I read before I came in talked about an inflation of 400 to 1 US Dollar on the black market. I go in and it is 600 to the dollar. I was eating at fancy restaurants and ordering 3 course meals with drinks for $2 total and staying at 5 star hotels for $10 a night.

I understand the social devastation the hyperinflation was and still is causing, but I was having a great time. I was touring the East of Venezuela looking for Caiman, Anacondas, fishing Piranas, riding horses through the wetlands. It was so clear I could make out the milky way with my eyes, and when I took a long exposure to it, it really popped out.

I watched the most incredible 360 lightning show from a hammock in a shack on stilts in Maracaibo lake where hundreds of lightning strikes were going off by the hour all night long!

I flew into the thick jungle and set on a 2 day boat ride and trek to get up close to the highest known waterfall on the planet, Angel Falls, with it's cascading waterfall of nearly a killoetre high. It was truly magnificent.

I left happy but felt sorry for the daily plight of the people that live there. The hyper inflation is causing havoc on the cost of living and these are desperate and fragile times for Venezuela.

The Venezuelan Bolivar is now nearly 100,000 to the dollar!