Venezuela

What is the common point between Margarita and Helgoland ? Both are taxfree zones. Hence, they are perfect for shopping but don´t have particularly beautiful buildings !

We do our check-in thanks to Juan who, for a few dollars, cares about it. In fact, we don´t have the choice, administration is so complecated!

The city looks like a huge holiday resort : plenty hotels, casinos, shopping malls... Between Grenada and Margarita -Venezuela-, there are only a hundred miles and yet, the contrast is amazing : We were in an anglo-saxon mentality, we now face a typical latin atmosphere. Order against disorganization, rap music against salsa rythm, well known english speaking against spanish that we discover.

In the streets of Porlamar, the main city of Margarita, policemen are equipped with kalachnikovs and militar clothes, houses and shops with barbed and electrified wires, guardians and vicious dogs. It seems that richness is not perfectly well distributed within the country...
Happily, people smiling, salsa songs, and street animation relaxes the atmosphere.
In the supermarket, we discover the dreamt place to replenish Cephee´s holds. We can´t believe it : Fruit and vegetable stalls without end : Banana, avocado, salads, papaya, watermelons, oranges, eggplants, ... Everything, we find everything ! After Cabo Verde, where the dryness limits the production drastically and Grenada, where the hurricane Ivan distroyed everything, we´ll make a fresh products curracy. And the prices are astonishingly low : 1 L rum for 1 euro ! For a kg of fruits, we mostly pay less than 50 cents. The Bolivar, venezuelian currency, keeps falling.

In restaurants, we get menus for less than 2 euros : A soup, a delicious main course, a fresh fruit shake and Arepas, the local "bread" which is made of maise flour and is fried in oil.

On friday the 14th january, we pick up Maryse and Alain, Thomas´ parents, at the airport. They´ll stay with us for a dozen of days. They had a good journey and they brought many good things : Ham, cheese, books, LED lights for Cephee...

We spend saturday in Porlamar and leave Margarita on sunday, to go to Tortuga island.
On the way, we catch a big wahoo (also called spanish maquerel) : 25 kg and 1m30 long !
We enjoy it during two days at each meal !
We arrive in Tortuga the day after, in the early morning and anchor behind a reef situated in the north of the island : Los Palanquinos. The water is turquoise.
Herradura is a small island a bit further in the west where we spend the following days, in company of fishermen who offer us fish : Barracuda one day, Ray the next. Our menus vary according to their fish. To thank them, we offer them cakes, chocolate, medecine.

Maryse prepares bread almost every day, she has a great recipe, Hélène learns from her.

The island is really picturesque with its fishermen huts and its colours, we don´t tire ourselves taking pictures of it. Each time the light changes, it appears more beautiful.

The diving however, doesn´t offer much, as water is a bit turbid and we finally go to the next islet : Tortugilla. There, we can see muraena and Thomas catches fish for the diner. We simply enjoy the sun and the beauty of the place.
After 10 days in these small paradises, we go back to the venezuelian coast, to Puerto la Cruz.

The Marina in Puerto la Cruz is luxuous. In fact, this is a labyrinth of canals and floating houses, surrounded by immense walls enhanced by electrified wires and kept by several guards, a ghetto for rich, a few steps away from the slams.
We have the feeling we are in retiring house as most of the sailors here are retired americans looking for the sun in winter.

The anchorages around are unsafe and nobody takes the risk anymore to avoid the marina. For this luxury we pay 6 dollars a day, which is the cheapest we ever paid for a marina.

Alain and Maryse leave us, they go for a treck in the country now.
We take the boat out of water to clean up the hull before we go to the Pacific... The Pacific ? Not really sure to go. Hélène goes back to Europe for one week to think about it, see some friends and leave the boat for a while. Thomas on his side, works hard on the boat.

During the work, we make acquaintance with Marc et Dominique, a french couple who navigates 1 month a year and is now doing some work on their catamaran before they go sailing. They are really nice and we hope to see them again later on the islands.
Hélène comes back from Europe very happy. And... the Pacific ? Yes, it´s decided, let´s go ! We fill Cephee´s holds consequently, because it will be much more expensive after Venezuela.

The Venezuelian situation is unbelievable : The country is very rich as it owns all rare raw materials in big quantities and a quite developed industry while the touristical potential is enormous. And yet, we see the misery everywhere in the streets, lots of people have nothing and the insecurity increases rapidly.

