Note May 28, 2013: Crime has become too bad in VZ. We would not go there today.
August 19, 2007 Sunday
Golfo de Cuare near Chichiriviche, Venezuela
10.54.723N; 068.18.432W Traveled about 95 NM from
Bonaire Avg 8 kts.
When we checked the location
of Hurricane Dean on Friday morning at 1:00 a.m., there had not been enough
movement for us to make a decision whether to remain in Bonaire
or head south. We decided to check again
when NOAA made their 5:00 a.m. report.
For the previous two 18-hour reports, the storm had moved .9 degrees
north and .6 degrees. During the current
18-hour period the storm had moved only .3 degrees north. So, we set our decision criteria to be that
if the storm had moved at least another .6 degrees north by 5:00 a.m. then we
would stay in Bonaire. Anything less than another .6 degrees north,
then we would head south to Venezuela. This meant that the storm must be at least at
latitude 14.5N by 5:00 a.m.
It wasn’t! The storm had only moved to 14.3N by 5:00
a.m. Friday. Even though neither of us
thought it was necessary, we decided that it would be prudent to move southward
so that we would be within the insurance zone for storm coverage. If we had stayed in Bonaire then we would
have had to motor back and forth behind the little island of Klein Bonaire when
the winds shifted to the west or south or if swells came in from the west, all
of which were definite predictions starting Friday night and lasting though the
weekend. If another boat had collided
with us then our insurance would not be in effect. The other option was to go to Curacao and anchor in Spanish Waters, where there are at
least 50 boats already anchored. If a
boat dragged anchor and ran into us then we would not have been covered by our
insurance because we were not far enough south.
So a trip to Venezuela was
in order.
We left Bonaire
at 5:20 a.m. Friday and arrived near Chichiriviche about 4:30 p.m.. We had to motor almost the entire trip as the
winds did indeed shift to be from the south (directly on our nose). This was the wind shift that we had feared
would affect Bonaire. Sure enough, according to our weather service
emails, Bonaire sustained a couple of wind
reversals between Friday night and Sunday morning. Glad we weren’t there! It wouldn’t have been that big of a
deal. We know what we can handle, but we
always worry what the “other guy” might do wrong to cause an accident.
We are glad we came down to Venezuela. If we had not made this storm avoidance trip
then we would have missed out on seeing a wonderful area of Venezuela
around Chichiriviche. As we entered the main channel from the sea
into Chichiriviche this morning a flock of scarlet ibis flew across our bow
about a boat length in front of us.
These were the most scarlet ibis that we have seen at one time. A scarlet ibis looks like a pink flamingo
except smaller and bright red; legs seem a bit shorter proportionate to the
total body size as compared to a flamingo.
There are high, dramatic
cliffs along the southern shore of the Golfo de Cuare. Mangroves cover the western and northern
shores. We maneuvered through the
mangroves on the eastern side of the Golfo in order to get inside here. At one point the water depth beneath our keel
was only 1.8 feet!!!! But it was an
adventurous little trip for us. Our
navigation charts stopped about 1/3 of the way inside here, but our sailing
guide had a good detailed sketch-chart and we followed it easily through the
mangroves. Bill stood on the deck and I
drove the boat while constantly glancing at the depth gauge. It was really pretty easy and our first
attempt at gunkholing.
We are the only boat inside
the Golfo; there were 3 or 4 other sailboats that anchored out just behind the
point bordering the sea. They didn’t
attempt to wind their way through the mangroves to get into the Golfo de
Cuare. We are very glad that we did not
anchor out there with the other boats. Apparently
very few boat come inside the Golfo because we are quite a curiosity to the
locals. Several boats have come by to
take photos of S/V BeBe at anchor in here.
Guess they don’t see a 53-foot sailboat in here very often. We are breaking the cardinal rule about never
anchoring alone in an isolated spot anywhere near South
America. But we feel
totally safe here. We are setting our
boat security alarm each night and locking down the hatches except for the one
hatch in the cabin where we are sleeping.
If someone does board the boat the alarm would sound and we could lock
that hatch before anyone could reach it.
Just because we feel safe doesn’t mean that we aren’t being security
conscious.
