SUBJECT: Letter #12 - Part 2

DATE: April 2, 1997

AUTHOR: Ted Burgdorf, his wife Betsy, and three girls - Heidi, Kristen, and Kara, work with the Gates family in Guyana.

---

At 2:17 am we were awakened to a rumbling and the house shaking. An earthquake centered somewhere in the Caribbean, they said. As we were drifting back to sleep, Elder Hihan Brown started calling our names. It was about 02:30 and his wife was in labor with her second child. Betsy went with him, along with Heidi. She had a boy at 05:45. The day had just begun for us, because Betsy and I were going to hike to Paruima with their club, who was returning from the camporee. We had our newly made warishi's (backpacks) packed and ready to go. Then Heidi and Lina Gates decided to go, so we put

Here I am hiking up to the Savannah

in a third sleeping bag and some extra food. We had to put some padding on the should straps so they wouldn't hurt so much. Betsy used two pairs of socks on her straps and I used two hot pads. They were attached with duct tape (good stuff). We said goodbye to all those staying behind and to Aunt Lita, Aunt Ruth and Uncle Eddie. He was stitching up someone's foot at the time.

We finally left at 09:30 and arrived up on the savannah two hours later. There were several men and boys from Kaikan that helped carry some of the girls and Betsy's pack. They went with us until noon when we stopped to eat at a small creek. We then continued walking on the savannah for six hours that day. We crossed Macaw creek and camped at the "dog" creek that night. They say it was named that because they used to have wild dogs around there. As we were hiking we were drinking water fast and furious, and soon finished what we were carrying with us. So, we did like everyone else and started drinking from the rivers and creeks. We made good time on the savannah since

We finally reach the Savannah

it was fairly flat and not many trees to go through. We also had a nice breeze most of the time while on the savannah. People has warned us about Crabu Mountain, which we were to encounter on the second day of our trip. They made it seem impossible, at least for weak foreigners, to climb.

Day two began with a shriek from a multi-toned whistle piercing the quietness and darkness at 04:00. It was the Paruima Pathfinder leader waking up his troops for the day. We didn't see any reason to get up, since it was still dark, so we laid in our sleeping bags until 05:30. Oh, what a night it had been. We were four adult-sized people in three sleeping bags on a hard, bumpy, and slanted ground. We slid down about two feet and it would have been more, except that we kept pulling ourselves back up during the night. Everyone else slept in the hammocks and except for the cold, had a good night's rest. I had the worships, both morning and everning, for the trip. I read from a book that my parents had brought over. It was about Angels and different stories of people's experiences with them. Everyone seemed to really enjoy them. We were back on the trail by 07:30.

(I should stop and tell about Ramo - Ramodin Rudy. He was one of the men who helped carry packs. He carried Betsy's up to the savannah. At noon he had turned back. When we woke up in the morning he was in our camp. He left Kaikan at 02:00 and was going to be our escort guide for the trip,

Ramo looking over the Savannah

especially the return trip, since we would be on our own otherwise. Ramo is on the village counsel and has been the best of friends and the most helpful person we have had during our stay in Guyana.)

We left camp 15 or 20 minutes before everyone else, because they were always ahead of us on day one. The savannah was everlasting. Time seemed to stand still and the girls got bored as we walked and walked. Slowly we approached the "infamous" Craku Mountain and were at it's base by 11:00. We crossed the Crabu river, about 30-40' wide, by stepping on the rocks that were out of the water. They say that when it rains, the river is too deep and swift to cross, and that you have to sit and wait for a few hours and it goes down again. The mountain didn't look that impressive. As we started up it rose sharply, and for the next 55 minutes (30 for resting) we climbed up

Ramo and friend stopping for a rest

the side of the mountain. No one ever told them about switch backs. "Straight is quicker". We had to stop often to rest our legs, and a lot of the climb involved holding on to bushes and branches to help pull yourself along. Coming the other way there are sections that you'd have to go down backwards and hold on to the branches, because it is steep. Where were the trail builders from the U.S. National Park Services.

Once on top we looked out across the savannah and saw way off in the distance where we had spent the night. It was hard to imagine that we had covered that distance in about 5 hours. We were now at the halfway point of our trip. No turning back now. As we climbed Craku Mountain we could see Craku waterfalls. It was long and narrow. We walked another half-hour and stopped for lunch. Rice and beans with some casava bread. We started eating some of our meals with the group and would only snack on some nuts while walking. I finally began to realize why we were at the back of the group most of the time. We were sightseeing and they were traveling. They were heading toward their destination and we were seeing and experiencing the beauty of the savannah. We saw ten different types of Orchids growing out of the ground. There were also a lot of other flowers. The mountains, with their cliffs in the distance, were gorgeous. We stopped around four or five pm at "Grass creek" for the night. Both nights were spent at places that had a pole frame structure that they put a tarp over and tied up their hammocks to. Again we were on the hard ground, but this time there was something else to deal with. We took our baths in the creek, as we had the night before. It felt good to get out of sweaty, stinky clothes. As was the case of the night before, someone kept waking up all night long to keep the fire going.

Love, Ted Burgdorff & Family

You may write to Ted at: gates@andrews.edu

[Home Page] [Children's Corner] [Life on the Frontlines] [How to become an adventurer]
[Others who did it] [About Us] [Caribbean Links]

---

Last Updated: may 13, 1997