Caravana Pan Americana: Venezuela southbound

Venezuela Southbound

This portion of the route was prepared by Ron Lussier. Please contact him if you have any suggestions for Venezuela.

The southbound route through Venezuela is as follows:

Day: Destination: Km: Hrs: Comments:

1 Oct

Caracas
0
We'll ship our vehicles from the United States to Venezuela and meet in Caracas.

While waiting for our vehicles to arrive, we should purchase a Libretta de Paso por Aduana from the Touring y Automovil Club de Venezuela.

We'll meet one another at the Cathedral near the Plaza Bolivar on September 29th and 30th and October 1st. Meetings will occur each day at 9am. There will be a final meeting opportunity on October 1st at 6pm. Hopefully we'll have identifying badges.

2 Oct

Puerto La Cruz

275
4
This beach town is an excellent place to relax after our first day of driving.

3 Oct

Ciudad Bolivar

350
4.5 Cuidad Bolivar is one of the oldest cities in Venezuela it still keeps a small part of the old city. From here we can try to charter a plane to go to Salto Angel (Angel Falls) and to the Canaima Camp. We'll want to find a secure place to store our vans while we're gone to Salto Angel.

4 Oct

Canaima

fly

Travel to Canaima in the morning. From there we can hike or fly to Salto Angel. We'll stay overnight in Canaima.

5 Oct

Ciudad Bolivar

fly

We'll fly back to Ciudad Bolivar in the morning, get our vehicles, and relax before our early start tomorrow.

6 Oct

El Dorado

~390
5
Leaving early, we'll drive east for 1 hour to Cuidad Guayana. It will take approximately an hour to get through the city.

From there we'll drive south to Upata, Guasipati, and El Callao. El Callao is an old (but still active) English gold mining town. We'll continue on through Tumeremo (also a mining town), approximately 2hrs from Upata.

Our stopping place will be El Dorado. El Dorado is known for its jungle prison camps, made famous by a frenchman who escaped in the 1960's and wrote a book called Papillon. (Fuel available.)

7 Oct

Kavanayén, Parque Nacional Canaima

~200
4
The turn-off to El Dorado is marked Kilometer 0, and the road is marked from here with green signs 1Km apart.

We'll head south, to the Gran Sabana, reaching it at Km 88. The road climbs up, reaching the top of the plateau 40Km later. At the 100Km mark, the steepest climb (La Escalera) enters Parque Nacional Canaima, one of the six largest parks in the world.

At Km 119 a short trail leads to the 40m Danto ('Tapir') Falls. More great views at Km 135. At Km 137 is a monument to the builders of the road... we should stop and leave an offering to the Road Gods. At Km 141 is Luepa, where we need to stop at a military checkpoint.

There are good views 100m west of the road at Km 102. We'll try to camp at Kavanayén, about 70km along a gravel road from Km 149. Kavanayén is surrounded by tepuis, and we can bargain with pilots to fly us over the Gran Sabana. There are several falls off the road to Kavanayén... see the South American Handbook for details (p. 1612-1613.)

8 Oct

Santa Elena de Uairen

250
4
We'll drive out from Kavanayén to the road and continue south to Santa Elena de Uairen, where we'll formally cross into Brasil.

Total kilometers:

1465

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