It is truly gorgeous in
here. We anchored in 16 feet of water fairly
far away from the cliffs --- for 2 reasons: 1) to avoid as many insects as
possible and 2) to catch as much wind as possible. Bill put our two mosquito covers over the
forward hatch and the saloon hatch, and we zipped up the shade screens around
the cockpit. This is not “bug-proof” but
it drastically reduces the number of flies and mosquitoes who can find their
way inside the cockpit or down below deck.
We want to purchase two more of these “noseum” mosquito nets for the
remaining two hatches and have screens made for our four side ports. We also want to buy many yards of nylon
netting o bridal veil netting to stuff into the spaces where the cockpit shade
panels don’t completely zip shut. Those
things would really reduce the number of bothersome insects to get inside the
boat or cockpit.
This morning we put the
dinghy in the water and motored over to the Indian site in the cliffs on the
southern shore. There are some rock
carvings inside a cave that was used as a burial ground by the Caquetios
Indians who lived here around 3400 B.C.
The local people have built a small jetty there where the local tour
boats tie off and unload their passengers to walk around inside the cave
area. The cliffs above the cave area are
the most dramatic cliffs all along the southern shore line. We wanted to go see this cave before the
local tours started for the day and thought that Sunday morning would be the
best time to avoid being in anyone’s way.
There was only one tour boat there while we visited. Another man and little boy arrived in a hand
made dugout canoe just as we were leaving.
There are quite a few rock carvings in this burial ground area. If you walk back you find yourself in a
crater with sheer cliff sides about 200 feet high. Quite a sight!
A bit east of the Indian cave
site is a grotto of some sort. It is
full of little statues so it appears to have some sort of religious
significance to modern day locals, but we have no idea what. There is a fresh water spring that comes out
of the rocks behind a large single mangrove tree well up inside this little
grotto area. Every nook and cranny of
the rocks in this grotto are filled with statues, photos, candles and all sorts
of things. Apparently in memory of
departed loved ones would be our guess, but who knows. At any rate, it is a different kind of place
and we are glad we were fortunate to see it.
This large body of water with
the high cliffs and mangroves all around it does evoke feelings of long
ago. We can see in our minds-eyes what
life must have been like for the native Indians who lived here more than 6000
years ago. I am reading a series of
anthropological novels about Native North Americans covering 13000 BC through
1200 AD. Wish I could find a similar
series of books about South and Central Americans because I find this history
interesting and would like to know more about the Caquetios Indians as well as
others who inhabited South and Central America.
Off topic note: last week when the kids were visiting I
bought a couple of one-liter cartons of what I thought was chocolate milk. It was labeled in Dutch; I could tell it was chocolate
and it was in the milk section of the supermarket. (BTW, I think the United States may be the only
country left where milk is still sold in refrigerated bottles; everywhere else
milk is sold in UHT long-life cartons which are not refrigerated until ready to
use.) That night I asked the kids if they
wanted a glass of chocolate milk; answer, of course, yes. I cut the corner of the carton and started to
pour a glass.
GLUNK---GLUNK----GLUNK! This was
the thickest chocolate milk that I had ever seen. Turns out it was a carton of chocolate
pudding ---- called Chocolade Vla on the carton label. BeBe still wanted chocolate milk but she had
to do without and settle for Vla instead.
I hope to go back to that supermarket and buy some more Vla before we
clear out of Bonaire this week. Also want to try the Banana Vla and the
Strawberry Vla. BTW, we also found
long-life yoghurt. It requires no
refrigeration until ready to serve and the expiration date is sometime in
December. It has a bit of a powdery or
grainy texture but would be great for while we are in the San Blas Islands and
can’t buy anything for a few months.
August 20, 2007 Monday
Cayo Sombrero, Morrocoy National Park, Venezuela
10.52.863N; 068.12.734W Traveled 24 NM
Today was the day to finally
move out of the Golfo de Cuare (or Golfo de Cuaro, depending on which chart you
look at). We very much enjoyed being
anchored all alone with views of the dramatic cliffs. The local people were very friendly; many
came by in their lanceros to take photos of our boat or simply to wave and say
bueno dia.
On Saturday Bill had dug out
our high-pressure salt water pump. We
normally use our fresh water hose to wash down the boat as needed. And we already have a salt water wash down on
the anchor, but it doesn’t always line up exactly with the anchor chain as the
chain pulls up over the bow roller.
Since we were anchored in basically a huge sea water lake surrounded by
mangrove swamps, we knew that the bottom was mud instead of sand and that our
anchor chain would be particularly nasty when pulled up. Bill set up the high-pressure salt water pump
to siphon up from the sea water level, through the pump and then through a hose
to wash down the chain as it was raised.