Cathy, our neighbour travels alone on her small boat : Ki-Uni. Her dougther, Gypsi, and her boyfriend Mickael came to visit her 3 weeks. We decide to leave Puerto la Cruz together. Them for a few weeks and us forever.
In Herradura, we are happy to find our fishermen again: Manuel, Franck, Bernardo and the others. Just after we arrived, they welcome us with big smiles and a lobster, as a present ! This time, we took Coca-Cola as they seem to like it : a big bottle of 3 liters. We bake fresh bread for them.
Cathy, Gypsi et Mickael exchanged a big fish against a botlle of whisky and Manuel prepared a barbecue. We share this great lunch together. Delicious !
Then we leave Cathy and the fishermen to sail to our next step : Los Roques, a protected venezuelian archipelago.

It is superb, as beautiful as a postcard.
Under the water, the seeings are great. We see a tortle, a lobster, a ray, and plenty of coloured fish. As fishing is forbidden here, we see more than we ever saw.

Our next stop is in the Aves, the "bird" island, a few miles away from Los Roques. The island is so named because of the thousands of birds who live here : Bobbys, Herons,...

Colours and lights are as marvellous as in Los Roques, it´s a real pleasure for the eyes.

Our anchorage neighbours, Bob and Sandy, are american and sail on a beautiful blue boat : Sapphire. We spend a really good time with them since they are very nice and helpful to us. We learn that we missed Marc et Dominique as Sapphire saw them leave the anchorage a few hours earlier to Los Roques. It´s too bad...

Our travel continues towards Curaçao, with an overnight navigation. Curacao is a technical stop as we just wait for a good weather window to cross the Carebbean gulf and reach the Sam Blas archipelago and then Panama.

We´ll update the site when we´ll be in the Marquises island after our longest cross : From Galapagos to the Marquises : about thirty days non-stop navigation.

See you in the Pacific !

A local recipe (finally a dessert !)

The Quesillo :

1 ¾ cup of water, ¾ cup of sugar, 6 eggs, a little bit of rum, 10 spoons powder milk, 1 tea spoon vanilla, 1 spoon butter

For the caramel : 1 ½ cup of sugar, ½ cup of water

First prepare the caramel and put in on the sides of a baking dish. You can also use individual dishes. Mix all ingredients together except the eggs and beat. Then add the eggs one after the other, beating between each egg.
Pour into the dish and bake in a water-bath for 45 minutes to an hour, in medium oven. Check the Quesillo is ready with the tip of a knife : It should remain dry when you plant it in the quesillo.
Serve cold.

The quesillo is like a custard which we found in all venezuelian restaurants.

Another recipe, just for pleasure, dedicated to Hélène´s sister and her boyfriend as it seems that the future father likes the :

Negro en camisa :

(and of course for all those who like chocolate !)

Biscuit : 300 g powder chocolate, 300 g butter, 300 g sugar, 6 eggs,
¾ wheat flour, ¼ baking soda, milk / water

" Crème anglaise " : 1 liter milk, 6 yolks, 1 vanilla cod, sugar (according to taste)

For the biscuit :
In a big saucepan, heat ½ cup of milk in a water-bath. Add the chocolate and the melted butter. Beat continuously. Add sugar while beating and remove the saucepan from fire.
Add the yolks and beat energetically.
Add wheat flour and baking soda. Mix.
Beat the egg whites and add them very carefully to the mixture.

Pour in a baking dish and put in medium oven until the tip of a knife remains dry.

For the " crème anglaise " :
Boil milk, sugar and vanilla cod in a saucepan, then reduce fire. Apart, beat the yolks energetically. Add them to the milk and keep stirring until it becomes slightly thicker (it takes a few minutes but be carefull not to overheat the mixture, you have to stirr continuously and to remove from fire as soon as it gets a bit thick). Remove from fire and let stand 15 minutes.

Remove the biscuit from the baking dish and pour the "crème anglaise" on the biscuit. Let the biscuit absorb the cream.
Serve hot or cold.

Well, we didn´t find this pastry in any venezuelian restaurant but it seems to be a local speciality. In all the cases, Venezuela produces very good chocolate.
The recipe is translated from spanish into french and then into english, so we hope we didn´t make too many mistakes !

Good appetite !