TIMESPINNER'S TRAVELS CHAPTER 12

30 November 2008

Note: click on photos to enlarge.

The chart in Fig. 1 shows our travels for this chapter.


Al cabo de una semana muy civilizada, el viaje ha de continuar. En la parte francesa de mi relato encontraréis el listado de la ruta y las distancias que hemos recorrido para llegar a Cartagena desde Bonaire. Se puede apreciar el recorrido en el mapa de la foto 1.

We have been working our way westwards, stopping for the night wherever possible, which makes a much more amusing trip than our last voyage in the first TIMESPINNER. That time we did it in four fast days of hard sailing, with just a stop in Curaçao because it was New Year's Eve and Daniel and Nicolette had presented us with a bottle of champagne. We had to buy some ice and celebrate. This time we are not itching to get to the Canal and are taking it easy.

Most of the legs, however, are of potentially 10-12 hours' duration, although given wind they may take less time. This means that we usually had to leave before dawn in order to be sure of arriving at our next anchorage before nightfall.

For the passage from Aves to Bonaire the wind was light, but we dared to hoist our spinnaker, which we were a little nervous to do, remembering a few hair-raising experiences in the old TIMESPINNER. This one is not a true spinnaker, being more like a huge genoa of spinnaker cloth, and much easier to handle. It went up easily and came down again with no difficulty and bowled us along at a good clip with dolphins playing at our bows. (Figs. 15 and 16). We have used it with more confidence since.

Bonaire is the most environmentally-conscious place we have seen. They live off tourism, and their main attraction is the cleanest, clearest, most crystalline water in the whole Caribbean. The underwater scenery is absolutely spectacular and they intend to keep it so. You can't anchor anywhere. There are about 100 moorings provided in the harbour of Kralendijk and you must use them. (Fig. 2).

Bonaire, la bien llamada. Debe su nombre a los vientos alisios que la mantienen seca y por lo tanto libre de los mosquitos portadores de malaria. Destaca tan bien por sus aguas cristalinas y su buena gestión de residuos. Al visitante, se le aconseja traer sus pilas usadas y plásticos de vuela a su país. Los fondos marinos se limpian anualmente y la prensa publica la "cosecha". Lo habéis adivinado: estamos en una isla ecológica. Todo empezó hace ya 40 años y gozan de unos fondos marinos absolutamente extraordinarios por su riqueza, su buena salud y su limpieza. De hecho, estos fondos son la principal fuente de ingresos de Bonaire atrayendo buceadores del mundo entero. Hay una gran variedad de zonas para explorar y de todos los niveles de dificultad.

La isla pertenece a la Corona Holandesa y atrae turismo nacional y de cruceros. El idioma oficial es el holandes pero el español y el papiamento son los mas hablados. El papiamento era la "lingua franca" desarrollada por los esclavos para entenderse entre si. Tiene su origen en varios idiomas africanos mezclados de palabras indias, españolas, holandesas y inglesas. Debe ser el idioma mas tutti frutti del planeta.

Bonaire se ha impuesto el reto de ser la primera isla realmente ecológica del Caribe y desea abrir camino para otros. Utilizan las energías eolica y solar y piensan alcanzar una autonomía energética total dentro de pocos años. No permiten edificios de mas de 4 plantas. Alquilan bicicletas y coches eléctricos para recorrer la isla (sin embargo ellos siguen conduciendo enormes 4X4s en una isla de solo 112 millas cuadradas.) La flora (cactos) y la fauna (burros, cabras, lagartos y flamencos rosas) están protegidos.La única industria es la sal que llevan recogiendo des de siglos. Queda mucho por hacer pero no parece imposible alcanzar la meta y ya Bonaire destaca del resto del Caribe en este respeto.(Fotos de 2 a 9)

The place is quaint, with multicoloured buildings (sometimes extremely coloured, Fig. 5) in a Dutch style (Figs. 3, 4 and 5).

Al llegar en barco en cualquier país hay que enseñar una bandera amarilla para anunciar su intención de ponerse en regla con la Policía de Fronteras y a continuación empieza un recorrido por varias administraciones que puede tardar hasta un día entero. Cada país tiene su forma de hacer las cosas y la administración parece ser una forma predilecta para distinguirse del vecino. O sea que, con zarpe de Kralendijk a Cartagena, decidimos agilizar el asunto y no "entrar" en ningún sitio , sino fondear por las noches y salir de madrugada sin bajar a tierra.