He tested it and it worked great.
So he decided to lower all our anchor chain and wash it thoroughly as it
was raised. Well, duh! He kind of forgot that he would be lowering
all the chain into yucky mud! Good thing
the pump arrangement worked so well because that chain came up with large
chunks of mud all over it. Bill washed
it well and lowered the excess chain back into the anchor locker. Now we were set for when we were ready to
raise the anchor and move on. No muddy
chain going into our chain locker!
First thing this morning we
again set up the high-pressure salt water pump and the hoses and started
raising the anchor chain. Murphy’s Law
struck at once. No matter what we did,
the pump would not bring up the salt water more than a trickle. And man, was that chain muddy! So, what to do? Luckily, Bill had saved a small section of
hose with an end-fitting that fit our stationary salt water anchor wash down
mounted near the bow rollers. He
switched out the normal fitting with this small section hose fitting and
attached a water hose. Now we were in
business again. Had very strong water
pressure to wash the chain as it was raised.
It took probably 30 minutes to raise and clean 48 meters of anchor
chain. Once the anchor was off the
bottom I went back to the helm and started slowly driving out of the
Golfo. This time it was easy because I
could simply follow the track we painted on our electronic chart when we
entered.
While doing all this messing
around with the anchor chain we discovered that the windlass would only operate
sporadically to lower the anchor chain.
It raised perfectly, but it only lowered every once and awhile. Bill looked at it later in the day after we
were anchored for the night. His
synopsis of the situation is written below my blog for the day.
After we re-traced our path
out of the Golfo we went back down to Morrocoy National Park. Unfortunately, neither of our electronic
charts are correct for this park area.
And our sailing guide did not appear to be correct either. And to top it all off, all the channel buoys
and navigational markers were missing.
There was nothing to guide you through this huge maze of snaking water
ways and reefs except the color of the water, and the water was murky (except
where it was so shallow that the reef was almost exposed). And there were at least a hundred of fast
moving power boats zooming in every direction.
Talk about stressed out!!!!!!
Our only purposed in going to
Morrocoy was to try to buy diesel. We
are down to half a tank and have already used our spare jerry cans. Our sailing guide stated that in 2001 a certain
small marina planned to start selling diesel.
So we thought we would give it a try.
The guy who owns the fuel dock supposedly speaks good English and
monitors the VHF radio. We tried raising
him on the radio several times with no answer.
We decided that we didn’t need all this stress just to buy cheap diesel,
so we turned around and got the hell out of that place! We would NOT recommend any keeled boat going
to Morrocoy. It is fine for power boats,
but sailboats need to avoid that place.
However, all that said, it is a beautiful place.
We motored back out of the
park and headed north between Cayo Sombrero and Cayo Pescadores. We planned to anchor behind Cayo Sombrero for
the night but we wanted to paint a track of the way out because we plan to leave
sometime during the wee hours of darkness to head back to Bonaire. It would be nice if we could simply sail
straight to Curacao, but we did not check out of Bonaire when we headed to Venezuela very
early last Friday morning. This lack of
clearance is not a problem for us here near Chichiriviche and Morrocoy because
there is no place here to clear into Venezuela. The nearest place for VZ clearance is Puerto Cabello, about 45
miles east of here. There are no customs
or immigration officials in this area to check on us; and the local Port
Captain does not want anything to do with private yachts. He says not to bother him. So we were go back to Bonaire tomorrow and Bonaire officials will never know we left. We hope to do a bit of shopping for specific
items and then clear out and head to Curacao
on the first good weather prediction.
And, now is Bill’s story
about the ailing anchor windlass:
Reason number 200 as to why I would buy only an Amel
The windlass had a problem
today. It would raise the anchor but not
lower it from either the helm switch or the button on the windlass. A quick check reflected that the Lofrans
control box was the culprit. This could
happen on any boat. The control box
would be mounted on a bulkhead somewhere that you would have to stand on your
head and hold your tongue just so to be able to even see it. Either that or it would be in a similar
place, but hanging free and swinging with the boat.
Let me try to explain what
Amel does with the Lofrans windlass control box. The most forward port side storage
compartment has a beautifully finished door that when opened exposes several
circuit breakers on the forward side of the compartment. By the way, the compartment is lined with
100% natural wool woven in a 1/8” pile.
