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The Daily Bucket: A Barbados to Brazil Travelogue, Part 2. Guyana [1]
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Date: 2025-01-22
Our Berth in Georgetown
Welcome to Guyana! It’s hot and humid here, too.
Guyana, Suriname, and French Guiana are collectively known as “The Guianas”. The countries have a long history of colonization, slavery, and indentured servitude. As a result the culture is a complicated mix of Dutch, English, French, African, East Indian, Chinese and Amerindian — depending on the country. The best book I read about this area is Wild Coast: Travels on South America's Untamed edge by John Gimlette.
The three countries are developing, and not prime tourist destinations. Our ship tied up at industrial ports, although right in the capital cities. There were lots of bureaucratic and security related delays. Our guides earned their keep.
After a day at sea, we arrived at Georgetown, the capital of Guyana. Development in the Guianas is concentrated on the Atlantic coast. The inland areas are largely undeveloped except for bauxite and gold mining along the rivers.
Our first destination was Kaieteur National Park.
The main tourist attraction in the park is Kaieteur Falls, considered the largest single-drop waterfall anywhere on earth, by volume of water.
We flew there in 12 seater small planes.
The name "Guyana" comes from an indigenous Amerindian language and means "land of many waters"
Mining in the interior
About to land at Kaieteur International Airport
Park headquarters, a few steps from the runway
According to a Patamona Indian legend, Kaieteur Falls was named for Kai, a chief, or Toshao who acted to save his people by paddling over the falls in an act of self-sacrifice to Makonaima, the great spirit. Another legend though was told to Brown by Amerindians on the night of discovery of the falls: Kaieteur had been named after an unpleasant old man who was placed in a boat and shoved in the fall by his relatives. Thus, the fall was named "Kaieteur", which means "old-man-fall". Wikipedia
The park encompasses 242 square miles and most of the park is part of the “moist forest ecoregion”.
The walk to the Falls starts across dry plateau, then through what appeared to be dry tropical forest.
Forty-one percent of plants are endemic to the region (not necessarily these).
The Falls
Here’s a link to my 20 second video of the Kaieteur Falls, I couldn’t get it to embed.
Escarpment overlooking the river and base of the Falls, you can see a couple people from our group at the top.
The Potaro River, which forms the Falls.
A Cliff Swallow
Vultures over the falls — could be Turkey, Black, or Lesser Yellow-headed.
Google images identified this bug as a dragonfly nymph, but it was up on the dry plateau.
The Golden Rocket frog (Anomaloglossus beebei) only breeds within the leaves of the bromeliad species Brocchinia micrantha in Kaieteur NP.
Guianan Cock-of-the-rock
On our hike back to park headquarters, I asked one of the guides if the geology was volcanic. She said that it was much older than that:
The Guiana Shield is a 1.7 billion-year-old Precambrian geological formation in northeast South America that forms a portion of the northern coast. The higher elevations on the shield are called the Guiana Highlands, which is where the table-like mountains called tepuis are found. The Guiana Highlands are also the source of some of the world's most well-known waterfalls such as Angel Falls, Kaieteur Falls and Cuquenan Falls.
Very old rocks!
Time to head back to Georgetown.
The next day we visited Guyana National Park in Georgetown. It’s an urban park that was built on a former golf club. There were a few birds hanging around the manatee lagoons.
We fed the very tame manatees
Yellow-crowned Night Herons
Black-crowned Night Heron
Brown-throated Parakeets
The Guyana Botanical Gardens had even more birds, and plants, of course. The plants aren’t necessarily native to South America.
Common Black Hawk
Southern Lapwings
Striated Heron overlooking the lily pond
Victoria amazonica lilies are native to Guyana and the Amazon basin, and are the second largest water lily. Colonial Georgetown had canals filled with the lilies, but they have been destroyed in modern times.
Ptychosperma macarthurii Palm
We saw Great Kiskadees throughout our trip. I quickly learned to recognize their call.
Dragonfly
Lilies and rushes
Striated Heron with meal on Lotus pads
Lotus flower, there were very large lotus ponds.
Both parks in Georgetown could use an influx of the revenue from the burgeoning oil production in Guyana.
Georgetown is situated on the Demerara River. That’s where demerara sugar gets its name (sugarcane was the main colonial crop). Demerara windows are also named after the region.
Demerara River
Demerara windows were built primarily into 18th- and 19th-century Colonial architecture-styled buildings to cool homes in hot climates, such as Guyana, before the invention of air conditioning. Demerara is a historical region of Guyana. The window design includes perforated sides and louvres to block direct sunlight. They are shuttered sash windows with the shutter hinged at the top so it could be propped open, sloping outward. They were generally propped open with a stick. At the window sill, a container of ice, water, or a potted plant helps cool warm air as it passes through the window into the building. (wikipedia)
Demerara windows at the Walter Roth Museum of Anthropology
In the evening we boated up the river to see more Ibis and Egrets. There were Yellow-headed Caracara, Hawks, and Vultures, too. The river is quite industrial and it’s surprising to see the birds here.
Scarlet Ibis
Roosting for the evening
An Ibis feeding and Egrets on the Demerara River (0:59).
Evening on the Demerara River, birdwatching
Here’s Part 1 — Barbados, Trinidad and Tobago.
From my readings
Part 3 will take us to Suriname, French Guiana, and Brazil.
The swizzle stick originated in the West Indies in the 18th century. It was originally made from a branch of the Quararibea turbinata tree, also known as the "swizzle stick tree". The swizzle stick was used to stir drinks, such as the rum elixir "Switchel". (Google AI)
The Daily Bucket is a nature refuge. We amicably discuss animals, weather, climate, soil, plants, waters and note life’s patterns.
We invite you to note what you are seeing around you in your own part of the world, and to share your observations in the comments below.
Sunrise with Sugar Maple this morning.
I’m still trying to warm everyone up. It was -5 F this morning, but by the end of the day we’re predicted to hit the teens. With wind chills between -10 to -30 and winds gusting up to 30 mph, it’s another indoor day. The silver lining is that the lake effect snow is temporarily focused slightly north of us, so we’ll miss out on an additional 8 inches of snow.
If you’re affected, are you still surviving the extreme cold? Are you experiencing snow in the South? How are critters coping? Let us know if you’re in the lucky areas with normal temperatures, too.
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