Guyana

The least interesting and by far the most expensive of the 3 Guyana’s. This former British colony, looks like it’s also the poorest, lots of very poorly built houses and the roads are terrible. Despite this, the prizes for food are sky high. €5,- for some cookies, €6,- for half a litre of yoghurt for example (we bought neither cookies nor yoghurt in Guyana). We don’t know how the locals can afford this since about 56% of the 750.000 inhabitants are considered poor. Guyana discovered oil about 200km before their coast and so there’s now money coming into the country and we’ve been told that in 2 years things will look a lot better. There was certainly a lot of road construction going on. Still the main source of income at the moment is the service sector, followed by the agricultural sector. Their currency is the Guyanese Dollar (GYD) where a 1000GYD is about €4.6.

Tourist wise it has almost nothing to offer, even the capital Georgetown isn’t worth a visit. There are a few tour operators offering very expensive tours inland, which is still mostly only accessible by plane or boat. Just like in Suriname most of the land is forest, with mining and logging going on inside it, either legally or illegally.

The locals are very friendly! People waving at us, giving us thumbs up or shouting welcome. Language wise this was also an easy country for us, as they speak English. And they also drive on the left side of the road. Those seems to be the only two things left from the former British occupation. You won’t find any British food or typical buildings. 

A part of the land called Essequibo is the subject of a territorial dispute between Venezuelan and Guyana. This dispute has been going on since 1899! Although both countries have held referendums with their inhabitants about who should own this area, neither of them bothered to ask the people actually living in Essequibo what they want… We did see a lot of stickers saying “Essequibo belongs to Guyana” Perhaps with the current political unrest in Venezuela, most people would indeed prefer to belong to Guyana. Apparently not so long ago the much more powerful Venezuela threatened to invade Guyana and just take Essequibo. But Brazil politically intervened. Who knows when this dispute will be resolved, if ever.

For us and for most overlanders this country is nothing more than a mandatory drive through, as its not possible to go to Brazil from Suriname. We have yet to make up our minds whether Guyana or Uruguay is the most boring country of South America, we will let you know 😉