I assumed that I would be able to get fuel at the border town Maicao but nope! The only thing on offer were the coke bottle vendors! I still had enough to get me to Maracaibo so I gave them a wave and carried on. I still couldn't work out why all these Petrol Stations had no fuel. I would say at Roahacha and Maicao there were about 25 stations and not one was open..
I assumed that there would be a lot of hustle and bustle at this border as it is the major crossing in the North but no! There were not many vehicles or people and it then dawned on me that I had passed very few trucks on the way here. The border formalities of getting out of Colombia were orchestrated by the Money Exchange man, not that I needed his help but they like to get close to you. He gave me a rate of 8 to the $ (which is what I was told to expect) - which is double the official rate so I changed some $'s with him. He also took my Colombian Pesos which was handy.
I then rode the 20 meters to the Venezuelan immigration post. The stamp went in my passport in about one minute. I asked for the Customs and was told that is about 5 kms down the road.
The first impression of Venezuela is awful, The road is a mess and it looks as poor as anywhere I have seen so far. The other major difference is that everyone drives 1970's American cars. The wings and doors are hanging off but they shuffle them along pretty quickly.
I got to the Customs post (having already gone through two police controls) and was met by a small group border guards. They liked the bike and one of them spoke good English which he was keen to demonstrate. They asked me to open the panniers and got bored after I opened one. They said I could go but I asked about the Temporary Import Papers - "nahhhhhh you don't need those" and then waved me on.. I said "won't I have problems with the police and when I exit the country. "Nahhhhh you will be fine".
I had expected to be given a hard time and it seemed odd to be pressing them for documentation. There wasn't even a hint of a full page stamp in my passport. I would rather have them than not.
The roads and housing improves as you get further in to the country. The first big town is Maracaibo. The heart of their oil industry. I finally found a petrol station that was open. I knew it was open because the queue was huge and back on to the road. I slipped up the side of the queue and asked a pump attendant if it was ok to wait here. He waved me round to the front of the queue. I was expecting to get lynched but not a bit of it. I just got a bigger crowd than normal - to see the bike not me.
I didn't see the pump but, judging by the fuel gauge I must have taken about 30 litres. The price 2 Bolivars........not per litre not even per Gallon but for the tank full! That is a total cost of 15 pence OR 0.5p per litre .
The German guys said it was cheap and they had worked out - it is cheaper to buy fuel and boil tap water rather than buy bottled water! It is just madness but it does clarify why the petrol stations are all closed near the border. They closed them to reduce the smuggling. I say reduce because the road side is filled with people selling full from plastic bottles.
Maracaibo looks quite a nice town with some smart buildings and tidy parks. I was doing well with my hand drawn map but I did check with a few people along the way. One was a bus driver. He didn't try to tell me he just said "follow me". Great I thought until we started to take some pretty small roads. Then he stopped and let some people off...............it didn't occur to me he was carrying passengers (the windows had the reflective plastic on them) and that he was taking me on a tour! I tapped on is window again "no problem we are nearly there". So I stuck with him and about 5 mins later he pulled over and waved me onwards - he had taken me right to the bridge! I am not sure what his passengers thought about it but he certainly upheld the honour of the Venezuelans for being kind and friendly.
The bridge is the largest concrete bridge in the world (for what that's worth). There are no spots to take a picture so I pinched this from the Internet. Another curious thing is the Peage's. Bikes rarely have to pay at them but in Venezuela no one pays, not even on this bridge.
Once across the bridge it was a rather plain ride through uninteresting green scrub land but it was Hot. It got to 36 degrees, that is until the thunderstorm. It tipped down and I was soaked in minutes as i had all my air vents open. The rain was so hard you couldn't see the road, I just had to follow the rear lights of the car in front. Luckily it stopped raining about 30 minutes from Coro. It wasn't soon enough to arrive dry but at least I wasn't dripping on their floor in reception.
The weather forecast is pretty bloody awful for the next few days with Thunderstorms predicted for just where I want to go. Such is life.
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