In A Colonial Hotel

It seemed from the tourist blurb that I had done Ciudad Bolivar a huge injustice in comparing it unfavourably with Kabul and Swindon. Indeed, the blurb seemed to intimate that the place was in fact Venezuela's answer to New Orleans, with marvellous old colonial buildings fronting a wide and mighty river, among which the beautiful, sexed-up inhabitants would be found drinking and dancing and partying till all hours of the morning.

So I persuaded Mr P that our time might be spent more fruitfully than just lounging around in the hotel room doing the things that couples do when they have time to kill in hotel rooms in unfamiliar cities (smoking and watching The Matrix, since you ask) and went for a walk down to the Paseo Orinoco in search of picaresque adventure and excitement.

Big mistake. A wide and mighty river there is. Colonial waterfront buildings there are. Stray dogs there are aplenty. But of the beautiful, sexed-up inhabitants drinking and dancing etc etc there was no evidence whatsoever. Not a bar, not a restaurant in sight. Poor.

However, we were much entertained by a sign declaiming "Ciudad Bolivar Es Historia" (Ciudad Bolivar Is History). It's always nice to be informed when the end is nigh.