Lazing About in the Aves

Isla de Aves are two separate little island archipelagos separated by about 10 miles of deep water. Huge numbers of birds make them their home, mostly boobys but also heron and other seabirds. The first island group is Aves de Sotavento and is about 40 miles east of Bonaire. We and Tony and Hilary of "Miss Charlotte" (a 46 ft. Halbery Rassey shown below left at anchor) decided to spend a few weeks there lazing about. You can see a picture of them at the end of the this entry.

Both our boats had been in the Bonaire/Curacao area for almost 6 months and needed to leave the country to restart the 6 month customs period. Traveling east means bucking the wind, waves and current so we carefully followed the weather and left Bonaire with a two day forecast of less than 15 knots of wind and 4 foot seas.

Miss Charlotte at anchor

The first part of the trip around the south end of Bonaire was rougher but then the predicted weather kicked in.
The Aves are part of Venezuela and there is a small coast guard station at Sotavento. Our plan was to spend one night there then proceed on to the Aves de Barlovento for most of our stay.

Hilary and Scott

We'd then stop and get our papers stamped by the coast guard on our way back to Bonaire. Once they see you, they want you to leave within 48 hours if you haven't legally checked into Venezuala. Which of course we hadn't.
A large reef surrounds the clear water, islands and smaller reefs. Most islands consist of no more than sand, a few plants and an occasional palm tree.
One larger island anchors each of the two island groups and these are dense with mangroves on the protected lagoon side and bare and windswept on the other. This section is really lovely and colorful with "meadows" of southern glasswort, seaside purslane and saltwort all in different shades of green and gold. See the picture below.

Hilary and Scott get ready for some snorkeling. You can
see the channel through the reefs

The Dutch once mined guano here and the ruins of old forts are now all that remain. Today a few fisherman maintain simple wood huts on a few of the smaller islands for occasional trips but they have wiped out the conch population and are working on the lobsters. Scott saw two conch and no lobsters for two weeks.
He left the conch not wanting the distinction of eating the last two alive.
The water varies enormously in depth. This results in a huge variety of blue green colors that at some times of the day meld into the sky. The snorkeling is excellent and there are many protected spots to anchor. To get around we practiced "eyeball navigation". The charts show the configuration of the reefs, islands and the depth of the water between them. But after studying them we put the chart down and us our eyes to follow the deep blues and dark turquoise/jades paths among the more pastel shallow areas.

The path to the Memorial from the mangrove entrance

There's a gap in the mangroves where you can pull in your dingy and
then follow the path above 

The channels are often narrow but easy to see when the light is good. This happens when the sun is above you or behind you. It's almost impossible when it's in front. So we time our arrival and departure accordingly. We found a lovely spot just north of Isla Sur, the second bay in from the west, with great holding and well protected by a series of small reefs.

Hilary gets our hors d'eouves ready - that's our Scott
Free sign behind her on the left. It's brown as we
varnished it.

Hilary, Scott and I took our dinghies out to several different reefs each day to snorkel. They varied enormously but all had lots of great fish and some, healthy vibrant corals. Storms and fisherman have caused a lot of damage. Once I came across a 6 foot nurse shark sleeping on the sand inside a coral corral - and backed out very quickly. That is the first shark we'd seen since we began our trip, while in the water.

We painted and varnished boat signs to place there  in Bonaire and one lovely evening left them there, drank wine, and saluted the many sailors who came before us.Scott and I had been here two years ago with "Angel" on our way to Bonaire from Grenada and knew about the boater's memorial on Isla Larga. A small gap in the mangroves allows access to the "moors" on the windward side and there with the ocean pounding behind is this beautiful spot.
Every other morning Hilary and I dinghied over to a beach and did our exercises and yoga. What a beautiful spot to meditate afterwards - and have a swim. That's me at the top of this entry.
It was hard to pull up anchor from this peaceful spot and return back to civilization. But weather windows only come once in a while so when a good one arrived we sailed for Curacao. Scott and I needed to apply for a 90 day extension on our immigration visa. Tony and Hilary are hauling their boat in two weeks and returning to London and Tuscany (tough huh!).

