
How to go from Manaus to Georgetown
This is a two day trip. It’s best to take a nightbus from Manaus to Boa Vista. There are night buses leaving at 19h or 20h you will arrive approximately at 5:30h or 6:30h. The semi cama costs 170R (43.30CHF/38.36€) and the cama is 230R (58.60CHF/51.90€).
From there you take another bus to Bonfim, the town at the border to Guyana. There is one at 7h and one at 16:30h and costs 25R (6.35CHF/5.64€). The journey is about two hours and you can either get off at the terminal or stay until the bus drives to the Brazilian border control.
At the border control there are taxis and minibuses waiting to take you to either Lethem or Georgetown or some place in between. A taxi to Lethem is 10Us$. The minibus to Georgetown is 18’000 GYD (86.75CHF/76.88€). After doing the border control stuff, they will drive you to the office of the bus company, where you can hang out in a hammock and change your money. There is no ATM that works for foreign cards in Lethem, so make sure to bring enough to pay the first few days. Especially, when you plan not to go directly to Georgetown. At about 18h you will leave, you might be driven to some eating places first to buy some food. There is a braek for the night of six hours for sleeping. You can rent hammocks at that place for about 500GYD (2.40CHF/2.13€). They will tell you, that you arrive at 14h next day, but you might possibly arrive much later, depending on the state of the road. There are probably also not buses everyday, depending on the condition of the road. Between Lethem and Linden the road is unpaved and a joy for everybody who like off road driving. I also had the impression that driving your own vehicle (assumed that you have a car that is made for off road driving) in Guyana is much better than backpacking, as tourism is literally non existent.
Bring enough food with you for this trip it is not guaranteed, that you might find vegan food. In the best case you find rice with pasta and beans or rice with dal, no guarantee that it is vegan.

The cheapest accommodation, but not the best, in Georgetown I could find was the P&A Guesthouse, which luckily is in the same building like the bus office, where you arrive when taking T&M Transportation (contact Lethem: 697-4135). A small single room with fan and shared bathroom is 4’000GYD (19.30CHF/17.08€) per night. A room with air-conditioning is more expensive. If you prefer to have more privacy I recommend to go to Julians Guest House, where you get a private bathroom and faster wifi for 5’000GYD (24.10CHF/21.35€). Julians Restaurant only serves fish and chips, but if you are starving it’s worth to order the chips (500GYD/2.40CHF/2.13€), because it’s plantain chips instead of potatoes (very tasty).

In Georgetown you can spend half a day visiting the city. But what you really should do, is organising a flight to the Kaieteur falls. A flight ticket for both ways costs 171US$ at the Fly Brasil travel agency (Lat 6.80997 Lon -58.15474). They have about three flights a week(Su, Tu, Th), but every flight has to be confirmed. I think it’s weather dependent.

2 Comments
Joe Evangelista
Currently the bus service from Boa Vista to Bonfim Brazil has ceased, however, it is possible to share a taxi for R50-R100 for the trip. I am writing this comment from Bonfim.
Vita
Thank you for the information. Things are changing fast in South America, so I am absolutely not surprised. Greetings Vita