Do you want to finish my porridge?  No thanks.  Can you throw it over while I head to the loo.  The first day back at sea after just over 4 months and the body is still acclimatizing.  In Puerto La Cruz, Venezuela, we left the CMO Marina Saturday with a blast on the whistle, and a big wave from Manuel, the dock master.  Manuel was particularly cheerful since we have been  emptying Harmonica's lockers and had just given him a set of zincs which don't fit our new propeller.  The afternoon breeze was picking up as we headed to the fuel dock where 400 litres of diesel and 50 of petrol cost us about $10 (and I suspect that $3 of that went into the pockets of the attendants).  A commercial boat was waiting to fill up so we slipped away, and were still tying things down, pulling in fenders, and trying to remember where everything was as we headed round the end of the groin.

With a double-reefed mainsail and 1/3 of our headsail, at 3.00 pm we set off at 6 or 7 knots dodging around the moored liquid-natural-gas tankers as we headed for Isla La Borracha (Island of the Drunken Woman).  The cruising guide encouraged us by saying that there were vampire bats there and if we were bitten, we should head to hospital immediately for rabies injections.  We found the one bay round on the far side - yes, I know that the headsail is out, there is a reef in front, and 30 knot gusts coming off the cliffs behind, but the top swivel is caught in the spinnaker halyard.  Well we know that we can sort that out, so we head up, release the sail, and furl it in again.  The water depth dropped to 3 metres and we decide to anchor off the deeper beach.  Then our new wind generator blew a 30 amp fuse so it was obviously time for supper and bed!

Sunday all was quiet, and we headed NW for Isla Tortuga in a moderate NE trade wind.  Harmonica's crew was dozing in the cockpit.  2 or 3 schools of dolphins herded shoals of fish while sea birds circle overhead.  Isla Tortuga is 14 miles long and has nothing much over 10 ft above sea level.  Last night we anchored over corral sand in the lee of a cay on the north shore.  The water is 25 C and clear as can be.  We shall meet friends from Calgary in the Venezuelan National Park of Islas Los Roques on Wednesday, and all should be peace and organization by that time.

We just picked up some e-mail to say that our son Mark, traveling through Thailand, bumped into some Calgary friends of ours who left by sailing boat in 2000.  What a small world!

Dave reached Venezuela on 21st February, and planned to spend a week installing the new water-maker before Jan arrived.  (For those unfamiliar with these devices, it is a reverse osmosis filter, which pumps sea water though a semi-permeable membrane at 900 psi to produce drinking water).  The 40 pound pump was in Dave's suitcase, and arrived without incident, but the 3 ft long filter was in a wooden box, which got stopped by customs and did not return until after a trip back to Caracas and a day spent getting to know many junior officials in the Maiquetia customs.  Dave planned to take the 5 hour bus trip in order to see some of the country, but the television spent the day broadcasting live film of riots in Caracas close to the bus terminal, so he took the aeroplane instead.  Most people were conspicuously helpful, including the secretary who shared her home-made cake, and the hotel manager who spent over an hour driving back to the airport to plead the case, but the best advice came from the marina manager, who suggested that going in person to the manager's office - dumb gringo - to plead the case in best Spanglish until they get bored or exasperated enough to let the box in.  It was opened twice before it was released, and at least one time the word "bazuka" was heard when the 3 ft long 3 inch diameter metal tube was sighted.

It took two weeks to get the water maker installed, and a third was spent sight-seeing in the Venezuelan Andes.  We took a 19 hour bus ride together to the city of Merida beneath Mt. Bolivar, the highest mountain in Venezuela at just over 5,000 metres.  Simon Bolivar is so revered that no town is called a pueblo without a "Plaza Bolivar" in front of a church, otherwise it is a mere village or collection of houses.  We were met in Merida by our hostess for the week and driven to her house in the middle of town, which she shares with her daughter, and mother.  Merida is described as a city within a university.  It is a young, cheerful, and cheap place to stay.  We did lots of walking in the mountains, ranching, and fruit-growing hillsides.  The haciendas with their white walls and orange tile roofs look beautiful on the steep hillsides.  Merida is more relaxed & less security-conscious than Caracas or Puerto La Cruz.  On our last night there we heard the Merida Symphonietta play Beethoven, Hayden, and Mozart in a lovely, informal, but excellent concert.  We climbed by cable-car and foot to 4500 metres, below a tiny glacier, then back down to the small village of Los Nevados clinging to the mountain side at 2700 metres.  We were fed beef & trout, and slept in a bed with a stone headboard.  The next morning we rented horses and rode down about 1000 ft to the river and back up the other side to an old hacienda where 3 generations live together in a very basic agricultural life.  Electric lights were brought in 3 years ago but it is a 1 hour walk down and up to the nearest dirt road.  In the afternoon, we were driven back in a jeep along that rough, winding little road to Merida.  At some of the wash-outs you could look 1000 feet straight down to the river.
 

Best wishes from
Harmonica, Jan, & Dave

position reports should be available again on our web page:  www.techco.ab.ca/harmonica
email address:   or    Use these addresses at all times.  They follow us on land & sea.