Tony and Hilary on "Miss Charlotte"

Close up of the Miss Charlotte sign

Aves de Sotavento to Bonaire

We left the next day at 9 AM and it was another rolly fast sail downwind. We're getting better at jibbing the main safely with the preventor but getting the jib through the narrow slot between the Yankee and the staysail is difficult. We've decided it's safer to roll it in and then take it out again. The route into our new anchorage in the Aves de Sotavento was easy to see and a pretty spot. We were between Isles Palmeras and the small island to it's south. Lots of dolphins escorted us in, playing in our bow waves. We spent the rest of the afternoon kayaking around the three islands, snorkeling off the north end and visiting a fisherman's compound and shrine.
Up early we cast off and again enjoyed our dolphin escort for miles heading west. We were in 20 plus knots of wind and 8 foot waves but it was fun tacking downwind and a fast passage. In no time we saw the hills of Bonaire ahead and headed up the west coast towards Kralenduk. As predicted in our guide book, this reach in calm waters with lots of wind was wonderful sailing. We hit 9.3 knots at one point! It was May 1, Labor Day, and a holiday in Bonaire so we picked up a mooring and went into Customs and Immigration (at the Police Station because of the holiday). Later we went out to dinner with our friends from Australia, Jerry and Nikki, on "Orphalleur" at the Mona Lisa Restaurant - wonderful food. After weeks in undeveloped islands it was a bit surreal to be there.
The next day "Enkidu", Bob and Barbara, good friends from our summer in Trinidad and moored beside us, took us all around in their car for errands. I dropped off three bags of laundry and visited two supermarkets - heaven to get lots of fresh vegetables, meat and fruit. Later we met up with Debra and Richard on "Tango", also friends from Trinidad for drinks. They presented our Welcome Aboard certificate from Seven Seas Cruising Association; we are now Commodores! They invited us all to a terrific dinner on their catamaran a few days later. That night we fell into bed early after motoring into the Harbour Village Marina and filling up our dry water tanks. We plan to stay a few days here and clean up the boat.
This picture shows Debra and Dick in their twin kayacks. We joined them one day for a trip up the coast in our double kayack to a pretty beach and some great snorkeling.
We've really enjoyed our double kayack, not only for fun and exercise, but also as a second "dinghy".

The Aves

The Aves are two separate groups of islands about 10 miles apart. Aves means birds in Spanish and there are many of them there. They live in dense mangrove forests on some of the islands. They crowd the branches; boobies, seabirds and herons. It had been a rolly passage that day and we were tired after lunch but the aqua water called to us. We swam over to a nearby reef and snorkeled for an hour. There was a lot of current so the trip back was slower. We had the rest of the barracuda for dinner and watched the last DVD in my Indiana Jones set, documentaries on the making of the series - really fun.
It blew hard overnight but was calmer in the morning. We borrowed Dave and Val's satellite phone to call our movers at their request. We were being moved out of our Lake Rescue home, Tall Timbers, into a storage unit today and tomorrow. We spent the day kayaking around to see the birds: baby boobies are so adorable, fluffy white balls. They and their parents didn't seem frightened of us at all, but just stared at us as curiously as we did of them. We had a lovely Sunday brunch on Angel mid day; scones, muffins, pancakes, Canadian bacon, fruit salad and peach cobbler. Fabulous! Later we explored over to the next two anchorages. A small landing allowed you through a gap in the mangroves to the open grassy east side of the island.

There a wall of painted rocks and wood testified to the many cruisers who have been through this area - a boater's shrine. We had seen a similar one back in the Exumas in the Bahamas. The snorkeling was very good as well and we saw a number of new species.

Los Roques to the Aves

There is a beautiful walk from our anchorage down to the sand bar connecting Cayo de Agua to West Cay and then across that cay to the lighthouse at the west end. We did it twice, once with Val and Dave, swimming every half an hour or so off the pristine white beaches on either side. The snorkeling and kayacking were all wonderful. Just sitting in our cockpit and watching the view beats most anything.
Sunsets are a ceremonial occasion for cruisers. The traditional "sundowners" are prepared and the crew lounges in the cockpit watching the show. Sometimes the sound of a blown conch shell heralds the last rays of the sun. Val is a talented conch musician and Scott is still practicing. The elusive "greenflash" is supposed to occur when the horizon is perfectly clear, with no land, clouds or haze. Perfection has still not occurred for us as we've never seen it!
As beautiful as our anchorage was, we still wanted to get going to the Aves so after a few days we got the boat ready for a rolly trip and set off at 8 AM, following our track out on the computer navigation. We had 15 to 20 knots of wind and it was directly from behind, so we tacked downwind, jibbing the sail with a preventor when necessary. It was a fast trip and soon we were circling the lighthouse at the Aves de Barlovento and followed "Angel" through the long passage into our anchorage behind Isla Sur. We were anchored by 2 PM and had a late lunch, seranaded by hundreds of birds roosting in the surrounding mangroves.

The noise level was deafening up close but we were forewarned and anchored far enough off. Two birds claimed our dinghy as theirs despite Scott's earnest efforts to dislodge them. They look here like they're having a heated discussion about it.