Iwokrama!

At the Canopy Walkway, alright!

Instruction before trekking to the Canopy Walkway

At the Iwokrama resort for 6 days


Staring at the Sankar the alligator amazingly
Ashton and Steven on top of the Turtle Mountain, so breathtaking!

Ashton and Jo-Ann exchanged their stockings

Hey everyone!!


Happy New Year to you all! Hope you have a great Xmas and New Year party in the UK and over the world!

I was with 7 volunteers (Stevo, Jill, Jo, Sarah, Michiyo, Boldi and Mary-Ann). Doctoring student Mary-Ann is not VSO volunteer but she joined us at last minute. She is from England, She knows some of BSL; so I taught her some of BSL signs as she is leaving on the 7th January.

We were so excited and ready, we took a first photo of us before leaving… cheese!

It was ‘ok’ journey to Iwokrama, we were supposed to leave by a coach at 10pm but left an hour delay over overload thing! But 30 minute later, the coach broken down, the driver and other staffs tried to fix it while heavy raining!! It worked!! Heehee! We finally arrived Iwokrama rainforest in middle of Guyana, all rainforest and rivers looked so beautiful! I can see this is really Guyana, breakaway from crowded, hostile, selfish, crime, pollution, bad environment, colonies building Georgetown.

Iwokrama resort looked cool and impressive, I could live there for ever! The guide called Gary who is Amerindian himself. He showed us around Iwokrama, Turtle Mountain, Canopy Walkway, Essequibo river, Screaming nature trail, wildlife, Fairview and more! You can see amazing pictures! It was really exciting to see rainforest in Turtle Mountain, Screaming trail and Canopy Walkway. I may have been to rainforest in Dominica, West Indies but this Iwokrama rainforest is more interesting!

On Christmas eve, My best trip is Turtle Mountain, I trekked up (800 metre high) for one and half hour and back for another hours. It was so cool experience! We were on the top of mountain, beautiful view of Iwokrama and river. Took a lot of pictures as well as filming!

I am not big into animals but most cool thing I have seen is Sankar the alligator! We thought he would attack us but not really, he is really a vegetarian! My friend Hannah (another volunteer) she swam with it last year!!!! Bloodly hell!!! I wouldn’t do it even I am a big man!!! Hat off to her!!! She noticed it without a leg! Although I still wouldn’t swim with it heehee! Saw other species like spider, different kind of birds, ants, dragonflies, fishes, snake, monkey, turtle (and turtle eggs in the red sand) of course mosquitoes (I got much fewer love bites than Georgetown). Tribe people lived there long time ago but wiped out over colonies thing. What a shame!

We were excited about receiving our secret stocking from other friend. It was Jo who gave me the brilliant present, this big sock with ‘Ashton’ sewed! You might see a picture! I took things out like a lot of sweets, cards, key-necklace holder, shot glass etc. I gave her a handbag, a wooden bracelet and a sign ‘Take off your shoes’ because she brought loads of shoes from Canada! We were pissed and having some fun!

On Christmas Day, I had a wicked Xmas at Iwokrama rainforest resort. Actually we really didn’t celebrated Christmas on Xmas Day, it is like normal day to me! Most of us slept, relax, read books/magazines, walking around and eating normal meal!

On 26th December, we went to Canopy Walkway, it was cool! We trekked up for just half an hour. Just relax and enjoyed view of Iwokrama rainforest. Poor Jill got sting from a wicked wasp; at first I thought she pulled her back because she held her back with her horrifying face! I saw a wasp, I killed it straightaway! The light went off at 10pm, we turned a torch on, unfortunately loads of flies attached around us!! A massive moth ticked my ankle, I jumped and thinking ‘It was sexual harassment!’ Heehee!

When I got home (Georgetown), I learned that Georgetown or other regions in North of Guyana wasn’t really Amerindian culture or rooted! In the 18th century, it was British, Dutch and Spanish colonies dragged African slaves and East Indians labourers into Amerindian Guyana changed most.

On New Year eve, I had a good time at Annestijn’s for celebrating New year, Stevo and me were supposed to meet Deaf people at Deaf church about 10.30pm but there was different church in same area though. Although we didn’t remember what street (we went there last August!), so we had to ride to look for most streets! We drank and rode! Oops! We couldn’t find them; we had to go back to Annestijn’s about 11.40pm.

My resolution? That’s all I am thinking about is setting up a new Deaf club for Guyanese Deaf community AND improving my footballing!

Funnily, 3 ex-Preston University students is in South America at the moment is me, Helen Phillips with Jason Vessey (Brazil) and Lulu Fresiel (Chile)! Lulu said she love this country (where her family is from) Chilean Deaf community is not good as Chilean Sign Language only started 10 years ago. Most of uneducated Deaf people used oral though. Lulu assisted with her Deaf friend Paola who is a CSL teacher and improving Deaf education across Chile. I’m sure she make difference for Chilean Deaf community!

That’s it!

Missing you all!

Ashton xXx