Suriname was the last outpost of what was once a substantial Dutch presence in South America. During the 19th-century, Indians and Indonesians arrived as plantation workers and the country finally gained its independence in 1975. The capital city, Paramaribo, is peppered with black-and-white colonial Dutch buildings lining grassy squares. The city is a melting pot of all religions as expressed by the mosque, synagogue, Hindu temple and cathedral all sitting harmoniously within the historic centre. Wafts of spices escape from Indian roti shops and mingle with car exhaust fumes outside a sombre Dutch fort - this was an invigorating city.

We took in the city sights including: Fort Zeelandia, a star-shaped 18th-century fort on the site where the first colonists alighted overlooking the Suriname River; the frenzied Central Market selling a variety of herbs, bones, shells and mysterious concoctions; Independence Square housing aging governmental buildings and famous for its Sunday morning bird-song competitions .

The mix of cultures certainly provided a rewarding culinary experience including many hearty Creole dishes washed down with a few Parbos and a chicken roti at 10am on our way out to the plantations...

In true Dutch fashion, we rented a couple of back-pedal-brake bicycles for a day. We explored the banks of the Commewijne River which were lined with old coffee, cacao and cane plantation properties divided by canals. One of the plantations, Peperpot, is now a beautiful nature reserve and cycling through it we saw many butterflies, monkeys and birds. Our final stop of the day was another fort with a museum displaying artifacts of the slave trade and an impressive Dutch-engineered system of locks holding back the river.

Onward bus to South Drain, 3.5hrs, followed by a 20minute ferry across the Corentyne River to Guyana and finally a shared taxi on to Georgetown, 3hrs.