Day 20: Home

Mi último día en Venezuela. Jess y su familia me llevó al aeropuerto donde nos despedimos. Me puse a llorar un poco cuando me abrazó Jess adiós! Nunca olvidaré mis vacaciones aquí. Viendo y viviendo en otro país me hace ver las cosas en una nueva luz. Conocer nuevas personas y adquirir nuevas experiencias es algo que siempre le beneficiará. Aprendí a mantener siempre una mente abierta, no importa a donde vaya en la vida. Algún día espero volver y visitar Jess y su familia. También espero poder visitar más paises y ganar más recuerdos. 🙂

The view out my window.

Day 19: Time To Pack

June 19th, 2012

This is my final day staying here with Jess’s family before I head back to Alaska tomorrow. 🙁 Today we’re just going to the beach so I can come back with a lot of time left to pack. The beach we’re heading to today is called Playa Colorado. It’s a little further away than the other beach we went to, but this beach has great waves for surfing and I wanna try out surfing before I go. On the way to the beach, the sadness in the car was evident. Jess seemed the saddest, but she tried her best to get everyone talking and in a good mood.

The waves at Playa Colorado are a surfer’s dream. There are sunbathers laying all over on the orange-tinted sand. There are some small uninhabited islands that beach goers can kayak to and watch the dolphins put on a show and the watch birds dive for fish. So gorgeous! Jess grabbed two surf boards and headed to the water with me in pursuit. Jess is an expert surfer so she was my teacher for the day.

After a couple of hours, I could actually stand up on my board and surf for a little bit without falling! I was so proud of myself. With a little more practice, I could be much better. It was getting late, so we started to head back home. At home, I tried to pack everything back into my suitcases. Since I went shopping so much here, I had a lot of extra clothes and shoes that I couldn’t fit everything into my bags! Jess’s mom kindly said that she would mail anything I left behind or couldn’t fit in my bags back to me. I nearly bursted into tears at the comment. I’m going to miss her and Jess so much! 🙁 Time to get to sleep if I wanna wake up in time for my plane.

Day 18: Let’s Go To Club…Again!

June 18th, 2012

Just two more days till I have to pack and leave this beautiful country! I just want to have fun these next two days so back to the club for more dancing! Tonight we’re going to a place called Rosalinda and I gotta say that this club might be even prettier than the club we went to the other night. The place was packed!

As soon as Jess and I were let in, my eyes could not stop looking around. The lights and decorations in here are phenomenal! There are waiters here and there and a DJ playing fast paced Spanish music. We spent the first hour or two dancing, then we headed upstairs to the restaurant for a quick bite. A day well spent! I wish we had clubs like this where I live.  A girl can dream, can’t she?

Day 17: Homerun!

June 17th, 2012

I’m not really a big sports fan, but I just gotta go see a baseball game while I’m here!

The game of baseball was introduced to the country by Venezuelan students who had studied at American universities. When they returned home after finishing their studies, they tought the the game to their friends in Caracas in the early 1890’s. Wow, the history of the sport is much older than I thought!

In May 1895, brothers named Amenodoro, Augusto, and Emilio, and Gustavo established the first organized baseball club, called Caracas BBC. The team had been practicing every Sunday for the preceding three months at a plot of open land in front of the train station in Quebrada Honda. The field would soon be known as the Caracas Baseball Club Exercise Field.

The place we went to is huuuuge! Unfortunately, I didn’t get to catch any of the baseballs that flew into the audience, but I still had a great time! The home team won the game too!

Day 16: HAPPY BIRTHDAY!

June 16th, 2012

Feliz cumpleaños Jess!

Today is Jess’s 17th birthday! To celebrate, we’re going out tonight to a really fancy restaurant with Jess’s family and some of her friends from school to dine in style and open all her presents! I hope she’ll like my present!

The restaurant we choose is called “Alto” and it serves ethnic dishes of Venezuela as well as a variety of international foods. The dishes are both balanced and elegant. It’s a little on the expensive side, but it’s worth it!

I have to say that this restaurant is just amazing. It’s really beautiful on the inside and Jess loves the place! She also loves the food that they have been serving, and I have to agree with her. Everything is fresh and crisp and tastes divine. After a few courses, a few of the waiters brought out a huge birthday cake and we all sang happy birthday to Jess, in Spanish of course! Next up are the presents! The pile at the end of the table was huge, but Jess took her time opening each gift and thanking the person who gave her the gift. When she opened mine, I could tell she loved it immediately. I bought her a friendship bracelet with two halves so both of us could wear it to remember our time together! I was absolutely going to miss her and her family a lot when I left.

Day 15: Art!

June 15, 2012

Only five more days till I leave for home! 🙁 Gotta make the best of the last few days I’m here!