The dominant impression is of Cleanliness. After the untidy, disorganised mess of most of the places we've visited, this comes as something of a shock. There is no litter to be seen and you could eat off the pavement. It is the same underwater. It is a busy harbour and you would expect some mess on the bottom, but there is none at all. Once a year they actually tidy it up.

Little restaurants and tourist shops abound and you understand why when you turn a corner on the street and see an absolutely enormous apartment block in front of you. Then you realise that it's a cruise liner docked right in the middle of town. (Fig. 6) They get one almost every day during the busy season and the little town becomes a crowd scene, full of fat pink people.

Some friendly yacht people who had a big powerful dinghy offered us a lift over to Klein Bonaire, the low island that shelters the harbour, to go snorkelling.

I couldn't go, having some work to do on the engine and then to mount a new galley stove we had bought from a yacht in Trinidad.
This was the first opportunity we'd had to mount it and for a big job, with the whole boat torn apart, it was better to have Marie away.

She came back ecstatic. By far the best underwater scenery she had ever seen, she said. I was sorry to have missed it.

We hired a scooter one day to tour the island. The scenery is, for the most part, dry and unremarkable. There is a big sea salt operation at the south end of the island and this really is a sight, with enormous piles of salt like whitewashed pyramids and a lake of pink water. I don't know why concentrated brine should be pink, but it is. (Fig. 7). We stopped for lunch at a little restaurant and met a mini-dinosaur (Fig. 8). I asked the waitress whether he hung around because they fed him but she said no, there were lots of iguanas about.

We were amused at the local way of keeping the neighbours at bay. (Fig. 9) See how the young plants have been woven. They grow at least ten feet high and once they get big the hedge will become absolutely impenetrable.

From Bonaire to Klein Curaçao is a pleasantly short hop of twenty five miles so we had the luxury of a leisurely start. There is not much there. People come over in tourist boats for the beach, which is long and beautiful (Fig. 10)En Curaçao paramos en la maravillosa Klein Curaçao (F.10 y 11) y en la bahía de Sta. Cruz.


Curaçao is a separate country from Bonaire (although both are semi-independent remnants of the Dutch colonial empire). Theoretically we should have cleared customs but it was just for the night and we did not intend to go ashore. The authorities do keep tabs, however; we were visited by a coastguard helicopter which flew low past us and then seeing Marie trying to take his picture, returned for a close pass, grinning and returning our waves. (Fig. 11).

A long day's sail, starting at first light, brought us to a bay in the north of Curaçao. Again, just a rest stop to avoid an overnight passage to Aruba. We thought of stopping to see the island properly, but yachts are no longer welcome to sail into the middle of Willemstad as we once done. We would have had to anchor in the south and taken a bus to Willemstad. Too complicated. We were visited by the helicopter just as we were entering our anchorage. We waved and they flew away.

Curaçao to Aruba, at 55 nautical miles,is a long sail to do in one day. Easy in a good breeze, ten hours or so, but the wind was very light. We tried the spinnaker but still could do no better than three knots so we started the engine and motored most of the way.

Looking at Fig. 12, the anchorage seems pretty enough. This was the view to starboard. The view to port was something else (Fig. 13).

En Aruba tuvimos que atravesar la refinería de petróleo y fondear al este de la bahía de San Nicolas, de forma a estar a barlovento de los gases, humos y otros malos olores.(F.12 y 13)

Still, the water was clean and delightful for swimming and we were upwind of the refinery so the trade wind blew the evil-smelling fumes away from us. The highlight of our stay was this living jewel who visited us. (Fig. 14)


Los Monjes are a tiny group of barren rocks sticking out of the sea (Fig. 17) some 55 nautical miles further to the west. They belong to Venezuela and the southernmost two are manned by the Venezuelan navy. Marie theorizes that this is to give warning of an American invasion but I think it's to maintain possession of a chunk of Caribbean that might have oil underneath. They have joined the two islands by a high wall of rock, creating a harbour. (Fig. 18) You moor to a fat rope that also joins the islands. This works well since the wind direction hardly ever varies.

The wind had been light leaving Curaçao before dawn but piped up as the morning progressed, necessitating a reef in the mainsail. Sailing very fast, we arrived in good time.

According to the information we had, it was not necessary to check in, except by radio, which we did, only to be told that the officials wanted to board us and would we tie up to the big ship dock. We were by this time comfortably moored to the rope and were reluctant to manoeuvre in that wind. They had no reason to board us other than boredom and curiosity, but they would not take no for an answer. We didn't have to make their lives too easy, however. If they wanted to board us, they could come by dinghy. We lowered our dinghy and I rowed over to the dock, which was very high and a difficult scramble over huge tire fenders to climb down.

