Thanks to Nick on s/v Caribbean Soul for this great picture of Dream Chaser in Laguna Grande

We finally got out of the marina on December 16th! We have covered roughly about 400 miles so far sailing along Venezuela's north coast and to a few of the outer islands. We met new friends in the marina this fall that we have been traveling with. The boats are Chill, Dragonfly, Rainbowrider and Caribbean Soul. It has been a pleasure spending time and getting to know each other and cruising together to these wonderful places!

Our first stop was in El Oculto, which means, "hidden bay". This is a large bay on the north coast of Venezuela and well protected from the ocean. It is surrounded by hills full of cactus, desert plants and a few flowering trees. You can see flocks of small green parrots in the mornings darting from tree to tree. In the bay, there are two small islands where the snorkeling is superb but the water is only 75 degrees making wetsuits a necessity! The coral is alive here where most of the coral in the Caribbean Islands is dead. The coral is covered with Christmas Tree Worms, which are cone shaped like a Christmas tree. They appear to be soft and fluffy, and are spiral in design when looking at them from the top - down. They range in colors from purple, peach, pink, white, and green, to white with a black spiral, blue with a tan spiral and more. If you wave your hand over them, they will pop back down in the coral-like tube they live in. It is quite an amazing site.

New Years Eve afternoon was spent with a large group of cruisers on the beach for a party in El Oculto. Ten cruising boats made the 4-hour trip east from Bahia Redonda Marina for the party. We used an old abandoned fishing camp for our party headquarters. The "camp" was set back from the beach and consisted of a 20' x 40' cement floor, with an old dilapidated corrugated roof and wire mesh sides for walls. We had not seen any fishermen using the camp since before Christmas when we were here. The decision was made to use this as our party base. We brought music on our MP3 player to shore that we powered by a portable battery and a small inverter. Others brought chairs, portable folding table, lanterns, grills and everyone had their own meat to grill and a dish to share. It was also Lucia's 5th birthday on New Years Day and this party doubled as her birthday party. We provided the dessert; cupcakes decorated with powdered sugar dog bone designs. The New Year was toasted to early with a huge bonfire just after dark. Only a few wild, younger souls made it to midnight. On New Years Day, the celebration continued with a Recovery Party onboard two cruising catamarans rafted together. We invited 2 Venezuelan couples to join us who were in the bay on their powerboat. They brought champagne and cooked traditional Venezuelan food to share with all of us.



Even Lucia brings cupcakes to the party

After spending six days in El Oculto, we were ready to move on to Mochima National Park. Mochima extends four miles inland and is surrounded by high green hills and with red rocks. The wind here pipes up early in the morning and blows with a vengeance, swooshing down the hillsides until it finally dies well after dark. It is thought that Mochima was a sunken valley and a place where pirates were rumored to have hidden treasure. The bird life and dolphins here are abundant and spear fishing for lobster is not allowed. The area is now protected and the local fishermen are no longer allowed to build new fishing camps. There are many little quiet anchorages to choose from, but since it was just after the New Year, many of them were packed with tourists coming from the mainland. The water taxis from the small town were going non-stop all day long carrying passengers to and from the beaches. We made one stop in the little village of Mochima for cervezas and pargo (snapper) for lunch but then decided to move on to a quieter anchorage away from the tourists and town.

Our next adventure was to the Golfo de Cariaco. The Golfo is 35 miles long and as wide as 8 miles across. The scenery is very dramatic; at the entrance, it is similar to the Badlands of South Dakota with hills of red, tan and white, and at the other end, it is mountainous, very lush and green. In between there are beautiful, palm-fringed beaches. Several small villages dot the coastline and there are dozens of anchorages to choose from. The first three days we stayed in Laguna Grande and spent time hiking to the tops of the hills. It was amazing to find coral at the tops of these hills, which were once obviously underwater. There were also large rocks that looked like petrified wood. The shoreline in Laguna Grande is dotted with mangroves, which makes the water too murky to snorkel. On one of the muddy beaches, we discovered oysters on the rocks in the shallows. Prying them off with our fingers, we collected a bunch and threw them on the grill for a tasty appetizer later that day. The fourth day was a long trip against strong winds to the end of the Golfo to catch a glimpse of the Red Ibis. We anchored in the mouth of the Rio de Cariaco, which is the river at the end of the Golfo. We quickly launched our dinghies for a river trip mid afternoon. The Red Ibis are bright, bright red birds about the size of a small heron. They are absolutely beautiful when they fly in flocks but are very skittish when they are approached in the river. Unfortunately getting a picture of them was next to impossible. Nevertheless, they were many other birds we saw such as king fishers, huge white herons and bright blue smaller herons, hawks and osprey.

