Oil Birds and the Odd Rat

Oil Birds Cave
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Our en-route stop was Cueva del Gaucharo known as the Oil Birds´ cave in English.  The birds used to be harvested once a year by the indigenous peoples and when the cave was discovered by Alexander von Humbolt he did the same but managed to almost eliminate the entire population of birds - oddly the Venezuelans have a statue of him outside the cave!

Fortunately the bird population has recovered and most people visit to see the 15,000 birds fly out of the caves at dusk although it seemed many people were more interested in our camp and dinner preparation even taking photos of us - the tourist becomes the tourist attraction!  Most people seem to think we are something to do with the National Geographic!

Sleeping in the truck to avoid the rats
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It was our first night camping for a while and all us girls completely chickened out and decided to spend the night sleeping in the truck.  In the morning we discovered some of our supplies we had left out overnight had been eaten by rats so we were somewhat relieved!