Jess’s birthday is tomorrow and since we’re going to be busy trying to fill my last few days with fun activities, we decided to visit something simple and easy today. We’re going to Galeria de Arte Nacional today! It’s an art museum with art that really captures the feel of Venezuela. It has over 6000 different pieces of art in it! Everything from pre-Hispanic, colonial paintings, sculptures to works of modern art. It shares a building with the Museo de Bellas Artes, which exhibits a random selection of art from all around the globe! The top floor is a terrace offering views over Parque Los Caobos and much of Caracas and it’s beautiful from up here.

Jess practically led the tour around the museum. She’s been here a lot just to look at the view from the top floor, so she knows her way around the museum. Paintings are okay, but sculptures are what really interest me.  It’s amazing how a sculptor can capture emotion in a block of stone!

Day 14: The View!

June 14th, 2012

Back to sight seeing until Jess’s birthday! From my guest bedroom, I can see these cable cars in the distance. They looked really interesting so I asked Jess’s mother about it and she told me the cars are apart of El Teleferico, which takes people over a distance of 3.5 miles to see the view and visit the hotel on the other side. I really wanted to go, but apparently the best time to go on the cable cars is early in the morning so you can beat the large amount of people who ride it in the afternoon and just because it’s just beautiful to see the sunrise over the mountain.

Surprisingly, it only took about 15 minutes to make it to the highest peak. El Teleferico was opened on September 29, 1955 and it still runs fantastically with small repairs and improvements here and there. This high elevation is making everything cold, but luckily I brought a sweater with me! The sight from the top is absolutely amazing, Jess’s mom was right. The sunrise casting light on everything makes it all shimmer. Absolutely breath taking. I wish I could stare at it forever, but unfortunately other people want to see it too so the cart has to keep moving!  Oh well, at least I got some pictures!

The view!

Day 13: Dance The Night Away

June 13th, 2012

I wanted to see more of Caracas’s at night because when the sun goes down, all the buildings light up and it makes Caracas look gorgeous! Jess recommended we go to one of Caracas’s nightlife hotspots called Centro San Ignacio. It’s a mall and also has clubs in the lower levels! I’ve been wanting to go one of the clubs for a long time because I’ve never gone to one before! Jess and I dressed up for the club. Hopefully I would be able to dance in my heels!

Jess’s parents came along with us, because they were going to go eat at one of the fancy restaurants and do a little shopping for Jess’s birthday while we went to one the clubs.  They would pick us up later. The club was amazing! Neon lights were everywhere and the DJ was playing fast paced dance songs. I pulled Jess onto the packed dance floor. It was time to dance the night away. Definitely one the best nights I’ve had here. 🙂

Day 12: Botanical Garden!

June 12th, 2012

I wanted to see more of Caracas’ beautiful scenery so we decided to head to the Jardín Botánico, which means “Botanical garden”! This garden was founded in 1944 by Dr Tobias Lasser and was later opened to the public in 1958. It located at one of Caracas’s colleges, UCV (Universidad Central de venezuela). It covers a total of 70 hectares (172,970 acres), 10 of them are flat lands and the other 60 are covered in hills. It contains more than 2,000 native and non-indigenous species as well as more than 100 types of palms and four greenhouses for bromeliads, ferns, orchids and shade plants. Also, 100,000 trees belonging to 80 species grow in the Arboretum and more than 100,000 types of plants are found in the herbarium.

It’s absolutely gorgeous. This garden has such a wide selection of plants and trees,and all of the different colors of the flowers make this place fantastic. I really wanted to puck some of the beautiful flowers and make a bouquet with them, but I didn’t want to get in trouble with any one! So I just took a ton of pictures to capture the essence of the garden. 🙂

Day 11: Bolívar’s Birthplace!

June 11th, 2012

Learning about the liberator of Venezuela, Simon Bolívar, was really interesting to me so we decided to go tour the place where he was born. Casa del Libertador is just a few meters from Capitolio or Hoyada metro stations. The house dates back to the 17th century  and is the place where Bolívar’s parents lived and raised a family of four children. Bolívar was the youngest child, born in 1783, and according to the historians, he lived in this house until 1792, when he lost his mother to a pulmonary disease. Having already lost his father in 1786, his grandfather took custody of him.

The house shows how wealthy Bolívar’s family was. The walls and floors are made of marble, lots of bedrooms, a library, a kitchen and even an patio that brings natural light to all the areas. Inside the house, you can see the belongings of Bolivar and his family, including precious paintings by famous Venezuelan painters. Among other things on display, you can see the baptismal font in which Bolivar was baptized in. The house was restored in 2011. It welcomes tourists and offers guided visits on only one condition- you must sign the guestbook!

Of course I immediately signed it to get a tour of the place! It’s very beautiful and has exquisite decorating. Simon had a very posh home to live in as he grew up!