All of the storage compartments on an Amel are lined completely with
this wool (top, bottom and sides). It
naturally absorbs moisture and, of course, it keeps things from rattling
(sailboats move). There is a
thumb-screw nut located just under the breakers inside the door. When the thumb-screw nut is loosened and
removed, a piece of wood that the breakers are mounted on loosens up…it does
not fall, just gets loose. If you
observe the other side of that forward cabinet wall, you will see a finished
piece of mahogany that the breakers are mounted on…also mounted on the reverse
side are several relays and the Lofrans control box.
Remember, I said that after
removing the thumb-screw nut the board became loose…it did not fall. It did not fall because it is held in place
by Velcro. Pulling the board from the
Velcro reveals a finished mahogany board with relays and the Lofrans control
box on one side…the other side is upholstered in 100% wool and has a piece of
Velcro. Now that the board is free of
the Velcro, you can pull it out of the tight quarters in to an open area
because all of the wires are long enough to allow that. Oh, by the way the wires are all labeled,
they are bundled and strapped…AND there is a small piece of bungee cord to pull
the slack out as you replace the board.
NOW, after all of this “hard”
work, the Lofrans control box can be replaced.
There are hundreds of reasons
just like this one that explain why I would only buy an Amel.
August 21, 2007 Tuesday
Kralendijk, Bonaire
12.09.114N, 068.16.725W Traveled 77.2NM Average speed 7.72 kts
The alarm clock failed to
sound this morning so we left Cayo Sombrero a little later than hoped. Anchor was up and we were on our way by 6:30
a.m., and we arrived Bonaire and were tied to
a mooring at 4:30 p.m. It was a very
easy passage. Bill was sick this morning
and spent hours laying in the cockpit.
Good thing I can handle the boat by myself --- especially since we were
motoring for the first half of the trip because there was zero wind. Bill began to feel better around
mid-day. The wind finally picked up to
15 knots and we sailed the last 35 miles.
A very easy trip.
We are glad that we made this
little side trip to Chichiriviche area of Venezuela. It is lovely.
It is very difficult to know what to write about Venezuela because the political and crime conditions have deteriorated considerably since we visited there. We thoroughly enjoyed our times in Venezuela and never felt threatened in any way. Common sense is required for anyone traveling in this country. There also is always the possibility simply of being in the wrong place at the wrong time, and that can happen in any country.
Our favorite taxi driver took us to La Cava, a meat market where we were assigned our personal butcher. It is a Venzuelan custom for women to have their own favorite butcher and meat shopping becomes a social activity. The woman sits on a barstool at a high counter and the butcher stands in front of her and cuts the meats to her specifications.
I enjoyed doing this twice during our stay in Puerto la Cruz. I sat on a barstool and told the butcher what cut of meat I wanted. He would go into the meat locker and bring out an "entero" cut of beef; this means a large section of whatever particular part of the cow that I requested. He would weigh this entero cut of meat and enter my customer code. 
Then he placed the meat on the counter in front of me and proceeded to cut according to my requests. For example, from one entero piece he cut a prime rib roast and numerous steaks, some with bones and some boneless according to my request. I had ground beef made from end sections and had him add back some of the fat because the meat was trimmed so lean. All of this for $1.58 USD per pound!!!!
From Puerto la Cruz we sailed to the outer islands of Venezuela. One that sticks in my mind as exceptionally beautiful was Cayo Herradura. It is a good distance from the mainland so robbery is not a problem out there. We also visited Los Roques. I expected to love Los Roques but was disappointed. I just don't like sailing around all that uncharted reef. Then we stopped at Aves de Barlovento and saw thousands upon thousands of red-footed boobies and other birds. That was quite an experience. Also stopped at Aves Sotovento and that was also a unique place. Then on to Dutch island of Bonaire.
On one leg of this passage we had pole foresails poled out, one to each side, and were making a very fast passage. This is when we learned that we have a "excessive speed" alarm on our Furuno GPS-80. I was down in the galley preparing dinner when an alarm started sounding. I could not figure out what it was. Then it stopped. This happened 3 times before I found the cause. The GPS screen was flashing "excessive speed alarm" because we were exceeding 11.5 knots. That is the fastest we have ever sailed in this boat. We felt totally in control of the boat at that speed in those conditions, but we reduced sail anyway. Really should not be sailing this boat that fast.
