Today we start our jungle adventure to Guyana that we dreamed about for some time. But until now we were flummoxed by the logistics involved and in the end we decided to go for the first time ever with a tour company. There are a few that run tours and we choose one that specializes in birding and we know from watching webinars during the Covid era. And as usual the adventure starts in the Phoenix airport this time at the new Chase lounge. Which you have to reserve in advance to even have a chance to get in. We start first with a signature Sapphire Cocktail and then it is time to check out the food.
The lounge has both the common food we expect in lounges and an Airstream that is serving more specialized food like tacos and other Mexican items. The flight to Miami and then Georgetown are uneventful and we arrive late at night. Unfortunately this is where our luck ends as our entry documents that we filled from Phoenix are not recognized at the automated gates. We try to redo them at a kiosk but it doesn’t work there either. In the end we make it somehow to a human staffed gate and then we enter easily.
And now we have to find our driver sent by tour company. Luckily that is easy enough it is a young couple with a van that have a sign with our tour company’s name. Leaving is more difficult though as there is a lot of commotion as a few of the airplanes are delayed unfortunately. At the hotel we check in and receive a good enough room as we are quite tired by this point, it is 2 AM already here. So we start the AC, a rarity as we will learn in Guyana, and then go to sleep.
We cannot sleep in too much as we have to catch the free breakfast. Breakfast is served buffet style right below our room in the main restaurant and there is no one there for the first breakfast that we enjoy at Cara Lodge.
There are multiple local options and a couple a la carte options which is good given that we will eat here for a few mornings. The food is reasonable but not exceptionally good.
As the days pass our group arrives and also a few other tourists so the breakfast room can become quite full. However the food does not change so we are quite bored of it by the end, not a lot of choice where to eat though.
The first day in Georgetown is relaxation day. We don’t have anything planned really, just to explore the hotel and the area around it and recuperate after the tiring flight. Cara Lodge is a historic house built in 1840 and as such it is in itself an attraction in Georgetown and we enjoy the historic wooden building and explore it during the days we stay here.
Unfortunately it does not have a large garden however still there are some trees and bushes where we spend some time during the day looking for any interesting birds.
There is also a covered inside courtyard that serves as a second venue for serving food and also has the bar. This is where we eat dinner on the majority of days in Georgetown as it is airy and somehow feels nicer than the actual restaurant.
During the day we encounter multiple times our nemesis for the trip, heavy rain. There are showers of rain that come and go, it is sunny and then it is raining and then it is pouring and then it is sunny again. Today it really doesn’t bother us as we can watch from the covered patio and the rain has a very nice cooling effect on these hot days.
During the patches of no rain we walk around looking for mammals and interesting birds. There are few mammals here in the middle of the city but there are a few including an unexpected Indian Mongoose, not something we expected to see in the middle of the city. And lots of Pale-breated Thrushes, a lifer for us but a common bird here.
On our exploration we are helped by the fact that we have our “personal” stairs to the garden right next to our room. They are personal up to a point as they are leading to a conference room next to us and the whole day there are lots of people going and leaving as they prepare the conference room for a conference for working women that happens also during our stay.
Other common birds are the Great Kiskadees that we have seen in multiple countries before, including the US, and most birds are using the palm trees given that they are in fruit. The Kiskadees try to protect the fruit why all the other birds just steal from them when possible.
Another interesting bird we see in the palm trees is the Wing-barred Seedeater, another lifer for us, while in the smaller trees we find a juvenile Ruddy Ground Dove, still being fed by its parents.
There are also hawks flying above and hummingbirds using the flowers in the bushes and overall we enjoy the birdwatching even in the limited area we can explore around the hotel.
We also take a closer look at the building and the atypical shutters that the windows have. We find out that they are called Demerara shutters and were used mostly in the 18th and 19th century before the invention of AC to cool down the buildings in equatorial areas. The primary characteristic of these window shutters is that they are hinged at the top so they can be propped open sloping outward.
We also explore the street but it is not that scenic and the first attractions are further away. We also heard that it might be dangerous to walk around and we are tired so really we do not go far before retreating into the hotel courtyard.
This time we enter through the official gate and enjoy the nice views of the historical building while birding in the slightly different area near the gate.
In this area we discover a few new lifers including Blue-gray Tanagers and more special to us a group of Red-shouldered Macaws that come in for the evening. This is where we see for the first time a few of the fellow participants in the guided tour as they are also “crazed” by the Macaws taking lots of photos and following them around.
On our first evening here we eat on our own and we order both cocktails and a few Guianan specialties, especially Pepperpot that we really wanted to try. The other evenings we eat with the group so this is the only private dinner we will have in Guyana.
The food takes a long time to come, which is no issue as we enjoy the cooler temperatures, and it is quite good especially the pepperpot. The color and the flavor is coming from cassareep, a syrup made from cassava root, about which we will learn a lot the next day. Ours even has the famous wiri-wiri chili pepper on top but we decide against eating it as we want to be alive the next day when we meet our group.
Back in the room we count the money we got from exchanging our USD and look at the interesting banknotes before trying to open the bottles of water we received in our room. And they cannot be opened so we go downstairs to request new ones. First they don’t believe us but they cannot open them either so we get new bottles that we open in front of them before returning to the room. And then it is time to sleep, tomorrow we have a guided tour booked in Georgetown, separate from our birding trip.
