Aves de Barlovento

June 25, 2011

Aves de Barlovento

( N 11 56,810 W 67 25,310 5m deep in sand)

The 35 mile sail was fast downwind and uneventful (no fish) , we entered from the south around Isla Sur and headed for the third bay. There is a lot of coral patches and the way to navigate is Jaco on the bowsprit “eyeballing” and signing to Christelle at the wheel to steer this way or that… in theory this works but try signing little to the port, fast to starboard and so on without getting the nerves fraying , makes for interesting times!!

We anchored close to the mangrove Island with a lot of birds flying in and out (we are non-starters at bird watching but we read names like red footed boobies, herons etc)

Close by was a small coral beach with lots of conch shells arranged in patterns which we could not figure out?

We walked to the south end of the island (open sea beach) and it was quite calm so it looked like a good spear fishing place. The next morning I convinced Hicham to join me for a dive.

This was a beautiful place to dive, lots of caves, coral and fish and my favourite: a drop-off (almost a wall) from 5 m to 25m and more to the deep blue sea.

Hicham had good fun (and two smallish fish) and I got a cubera snapper and yellowtail snapper. I think after this Hisham was hooked on the sport and getting 100% better every day. I sharpened his spear and the next day he shot two bigger fish.

The anchor spot was very close to the mangroves and when the wind dropped the mosquitoes came in droves, so the next day we moved to the fourth bay.

(N 11 56,850 W 67 25,040 9m deep in sand)

This was closer to the barrier reef and Hicham and I went for spear fishing on the reef. It was very shallow here but there was a lot of pan size fish and Hicham was getting to be very good and shot two. I tried the open sea on the other side of the reef but was welcomed by a mako shark so I returned shortly.

Meanwhile Christelle was dealing with friendly fishermen with cigarettes for crayfish.

She exchange a packet of Marlboro for a 1.5kg crayfish (we weighed this one) and then a 4kg one (the fishermen said) for two packets of Marlboros. This was the biggest crayfish I have ever seen. We invited Yapa over for Crayfish that afternoon, we had the smaller one for starter, cold with homemade mayonnaise and because no pot big enough could be found, the big one on the BBQ with garlic-butter basting.

The big one tasted delicious (one would think one that big is not so good) and when Hicham opened the 17 year old French red wine, life could not get any better.