ISLAS de LOS ROQUES

El Grand Roques is easy to spot.

The rest of the cays are only 10'-15' above sea level.

      

As you may recall, in mid-November we decided to visit the Venezuelan out islands just east of  Bonaire before heading north to spend Christmas with our son’s family in St. Croix. We planned this route for three very good reasons.  First, Las Aves and Los Roques were highly recommended by fellow cruisers, always a big plus. Second, we felt it was too early to head north and trust that the 2014 Hurricane Season was really over. But the third and most important reason we headed to these Venezuelan island groups was to get some serious easting in before sailing north.  We were richly rewarded on all three accounts.

The light house at West Cay as seen from Cayo de Agua

From Barlovento, Las Aves we knew we that a very long day lay ahead of us, so we weighed anchor before daylight and began to motor-sail toward El Grand Roques, Los Roques- our intended destination. After slogging our way over forty nautical miles, we’d had enough and dropped the hook at Cayo de Agua, the first available anchorage in the Los Roques group. It was late Sunday afternoon and a half dozen motor boats were hurriedly shuttling the folks on the beach back to their posadas before nightfall. We remained the only boat there in water that shallowed-up pretty quickly.

This is the only village on El Grand Roques.

View from the top overlooking some cays to the NE

       

After a sound sleep and a hearty breakfast, we worked our way around some cays and through deep water passages to anchor and clear in at El Grand Roques which is the largest and only populated island in the group.  Cruisers had cautioned us to make way and anchor only in good light because the marine charts for the 355 square miles of these islands are incorrect. The water was clear enough to see and avoid coral heads or large underwater boulders. Thankfully, many times the water was deeper than our electronic charts showed.



It was siesta time when we stopped for information...

Capt. Dan always peruses the local hardware stores.

If you speak Spanish, you can probably complete the entire procedure for clearing in- which entails visiting 4 different offices located in different parts of the town- within an hour.  We don’t speak Spanish, so it took us almost 4 hours. At least one and a half hours of that was spent waiting for one office or another to reopen after their midday siesta, as they don’t all close at the same time. To complicate matters, Venezuela is on what we came to call “Chaves Time” which is one-half hour behind AST. (For example:10am AST is 9:30am Chaves Time.  I bet you are saying, DIOS MIO!) We sensed that many of the officials understood most of what we were saying, but were reluctant to speak English.

 

Just one of the classier posadas

Visiting El Grand Roques is like taking a step back in time.  None of the streets or roads were paved and large blue plastic cisterns were perched upon rooftops of buildings no more than two stories high.  The streets are lined with posada (inn) after posada, each entrance brightly painted or decorated with ornate tiles. Our noses lead us to find the panaderia (bakery) one day where we bought 2 large loaves of bread, 2 seasoned hoagie-type rolls, and 2 huge coconut custard filled sweet rolls for under $3 US.

Spotted this guy one day alone on this tiny cay. 

The money exchange rate was and is fluid in Venezuela.  We exchanged $100 US for 9,200 pesos when we arrived.  The stack of pesos was about 2 inches thick and the smallest denomination in the pile was a 20 peso note. Another day, we found an exchange rate of 86 pesos to $1 US, while the banco offered 62 pesos per $1 US. We paid cash for everything because the strained relations between the USA and Venezuela prohibited the use of credit cards.  Before leaving Los Roques, we went to the only supermercado (floor space of about 20’ x 30’)  to use up the last of that peso stack.

We were so enamored with all that Los Roques has to offer that we already plan to return there for part of next summer. El Grand Roques has the only high "mountains” (180’) and the rest of the cays are only 10-15’ high and are relatively narrow strips of sand with low vegetation. This island group caters to wealthy Venezuelan visitors as evidenced in many of the posadas.  The outlying cays are plentiful enough for cruisers to be alone in the bay on any given night, sometimes sighting flocks of pink flamingos at dusk winging their way home to nest for the night. Among the many cays you can fish, dive for lobster and conch, or buy some from local fishermen who are willing to bargain or barter for items they need. We had many white sand beaches to ourselves whose shallow waters were dotted with sea stars and whelk. The Islas de Los Roques have safe anchorages lined with reefs that shush you to sleep at night and energize you during the day.  We only had time to explore six of the 60+ cays during this stay, so we look forward to going back! (And I have been taking my study of Spanish more seriously these days.)

Going...


going...

gone.