In deciding to embark the officials by dinghy, I hadn't counted on the size of one of them, who must have weighed well over 300 lbs. He sort of poured himself over the dock fender and landed plop in the dinghy, very nearly sinking us. Clearly impossible to take a second passenger, I would have to make a second trip.

With so much weight in the stern, it was hard rowing for me in the strong wind and to see this blob climbing our swim ladder out of the dinghy was a sight to behold. His companion was slim, wiry and athletic and getting him aboard was easy.

Then followed an interminable filling out of forms. They wanted to see our safety equipment: signal flares, first aid kit, lifebuoy, VHF radio, lifejackets, etc. Finally they finished and we offered them a cold beer, which they accepted. The fat one slurped his immediately, while the other pocketed his.

I took the thin one ashore first but by this time the wind had increased (for some reason this doesn't show in the picture). He laid his clipboard with the laborious forms on the seat beside him and as he stood up the wind whipped it away!

It was going to be very hard work to ferry the fat one. I did it by pulling myself along the mooring rope (Fig. 19)


En los Monjes Del Sur (pertenece a Venezuela) nos enganchamos a un cable y no pudimos esquivar los guarda costas que quisieron subir a bordo para rellenar hojas y hojas de papeleo que luego se llevo el viento! (F.17,18,19)

Slow, but without the danger of a gust blowing us out to sea. Meanwhile, the thin one was sitting on the dock, enjoying his beer.

As we parted, I complimented the thin one on his sense of priorities. "What do you mean?"

"Well, you managed to get ashore, guarding your beer safely, while the papers, which were worth nothing, flew away!"

It was a noisy, uncomfortable, unbeautiful anchorage and we were glad to depart in the dark next morning.

At 60 nautical miles, the leg to Bahía Honda, our next stop, (Colombia at last) was our longest day's sail, but we had plenty of wind and arrived just before dark. At one point we were hit by a vicious squall with high wind and torrential rain. Although the sail was well reefed, the automatic steering was overpowered and I had to take the wheel in a hurry with no time to dress for the occasion and certainly not expecting photographers! (Fig. 20)

Los vientos fueron muy variables. Con poco viento se puede usar el spinnaker y disfrutar de los delfines y en la tormenta hay que estar al timón. (F.15,16 y 20)




Arriving, our chart showed very little detail of this bay and the water was opaque for some reason. We crept in very slowly, blessing our new depth sounder, to anchor just behind a rocky point, sheltered somewhat from the prevailing swell. We would have liked to tuck in a bit further but the bottom shoaled alarmingly, so we dropped anchor hurriedly in ten feet of water. Next morning we went out in the dinghy and took some soundings. It turned out to be shallow just ahead of us and also to the side.

The morning offered a wonderful vista of sea and sky, like the first morning of the world, as Marie exclaimed as soon as she went on deck. The bay is miles across and the land is low-lying, so that you can barely see the other side. (Fig. 21)

Later two fisherman passed by (Fig. 22)


En Bahía Honda los indios trajeron langostas y pardos ya preparados para la sartén.(F.21 y 22)

and gave us six small lobsters and two good-sized red snappers. We gave them Sarah's broken fishing rod and a bottle of Barbados hot sauce. We had the fish for dinner and the lobsters cold for lunch at sea the next day.

We are always intrigued by the differences in boat styles in our travels. Unlike the high-prowed boats we have seen, these are lower in the prow, partly decked and with a breakwater built up. Modern outboard motors have not penetrated here. All the boats we saw had the same model of one-cylinder inboard engine, at least fifty years old. There is no clutch or gearbox; to stop they must stop the engine. I remember such engines from my childhood. Put-put-put.
The boat in the picture is a nice one. Some of the boats were in an incredibly dilapidated condition. They looked as if they would not stand up to any sea, and yet they fish miles out. Indeed, they are lost from time to time. We heard on the VHF radio that the coastguard was searching for one that had disappeared, perhaps in the same squall that had hit us, while a fisherman in our next harbour told the tale of another boat that had broken up with one man lost.

Cabo de la Vela was an easy 30 mile morning sail. The stop was unremarkable except that we were visited by an incredibly filthy boat manned by two men and a boy, the crew as filthy and primitive as their boat. They were friendly enough, just wanting to see what they could beg from us. We gave them a present and they promised us a fish but never delivered.

