AOPA Pilot Magazine - March 1958 - (Page 73) through. Entering at Gonuuba, I was told that they had not received any M e making trouble for toe, the DAC (Brazilian CAA man) saiflingly assured me that there -would be "wto pro61mnd0; he would send a -wire to R ~ o ~ P l d d W e the situation and would soon lave an answer allowing me to proceed. While be was doing this, an assistant found gram of authorization and that my entry had lean illegal. But instead of You can imagine how I welcomed the the missing telegram. It had been received 60 days before and had already been buried deep i the storage flies. n At other stops in Brazil, the pleasant DAC men often instated upon buying me beer and sometimes even a meal after they had finished checking my papers. I cut off the nose of Brazil, traveling from Bahia to Sao Luis by the inland route. Instead of the jungle which I anticipated, the area proved t o be.-dry, much like the hill country of southwest Texaa. Several times I saw groups of giant ant hills, like laud wasp neah mevan or eight feet high. At Petroilina On the Sao Francisco Rivet, people were unconcernedly awi-g i water n which they told m e was full of piranhas, the little man-eating f a which are supposed to nibble one to pieces in a few minutest gine there wee many flights wvw South Without complete faith in your en- America's swamplands and jungle which would be pretty harrowing. One such trip is the lap from Sao Luis to Trinidad. Except for sugar cane fields on the Guiana coast, you see awamp and jungle all the way, and 1 mean the real thingÑdens forest with water standing between the trees and either rain or threatening shies to harry you. Across the Amazon River delta and up the west bank it was almost solid swamp, .tJmugh once in a while the land would nse a few inches, allowing some hardy aoul to try raise cattle. I kept thinking of a remark made by an official in Asuncion: "If you have to land, the snigatora will eat you very carefully." Before each flight I would tell myself that BWW 'say little engine bad run BQ many hours without missing a heat, it was bound to keep running as far as the next; airport. Thw having convinced myself, I would settle back and enjoy the ride. On the final lap along the northern coast, however, the prevailing winds blew oat of the East, providing a 26-mile tail wind which added to m y pea& of mind. It stayed. w t me all the way home and -was very ih comforting during the time I was out of sight of land between the Caribbean Islands. From Cayenne on, I began to hear English again. Perhaps I haven't ittentioned it, but I miderstand no Portuguese wid can remember only a little textbook Spanish from high school and university courses I took years ago. Traveling alone, I developed an intense feeling of loneliness from weeks of not being able to talk to people and not understanding what went Qn around MARCH, 1958 English-speakingpeople of Paramaribo, and (mess how good Her M j s y s aet' colored officials sounded at Georgetown. The linguistic ability found in Paramaribo was aznszita. Everyone spoke English and D M , and many also used Spanish and French, Heavy rains forced me to lay over for a day and I stayed at a pension where all the goes& ate at one large table. During the meals at least four languages Sew tacit and forth and everybody seemed to be understanding everything that "was said. Much of the conversation was about a curio shop owner from Virginia City, Nev.,, who had been there a few days earlier wearing a Hollywood-designed Wild West outfit and calling himaaljE Buffalo BilL They had liked this man very much and many of them seemed to think he was the resl thing. back home he aella ice cream cones to the tourists. Three days after leaving Port of Spain I was back in the United States. All in all, 'it was not a difficult trip. There was BQ real navigational or weather problexne and with the engine running perfectly there was -no reason to get in trouble. Credit for this mask go to Bill Weatover, mechanic at Am&dor County Airport, Jackson, C l f , ai. who overhauled the engine before the trip and did auch a good job that it went 21,600 mila in 230 hours without being touched. The entire trip cost under {800, of which $498 was for gasoline. Everywhere prices were lower than at home and i some countries food and hotels n were unbelievably cheap. I Argentina, n for example, a good steak cost only 16 centsÑsometim it came from a sheep, but it was always good. My hotel bills averaged ^3.86 often incladtag meals. Boom with, meals was leas than $1 at three different' plaefia, Lago Buenos Aires, fJan Julian and Campo Grande. Admittedly, I was avoiding the swanky tourist traps, but I always stayed at s . good first dass hotel. My highest bill waa $8.65 ait the Othon Palace Hotel in Sao Paulo. This was one of the best hotel rooms I've ever seen and tbe bill included breakfast i m y room. By eonn hast with these items, a taxi driver in Buenos Aired told me his old 1942 car was worth $2,600. Looking back on the trip, to me the outstanding thing was the way I was treated. All along the way people practically knocked themselves out trying to ddi things for me, and in some places it was difficult to spend my own money. Whenever I was faced with any kind off a problem somebody immediately came to help me. Uncle Sam has a lot of friends in the countries to the south, and they are all worth getting acquainted "with. END James D. CAwrcft, author of "South ArneChalhp," ts a CAA air-port mgifww now on, wsigwment with the I i i t e m t t w w t Cooperats.*on AdwMnistra' tim in Kandahar, Afghanistan, A cornrnerctal pilot with an W9trwment rotinn, Church hat k g e d more than 5.000 hows in single and multhn&fie airera& In 1958, Church took a trip alone to Ecuador in a Moomsy Mite.
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