En route to Los Testigos

In the pitch dark at 0300 this morning we lifted our anchor, turned on our navigation lights and motored out of Chaguaramas Bay, Trinidad, against an incoming tide that flowed towards us like a swirling green river. This is a complex boat, and it takes a while for us to get fully set up for a blue-water passage, so we had the autopilot steering as we set up the sheets, took off the sailcover, and set up our harnesses and tethers. It was very, very dark and I was trying to get my nightvision tuned in, but inevitably at this stage of a journey we use our headlamps quite a bit while we get things set up, so it's a bit difficult to see much beyond the red and green glow from the nav lights illuminating the water off the bow.

While we were pretty confident, but careful, in Chaguaramas, we're very conscious that we're sailing into one of the world's simmering piracy hotspots: Venezuela. Indeed, from our anchorage it's only a 12nm shot to the Promontorio De Paria on Venezuela's east coast. There's been a lot of talk about Venezuela amongst the yachties we've been with because of the number of recent problems - mainly robberies against yachts - but some assaults, and armed robberies. And it seems that more recently things have really taken a turn for the worse. This is from the Isla De Margarita section of the blue-water cruiser's website Noonsite:

A report from the International Maritime Bureau has detailed another Venezuelan attack on a yacht in Bahia De Robledal, Isla De Margarita, in January 2008.

Five armed men boarded the yacht, assaulting the crew and demanding all their property. One crew member was shot and injured. The incident was reported to local authorities.

There have been several attacks on yachts in Robledal Bay in the last few years and yachts wishing to visit Isla de Margarita are strongly advised to stop at Porlamar only which is more frequented by yachts. Yachts should be vigilant at all times, especially at night, and take extra precautions.

'Extra precautions' for many yachts means cruising in a convoy. Others set up radio 'scheds' so they can check on each other using high-frequency radio bands that are unlikely to be accessible to pirates, and many others simply don't sail in Venezuela. Greg, in a perhaps uniquely American approach, wants to arm us with fully-automatic assault rifles so we can 'light em up' if we get any trouble. I can just imagine him on the bow, shoe polish covering his face and bandana wrapped around his forehead, machine gun blazing into the darkness and shell cartridges bouncing all over the deck ('don't worry mate, I checked it out and it was just a floating log, and it won't be bothering US again anytime soon'). While he's (half) joking, some folks do carry guns.

We don't. I hope to rely on Kiwi charm. ('Gidday maaaate! Thanks for letting yourself onto my boat at 3am, care for a drink? My that's a nice shotgun you've got there, scout! What's your interest level in good old-fashioned cold-hard cash? We've got plenty!'). For me the bottom line is that if you carry a gun, you'd better be prepared to use it, and fast, and I'm just not. It seems, from what I read, that pulling out your heat just seems to escalate the situation. You may get killed rather than robbed. I think of the famous New Zealand sailor Peter Blake who was murdered after grabbing his rifle while sailing in Brazil.

The risk is, of course, still pretty small. But I can assure you all this talk leaves you a bit on edge, and this was all running through our heads as we sailed out into the Gulf of Paria. The rhumb line (direct route) to Los Testigos is 100nm east northeast. We'd be told to sail NNE until we're about 20nm offshore, to be out of sight and temptation of the Puerta Mejillones pirogues; but adding about 10nm to the sail.

While Greg cleared up our reefing lines, I went below to check on our track through the islands. It's very tidal, so I switched on the radar to verify our position, and check we weren't being pushed into danger by the tidal flow. Suddenly I saw an orange dot screaming towards us out of the south. Now this thing was flying - each sweep of the radar seemed to bring it about a quarter nautical mile closer - I've never seen a radar target move so fast - and it was close. I yelled to Greg that there was a target closing fast on our port side; I saw him looking and straining: no lights. Oh boy, here we go.

By then I was on deck and I saw the wake of a long, sleek, very fast grey speedboat swooping out of the darkness in a white wall of spray. It closed on us and did a sharp, rounding turn close onto our starboard side then hit us with a bright spotlight.

It was the Trinidad Coast Guard in one of their new, American supplied, drug interdiction fast-patrol boats. These are dark gray 45' speedboats with triple 225HP outboards. Without taking the light off us they advised us to change course (by yelling, strangely no radios) and to proceed to the Coast Guard station for boarding and search.

Greg immediately starting flushing our huge cargo of St Lucian cannabis and loading his rifle. (okay, okay, I made this bit up for effect).

Ultimately, we tied up to their remarkable CG base and they conducted an absurd information gathering process. ("what's your date of birth? How old are you?") I was getting frustrated as the whole purpose of leaving at 3am was to arrive in Los Testigos in daylight; I don't like arriving in unfamiliar, reef strewn anchorages in the dark. However, we remained as polite as we could manage (which you need to realize, is very, very, very polite - they had big guns) and an hour later we were off again, sails up but well behind schedule. We cut the corner and raced directly down the rhumbline, next stop the little archipelago of Los Testigos, Venezuela (11 21'N; 063 07'W). It was my watch as the sun rose behind the misty, Venezuelan mountains and I set up the spinnaker - it's a reaching breeze and if were going to arrive before dark, we'd have to fly.

Later we came across five Venezuelan fishing boats, the chute slicing us through the waves at nearly 9 knots, a good wake chuckling and burbling out behind us. They seemed to be changing course towards us so I bared away as much as I could while keeping the kite full. Still they turned. Finally when we could see the whites of each other's eyes (mine a bit bigger than there's) I gave them a big wave - they all broke into big white smiles and waved passionately. Phew! The were hand-lining for tuna.

And what a sailing day! Greg woke me on his watch to show me the speedo at north of 10 knots, a big rooster tail ripping out behind us and foamy dots of spray flying in the breeze. YEAH! This is what we came for - we started trimming and singing and yahooing - and trying to squeeze out another tenth here and another tenth there, the boat getting big surfs as we lifted and careered down the ocean swells, our grins from ear to ear. The sense of exhilaration on a 13,000kg yacht surfing powerfully down ocean waves, only just in control (giving us the benefit of the doubt here), is a simply life altering experience!

Crack! Suddenly a noise like a rifle shot and the chute blew up into the sky. I thought one of the snatch blocks had exploded under the load, but it turned out to be one of our tired spinnaker sheets. It had parted in a puff of smoke and whipped out through the spinnaker pole. Fortunately it was the brace (windward) sheet so we got it down and under relative control pretty fast. But that, or course, was the end of the kite today. We soon had the genoa pulling us forward and were back on course, still trying to run down the miles by nightfall.

It's now midafternoon. We're 22.7nm from Los Testigos. We're sitting at a little over 9 knots, but this is a good part due to the equatorial current giving us some extra edge; it's bright and sunny and there's whitecaps to the horizon. The water has been a strange green today. Perhaps the run off from all the recent rain. So we're looking good to get there late afternoon after all.

Oh, and I just snagged a big tuna.

12 Feb 2008