We are currently wasting time in Corumbá in Brazil. We arrived late yesterday afternoon and are stuck here as we wait to catch the train into Bolivia in order to get to Santa Cruz. There was no room in today’s more luxurious train so we have to wait until tomorrow to get a berth on the infamous Death Train. I am not sure why it is named the Death Train - I certainly hope we don’t get a good idea as to the reason why. I really don’t fancy the twenty hours of hell that await us tomorrow. I have my fingers crossed that the toilets aren’t like the ones on the trains in Egypt but I don’t like my chances. I guess I will soon enough find out why everyone was on board tonight’s train and not our one.
It wouldn’t be so bad being stuck here if there was something to do. Alas this place is dead. The Lonely Planet only devotes one small paragraph to the description of Corumbá and I can see why. Nothing here is open on the Sabbath and we have been forced to wander the streets aimlessly killing time. As there isn’t anything to see apart from the river, the hours are passing very slowly. It did take us quite a while to work out how to get down to the river, so that wasted a bit of time. Unfortunately when we got to its banks there was not much to keep us there.
Lunch was spent at a local joint we stumbled upon. Since the lady couldn’t understand a word we said and vice versa, we pointed at something on the piece of paper she wrote the menu on and hoped for the best. We believed we were getting something with meat in it for 15 reals all up, plus 5 reals for our two cokes. While we waited for our food we took out our travel bible and note pads and started writing our journals. Well, we did get meat and a whole lot of other stuff that was quite tasty. I think the owner thought we were from the Lonely Planet though as when we got the bill, the total, including our drinks, was 14 reals. We have committed this neat trick to memory and are going to pull it out more often now!
After lunch we just loitered on the streets for a while longer. Generally I would be pro no Sunday trading as it means people have family time but it is not much fun when you are tourists who have no air con in their room and only a crappy tv with everything in Portuguese. Hence, we do not really want to hang out in there. We should have stayed in the youth hostel (I am not sure why we listed to Trudy’s recommendation. At least there would be people to talk to and DVDs and it would have been cheaper. Maybe the Death Train wont be so bad after all.
Note: Jon is amazed I can write so much about so little!
It wouldn’t be so bad being stuck here if there was something to do. Alas this place is dead. The Lonely Planet only devotes one small paragraph to the description of Corumbá and I can see why. Nothing here is open on the Sabbath and we have been forced to wander the streets aimlessly killing time. As there isn’t anything to see apart from the river, the hours are passing very slowly. It did take us quite a while to work out how to get down to the river, so that wasted a bit of time. Unfortunately when we got to its banks there was not much to keep us there.
Lunch was spent at a local joint we stumbled upon. Since the lady couldn’t understand a word we said and vice versa, we pointed at something on the piece of paper she wrote the menu on and hoped for the best. We believed we were getting something with meat in it for 15 reals all up, plus 5 reals for our two cokes. While we waited for our food we took out our travel bible and note pads and started writing our journals. Well, we did get meat and a whole lot of other stuff that was quite tasty. I think the owner thought we were from the Lonely Planet though as when we got the bill, the total, including our drinks, was 14 reals. We have committed this neat trick to memory and are going to pull it out more often now!
After lunch we just loitered on the streets for a while longer. Generally I would be pro no Sunday trading as it means people have family time but it is not much fun when you are tourists who have no air con in their room and only a crappy tv with everything in Portuguese. Hence, we do not really want to hang out in there. We should have stayed in the youth hostel (I am not sure why we listed to Trudy’s recommendation. At least there would be people to talk to and DVDs and it would have been cheaper. Maybe the Death Train wont be so bad after all.
Note: Jon is amazed I can write so much about so little!
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