Los Roques & Los Aves
15th August 2011 - 3rd September 2011
When the carnival-hangover was out of our systems, we had a few days left to explore Grenada. Whilst Arianne and Adriaan had the opportunistic (and low-budget) idea to discover the extremely mountainous landscape of Grenada by bike in the blazing sun, Josefien, Rudi and Maarten took the lazy way out and rented a car. The country has lots to offer: waterfalls, jungle, a small but very welcoming community of Syrians, exotic fruits (e.g. breadfruit) and the world’s largest nutmeg-production.
After saying goodbye to Arianne and Josefien, the remaining crew Rudi, Adriaan and Maarten were off to Los Roques, Venezuela. With 60 hours this was our longest trip so far: 284 miles! Like on so many overnighters before we all started out very enthousiastically. But as time went by and waves got higher and higher, we all found ourselves more grumpy, green and craving for land.
Ever since we were 15 years old Rudi has lent us his boat Corsaire unsupervised, enabling us to sail in Holland, England and Denmark during the summer holidays. This is how we learned to sail yachts and it was a big learning experience back then. Crashing into shoals and other boats, brushing trees with the mast, it’s a good thing the Corsaire is a steel boat. Now the tables have finally turned and we could take Rudi sailing on our boat.
The main reason we sailed so far in one go, was to avoid any possible pirates that have been reported to operate in the Eastern and Central Venezuelan coast. But our goal, the Los Roques and Los Aves archipelagos, proved to be well worth the long trip. Since tourism has fallen dramatically in Venezuela since Chavez took office, we had most islands and bays to ourselves. The reefs are teeming with life, we saw fish larger than ourselves, loads of turtles and thousands upon thousands of birds (hence the name: Los Aves = The Birds). A pity we couldn’t stay longer, but Rudi had a plane to catch, and the Gnirrep’s had a small family reunion with Rudi’s cousins that have lived in the Antilles for years.
When the carnival-hangover was out of our systems, we had a few days left to explore Grenada. Whilst Arianne and Adriaan had the opportunistic (and low-budget) idea to discover the extremely mountainous landscape of Grenada by bike in the blazing sun, Josefien, Rudi and Maarten took the lazy way out and rented a car. The country has lots to offer: waterfalls, jungle, a small but very welcoming community of Syrians, exotic fruits (e.g. breadfruit) and the world’s largest nutmeg-production.
After saying goodbye to Arianne and Josefien, the remaining crew Rudi, Adriaan and Maarten were off to Los Roques, Venezuela. With 60 hours this was our longest trip so far: 284 miles! Like on so many overnighters before we all started out very enthousiastically. But as time went by and waves got higher and higher, we all found ourselves more grumpy, green and craving for land.
Ever since we were 15 years old Rudi has lent us his boat Corsaire unsupervised, enabling us to sail in Holland, England and Denmark during the summer holidays. This is how we learned to sail yachts and it was a big learning experience back then. Crashing into shoals and other boats, brushing trees with the mast, it’s a good thing the Corsaire is a steel boat. Now the tables have finally turned and we could take Rudi sailing on our boat.
The main reason we sailed so far in one go, was to avoid any possible pirates that have been reported to operate in the Eastern and Central Venezuelan coast. But our goal, the Los Roques and Los Aves archipelagos, proved to be well worth the long trip. Since tourism has fallen dramatically in Venezuela since Chavez took office, we had most islands and bays to ourselves. The reefs are teeming with life, we saw fish larger than ourselves, loads of turtles and thousands upon thousands of birds (hence the name: Los Aves = The Birds). A pity we couldn’t stay longer, but Rudi had a plane to catch, and the Gnirrep’s had a small family reunion with Rudi’s cousins that have lived in the Antilles for years.