En el Cabo de la Vela nos visitaron unos niños sucios y mal educados que solo querían...galletas!

From Cabo de la Vela to Taganga is 130 miles, about a 24 hour passage, our only overnight of this part of our voyage. I usually enjoy night passages, with just the sea and stars for company, but this one was overcast and squally. Every time I dozed off I would be awakened by a change in the weather, either wind or rain or both. We arrived in the afternoon.

En Taganga no resistimos mas y bajamos a tierra. Casi perdimos el barco que se soltó con un golpe de aire. Los pescadores nos advirtieron y se ofrecieron para el rescate. Tuvimos mucha suerte y la aventura ocasiono una velada inolvidable con Roberto y Guillermo, los pescadores, que nos contaron sus artes y redes, su contrabando de gasolina de Venezuela, sus seres queridos perdidos en el mar. (F.25)

It's a funny little village, a sort of hippy tourist resort, with diving and backpacking being the attractions. The streets are unpaved and the only traffic is the odd small motorcycle. The buildings are shacks for the most part, lots of bars and small restaurants, but everything very poor. We were a bit worried about security in this place, although the local people seemed friendly enough. We locked TIMESPINNER up thoroughly Marie took pains to arrange for someone to guard our dinghy while we ate dinner.

It was a good meal of nice fresh fish but was rudely interrupted when someone came running in saying that our yacht had disappeared. At first I laughed, thinking that they were playing a trick on the funny foreigners, but he was insistent. Marie went to look while I hurriedly paid the bill. She came running back--it was true! There must have been a gust of wind that unhooked our anchor and blew the boat over to the corner of the bay, where, finding shallow water, the anchor rehooked itself. We didn't know this then, of course.

The fisherman who gave the alarm had recognised me as the owner of the boat because we had passed him at sea on the way in and I had given him a cheery wave. He took us to his boat but there was an interminable wait while somebody went to fetch some gasoline. I was chewing my fingernails, imagining TIMESPINNER grinding on the rocks all this time.

Finally they got the boat going. They took us out to our boat, which we found quite undamaged. We started the engine, raised the anchor without trouble and the fishermen showed us to a safer spot to anchor.

Later, after they had taken us back to recover our dinghy, they came aboard for a glass of rum and we gave them $100 US to share, which seemed little enough to us under the circumstances, but must have been a fortune to them from their reaction.

As it happened, we could perfectly well have rowed our own dinghy out to the boat and sorted ourselves out without involving the fishermen but we did not know that. Had TIMESPINNER been aground and damaged, we would have needed all the help we could get.

Why the anchor suddenly started dragging is something I don't understand. I had plenty of chain out. I can only suppose that, instead of digging into what should have been a sandy bottom, it caught on a rock and dislodged with a gust of wind from a different direction. In any case, I hope it doesn't happen again. That was a fright and we consider ourselves very lucky!

After primitive Taganga, we were startled upon leaving to see that the very next bay, barely ten miles away, contained a modern resort full of high-rise buildings.

We arrived at Punta Hermosa with not much time to spare before the light began to fade. The place was poorly charted but we were following the sailing directions of another yacht. The anchorage was up a shallow inlet and, as promised, we had 15 feet of depth up to the anchorage in 12 feet of water.

The place is low-lying and seems to be a popular weekend spot for campers. Thatched open huts line the beach. (Fig. 26) They are flooded at high tide, but this does not matter to people who sleep in hammocks.

We were quite happy with our anchorage until I went swimming the next morning and to my great surprise, found myself standing in waist-deep water just a few feet from the boat! (Fig. 27) This was no problem, since we were about to leave in any case.
El día siguiente cruzamos le rió Magdalena, a 5MN de la costa donde mezcla sus aguas dulces con las saladas del mar. Suele ser un lugar peligroso pero no había viento y solo experimentamos las aguas amarillas, el olor a barro los islotes de vegetación a la deriva, escupidos por el rió.

Por la noche en Punta hermosa, casi casi encallamos. (F.26 y 27)

Para terminar, en Punta Canoas organizamos una gran limpieza del barco y de su tripulación de forma a entrar en Cartagena como Dios manda.

Y aquí estamos, disfrutando de esta maravillosa ciudad, pero esto ya es para el próximo capitulo.



We could have sailed straight to Cartagena from Punta Hermosa, but we elected to anchor 15 miles short of the town in a rolly, open bay. This gave us time to clean up the boat and ourselves and generally get ready for a return to civilisation.

