The Mighty Essequibo River

I had no idea Guyana had so many islands and so many with white sands beaches to boot,


until I took a day safari down the mighty Essequibo, the 3rd largest river in south America and the river where miners from all over the world are converging on to  make a fortune from gold, using huge dredges that we saw all over, to bring up the mineral.

Many of the islands you see are huge by Caribbean standards with Hog island being even larger than Barbados. Many are also owned by rich Guyanese who have built "country retreats," none being more beautiful and ostentatious than the house and studio on the island owned by internationally acclaimed Guyanese singer Eddie Grant of Electric avenue fame.

I really have never seen such a large expanse of water in my life either, although I have travelled on the Mississippi river and along side the Colorado river. Just being on the mighty Essequibo is like being on an ocean and it does get as rough in parts with huge swells rising up as the wind comes up. And of course we did not even begin to see the river in full for although it is approximately an hour and a half by speed boat to Bartica, allegedly the oldest village established by the Dutch when they colonized the area, that journey does not even cover a distance of one eight of the mighty river.

Eddie Grant's lavish home on his private island

 We had been on our way for a day trip to the 187 acre resort island in the river called Baganara. To get to  Parika where we were taking the speed boat, we had to drive on the longest floating bridge in the world which spans the Demerara river. This bridge is one and a quarter 1/4 miles long and opens up in the middle to allow through huge container ships which bring goods from all over the world, to the dock behind Stabroek market where  there are several wharves.

The road down to Parika symbolizes perfectly the Guyanese cultural heritage as we saw houses and temples boasting the type of architecture depicting Hinduism, Islam and westernization. You could not miss houses where the residents were Hindu as they tend to fly flags in their front yards each colour selected to inform you whether they were mourning or celebrating some important event. Most of the way down too,  sections of the 280 mile the sea wall built by the Dutch in the 18th century to protect the country which lies below sea level, from the mighty Atlantic Ocean was visible.

Our first stop down the very busy and well traversed river was Fort island which the Dutch colonial masters had used as a look out against their British adversaries and where they also auctioned African slaves. Today the population of that 100 acre island is just 10 families and there is a primary school there with 21 students who will have to travel to  the mainland when they get to high school age.

The banks of the Esiquibo are covered with villages where, agriculture, lumber yards and fishing are the mainstay. River transportation is widely used for all these products. Families of monkeys are also all over going about their business in tall trees along the banks.
We had a wonderful peaceful day at the nature reserve resort of Banganara which is a bird watcher's paradise with some 160 species and several shy small wild animals.

I had no idea what I was getting into when I signed up for that river safari, but I certainly would do it again as just being on that huge wide river and at one with nature was worth every minute.

I can't wait to see more of this vast expanse of rain forest known as Guyana before heading off to Suriname, french Guyana and Brazil.