The weather forecast was predicting a break in the winds for the upcoming week and we had planned to spend more time in the Golfo, but now it driving us to move a little faster. We needed calmer weather to sail to Blanquilla and this was looking like a good opportunity to get there. In order to make the trip to Blanquilla it would take us several steps and several days to get there.

The following morning bright and early at sunrise, we motored out of the Rio de Cariaco anchorage along with Rainbowrider, Chill and Dragonfly. We sailed the 35 miles back down and out the Golfo and then another 12 miles back to Mochima for the night. The second day was another early departure to make the 60-mile trip to the island of Margarita off the northern coast of VE. 60 Miles may not seem like much but at only 6 knots, the trip is about 10 hours.

In Porlamar, Margarita there were 73 cruising boats at anchor. This is a major stopping place for cruising vessels. It is a big city with all the sights, smells and sounds. In town, we topped off on fresh veggies and fruit, and took on diesel fuel, the hard way. Getting fuel on the water is usually quite simple, but the "diesel boat" was out of commission. Normally, the diesel boat would come out to the boat. But this time we launched the dinghy and buzzed down the bay about 2 miles to the fuel dock which is really only for the fishing boats. The dock, which is permanent and made of concrete with big concrete pilings and rusty metal pieces poking out of the cement, is about 10 feet above our heads. It was difficult to hang on and keep us from being sucked under the dock with the surge of the ocean. The gas attendant began to hand us down the fuel pump, but he hesitated because we were "Americanos" and he said he was not allowed to sell fuel to us. Nevertheless, after a few minutes he finally agreed to sell it but for a higher price. Without him telling us what the price would be, he dropped down the nozzle to us and we filled our 6 - 5 gallon fuel cans full of diesel. The price ended up being 10 cents a gallon, rather than the normal 4 cents! It made him very happy considering he probably pocketed the extra, plus we gave him a tip for the trouble, which amounted to 60 cents. We did have to make one more trip back for another 30 gallons and he did not hesitate at all the second time around.

Two days in Porlamar, Margarita was plenty. Once again we departed at sun up, got underway and headed to the north coast of Margarita 35 miles to a small town called Juangriego for the night. This location was best for the next morning's departure to Blanquilla. The charming town was named after a Greek pirate who was shipwrecked here. While we all enjoyed cocktails at the beachside restaurant, we watched fishermen who were sitting in their boats making fishing nets by hand. All of us bought loaves of bread at the tiny bakery in town taking the last 4 loaves of bread that were just taken out of the oven.

The passage to Blanquilla was an all day trip again and we wished we had more wind. There was not enough to get us there before dark so we motor sailed most of the way. About 30 miles out we saw lots of dolphins and a dozen or more of them swam and played in our bow wave for a very long time. Blanquilla is probably the most beautiful of Venezuela's offshore islands we have been to. It is off the beaten path and is a low island only about 50 feet high with beautiful white sand beaches and excellent snorkeling. There are small valleys where there are lots of trees and dry creek beds but otherwise it is mainly low scrub and cactus. Wild donkeys roam the island and have made trails all over. We hiked inland on these trails and tried to avoid the "jumping cactus" that would occasionally embed themselves in our legs. We came across remains of a huge crab and the claw was the size of our hand! There were also more fossils of old coral and sea shells in the rocks. One morning early, we ventured in our dinghy along with our friends to the next bay north called Americano Bay. Here the ocean has formed a huge natural arch in the rock and there are cliffs on either side as you enter the bay.





Dolphins off our bow

To complete our outer island tour we set sail at 4:00 AM on the 5th morning and sailed all the way back to El Oculto Bay. It was an interesting passage of 3 different types of conditions. There were calm seas and a beautiful sail for the first third of the 90-mile trip. However, it turned ugly and rolly near the west coast of Margarita with squalls and the seas came from all different directions with the wind piping up to 22 knots. It felt like we were in a washing machine. The last third of the passage the seas finally calmed out and we had an awesome sail. The wind was fairly steady and strong, on the beam (the side), which is the best, with 5-foot seas, except for that occasional rouge 8 footer wave that would slap the side of the boat and a splash into the cockpit.

The second evening in El Oculto we had happy hour on the beach and invited all the boats that were in the anchorage. There were the eight of us, one German couple and another Danish couple. It is so interesting to meet folks from other countries and find out where they have been sailing all these years. In addition, we flagged down 5 local fishermen to join us who were passing by. They were on their way out to sea to go fishing for the next two days but were staying a local fishing camp for the night. To be friendly, it is common to share things with the local fishermen and quite often, you are rewarded with fresh fish or lobster the following day. We gave them rum, beer and cigarettes and shared popcorn as we chatted as best we could in our broken Spanish.

We are now back in the marina for several days to provision and make a few repairs. Soon we will head east to Grenada with the next weather window.