We have all heard that phrase that says: "Traveling is the only thing you buy and it makes you richer" . And I think it's one of the greatest truths I've heard in my life. It will be what you live for, because you get soaked in other cultures and learn new languages. Or maybe it's because of the unforgettable experiences or the people you meet on your way.
I don't know if it's the excitement of being away from home or simply because the adventure calls for adventure, but when we travel we love to try things and live new experiences. Personally, I'm a lover of the first times and one of those people who think that before dying you have to try everything. Because those moments, in addition, are tthe ones we remember forever. Maybe you do not remember what was the sixth time you kissed someone, but the first? Well the same happens with trips.
I started telling the story of one of the greatest trips I've ever made, in Venezuela. I'm picking up the story right where I endend the last post about this story:
We arrived to Chuao, it's a 15 minutes boat ride from Cepe, this shore is more populated. This place is known by its for 400 years of sowing of "cacao criollo" (creole cocoa) , which is the species that produces the highest quality cocoa seed in the world. This peculiar town is reached by means of the sea, since the terrestrial access is complicated and long. In fact, there are only twelve cars in the town.
These are cocoa seeds.
Chuao can be defined as 449 years of culture, tradition and cocoa.
It's a coastal and picturesque village with cocoa aroma.
The people in this small town are culturally traditional, I can personally say that they have not been affected by the "malice" that abounds in the rest of the country. From the locals who met us at the pier when the boat arrived, to the lady who prepared "empanadas", they retained that pure essence characteristic of the Venezuelan, they gave smiles and gave you the warmth of a home.
Traveling is undoubtedly a very intense experience at all levels and emotions take you to the surface. I have met people for days, a few hours or sometimes I have only shared a meal with them. But I've always taken a little bit of them with me. This time, in the first couple of days I had the chance to meet other venezuelans from Valencia, Carabobo, their names were: Claudia, Sergio, Jorge and José. Even had the chance to meet a guy from Floreanópolis, Brasil; his name was Alessandro. In the latest days I met a couple from Buenos Aires, Argentina; Viki (short for Victoria) and Lucas, they went back with me to Mérida when I finished my 10 days adventure.
I don't know if it's because we are far from our homes, our routines and our comfort zones. But that "imbalance" makes us experience every detail more intensely. We went exploring arround and met some locals, there was a little girl that caught our attention, you could see innocence right in her eyes, she had one of the purest looks I've ever seen in my entire life.
Because Chuao is in the middle of Henri Pittier National Park , it has a lot of rivers and water pits aroud, really conld and refreshing after an entire day at the beach. You can find locals bathing in those pits, that's part of their everyday life, we were just guests at the time. Traveling opens your mind, frees you from prejudices, brings you closer to people, makes you more human and comes to understand more of the world. And as Mae West says: "You only live once but if you do it right, once is enough".
This is some sort of water dam we found, I'm not even sure if we were able to swim there.. But we did, sorry.
The first couple of days in Chuao were definitely relaxing, but also full of adrenaline.. Why? At the second night we spent there I felt something moving in the floor (like from outside the tent) while sleeping.. It was a HUGE crab, but like HUGE! I'm afraid of crabs, lobsters, everything that has pincers. My camera didn't help at the moment to take the photo (also I was like a million meters away from that thing), but I tried and this was the greatest photo of the monster:
If you ask me, it has an angry face.
With this monster crab experience I was able to prove myself, to measure my strenght and my capacity to adapt (also proved how loud I scream and how funny I look while crying). I kow it sounds ridiculous, but after this I became a little different. I was forced to get out of my comfort zone, I met a "braver me". All I did was to move the tent and put the crab into a pail, then released it like one million kilometers away from my tent.
The field of life will always give us experiences and that is what will make us experts in the area that we are passionate about. Learning is part of growing and maturing; As children learned the alphabet, when we became adults we started to live different and more complex things. For many it is difficult to learn something from a bad experience, perhaps because they believe that only good things can be learned, but not always.
Here I am with the most beautiful group of people I've ever met!