November 11/05 -- Away from Margarita, and Back Again

November 11/05 -- We stayed in Porlamar a lot longer than the couple of nights we planned. The wind and waves stayed strong, and we waited for them to go down. We did some boat jobs, the usual varnishing, Cliff tried to fix Hello World's outboard, and Orma enjoyed the shopping. We both appreciated the WiFi available for 6000 Bolivares/day ($2.50) and became familiar with "Skype", which makes it possible for us to telephone home over the computer for almost nothing. Finally a four-day weather window opened, and it was time to go. We motorsailed in light winds and calm seas to the little offshore Venezuelan islands of Los Testigos, about a 9-hour trip, in company with Hello World and 9 or 10 other boats, and anchored off a lovely beach.

The next day we took an expedition to "town", a tiny fishing village, with David and Kate. They took photos which will probably appear in some classy calendar, and gave us tips which didn't seem to help our photography much. I guess it's not as easy as it looks.

Some friendly fishermen gave us enough yellowtail snappers for dinner. Cliff got the job of cleaning them and sharing them around with the other boats – and was heard to wonder whether it was worth the effort! We had a quiet afternoon, relaxing and swimming in the crystal clear water, and went to bed early in anticipation of the 20-hour trip to Grenada the next day. HOWEVER, the weather window slammed shut in the morning with the forecast of a possible tropical cyclone headed right for us. We had a meeting with the other boats and we decided to hightail it all the way back to Porlamar, Margarita, or even farther west and south if necessary, but by the time we reached Porlamar (in very comfortable conditions), the storm had turned northwest. The seas and winds picked up again, though, and as frustrated as we were with having to backtrack, we were glad to spend the extended waiting time in Porlamar rather than Los Testigos.