When we left off last, Zen and crew were anchored on a lee shore in a nasty squall off an island named Blanquilla. We've covered about 150 miles and spent a couple days at another island since then. I never did get back to sleep that morning because we decided to get underway for the safety and comfort of crew and boat. We set course for Tortuga another small island about 90 miles from Blanquilla and 40 miles off the coast of Venezuela. We had a pretty boisterous sail from Blanquilla to Tortuga. The wind (15 - 20kts) and sea (7 - 8 ft) were in our face 3/4 of the trip. Zen handled it well and we tacked back and forth making the best time we could toward the anchorage on the North East side of Tortuga. We chose this anchorage over a few others because our ETA was 10pm and it looked easiest to enter in the dark. In the final few miles the wind died and we dropped sails and fired the engines with a very bright half moon illuminating our path. The anchorage was wide open and it would have been a very uneventful entrance had it not been for the blood sucking mosquitoes that invaded us about 1/4 mile off the island. Holy cow, I have never experienced anything like this in my life. These dirty little bandits from above were coming at us from all directions. The crew moved into immediate defense mode. We coated ourselves with Off and closed every hatch and door on Zen. Monique and I were busy doing the mosquito-slap-tango on deck while the kids, closed inside Zen, waged their own little battle with the bandits that had found their way past our initial defenses. It was dark and there were about 20 other boats in the anchorage we had to avoid while we found a spot to drop the hook. The mosquitoes were relentless. They were biting and buzzing all over us. Each time I opened my mouth to talk to Monique 2 or 3 of the blood suckers tried to fly down my throat. I'm not exaggerating!! We found a sandy spot in about 15 feet of water on the outskirts of the anchorage, dropped the hook, set it and ran for cover. Inside we found the kids barely holding their own against the flying squadron. Monique, a professional bug killer and very protective mom, snapped into action with bug spray and hand slapping. Fortunately we had a couple of cans of fantastic bug killing spray we bought back in Grenada. We nearly fumigated ourselves during the ensuing 20 minute battle but when the dust cleared there were four humans....no bugs.

One final note. Although that particular anchorage was bug infested, Tortuga redeemed itself the following day. We found a relatively uncharted cove called Laguna El Carenero on the other side of the island and spent a wonderful day and night in a very shallow 7 feet of water with only two other boats. We will return to Tortuga...bug spray on hand!