We sailed into Cartagena the next day, but we'll tell you about that city in the next chapter.


FRANÇAIS

Bonaire. Les îles que les américains appellent les ABCs forment part des Antilles hollandaises, mais se trouvent plus a l'ouest, au large du Venezuela. Il s'agit, en commençant a l'est, de Bonaire, Curaçao et Aruba. Elles dépendent de la couronne hollandaise mais ont avec elle des degrés d'association différents.

C'est une île propre et soignée (Ph.2, 3) où se déroule une intense activité eco-touristique. Ce programme a commencé il y a déjà plus de 40 ans et il faut voir le résultat. Rien a voir avec les autres Antilles. Ecologie, écologie, écologie. Une population (14 millions) prospère et satisfaite, un désert de cactus géants ou iguanes, ânes et chèvres ont également l'air de cohabiter harmonieusement, pas une construction de plus de 4 étages et par dessus tout, des fonds marins absolument extraordinaires. L'eau est cristalline partout, pas un déchet nulle part(les fonds marins sont nettoyés plusieurs fois par an et la liste des déchets publiées dans la presse (3 canettes de bière, une sandale et 8 sacs plastique) abondance de poissons multicolores, grande variété d'algues et coraux. Comme l'eau est si claire et les fonds peu profonds, les rayons du soleil illuminent tout de lumière naturelle. C'est une vraie explosion de couleurs lentement balancées au rythme des coraux. Un aquarium géant, un monde aquatique parfait.

Pour rentabiliser tout cela, on fait venir des paquebots, (Ph. 6) chargés de jusqu'à 3000 passagers que l'on emmène faire de la plongée, des sports aquatiques, du shopping, des randonnées a pied, a bicyclette ou en voiture électrique. La journée du passager se termine dans un des nombreux restaurants de Kralendijk. Le soir ils sont tous partis et la vie tranquille du bonairien (Ph. 5, 4, 8, 9) peut reprendre jusqu'à l'arrivée du bateau suivant.

Il y a quand même une industrie sur l'île: le sel. (Ph. 7) Ce sont des marais salants qui existent depuis très longtemps et qui chargent les bateaux directement par courroie transporteuse depuis leur propre quais. Incongruité du commerce: le seul sel en vente au détail sur l'île vient de Hollande. Qui sait, c'est peut être du sel de Bonaire...

Après un réapprovisionnement en supermarché hollandais, nous reprenons la mer avec l'intention de faire du cabotage, d'île en île, de baie en baie, jusqu'à Cartagena, en Colombie. Voici donc le plan du voyage: Bonaire-Kleine Curaçao. 25MN
K Curaçao-Curaçao(Sta Cruz Baai) 40MN
Curaçao-Aruba(S Nicolas Baai) 45MN
Aruba-Monjes del Sur 60MN
Monjes(Vnzl)-Bahia Honda(Clmb) 60MN
B. Honda-Cabo de la Vela 30MN
C. Vela-Taganga 135MN
Taganga-Punta Hermosa 60MN
P. hermosa-Punta Canoas 40MN
P. Canoas-Cartagena 15MN
Total: 510MN en 10 jours.
(Ph. 1)

Le but étant de mouiller tous les soirs dans des lieux différents. Nous avions les instructions du yacht Pizzaz qui a fait ce voyage plusieurs fois. Les cartes marines ne sont pas assez détaillées et il n'existe pas de guide pour navigation de plaisance le long des côtes colombiennes. Nous ne pourrions pas descendre a terre parce que nous serions illégaux partout: les gardes côtes hollandais font la chasse aux trafiquants et aux pollueurs et veulent donc tout savoir sur vous. Pour se mettre en règle il faudrait aller à la ville principale de chaque île et y passer une bonne demi journée. Nous avons donc décidé que nous ne nous ferions pas remarquer et que, les vents étant légers, (Ph. 15, 16) nous partirions a l'aube chaque jour, de façon à arriver au point suivant avant la nuit.

Klein Curaçao est toute plate et comprend en tout et pour tout une très belle plage parsemée de paillotes, un phare désaffecté et un restaurant ouvert a midi pour les excursionnistes venus passer la journée. Bien a regret, nous avons du nous abstenir de descendre sur la plage et heureusement d'ailleurs, car nous avons étés repèrés par l'helico des gardes côtes. Nous nous sommes fait des grands saluts. (Ph. 10, 11)