Georgetown was our final stop. In the morning, we went to the park to see manatees, or sea cows. These huge, harmless creatures inhabit a pond in the city center. They only emerge from the water to graze on grass; the rest of the time, they remain out of sight. Manatees can stay submerged for hours without surfacing. We picked up some grass, and the manatees immediately gathered around us.
We didn’t seem to do much, yet by the end of the day, we were completely drained by the heat and humidity.
Our group was set to disband the following day. That morning, we managed to make a quick trip by car to the city of Linden, known for the mining and processing of the bauxite that Guyana exports.
From Linden, I headed to the airport to fly to Port of Spain, Trinidad, this time on my own.
In 11 days, we visited four very different neighboring countries. The first was Brazil, where Portuguese is spoken. Next came French Guiana, a department of France, followed by Suriname, a former Dutch colony where, naturally, the official language is Dutch. After that was English-speaking Guyana. If one continues moving westward, the next country is Venezuela, a former Spanish colony.
Speaking of Venezuela, that was where I was supposed to go from Trinidad and Tobago. The massive, devastating earthquake that everyone knows about struck just before I was due to leave Guyana. The airport in Caracas was badly damaged and closed. I needed to do something about my ticket. I called the airline and found out that the airport in Valencia, Venezuela’s third-largest city, was operational. I changed my ticket to fly to Valencia instead of Caracas and told my husband. He, to put it mildly, said this was the wrong decision. I promised to think it over and flew to Trinidad.