Los Testigos

We made to to Los Testigos and anchored off Testigo Grande albeit not without incident.

Having put all the lines out (three of them with Ballyhoo attached) at dawn I had hopes for a catch. We were pleasantly surprised to be joined by dolphins which stayed with us for two and a half hours. If we had any chance of a catch beforehand, being surrounded by a top predator certainly didn’t improve our chances.

We marveled at the hundreds of frigate birds soaring above Conjo island before the wind again died on us. We engaged the electric motors for a mild assist before deciding to bring in the lines as we came around the south side of Testigo Grand.

As I was sat on the starboard transom reeling in the first line I looked over my shoulder only to see us about to pass over a large fender. I yelled at Helen who was on watch to cut the motors which she did just in time. We weren’t that lucky though because the boat ground to a halt with no sign of the fender behind us.

I threw a line of the stern, put on my face mask and snorkel and jumped in to assess. The fender tied to a stout rope had jammed between the rudder and the propeller. With a 2-3 knot current trying to push us north and the wind also behind us and the sails still up it was not going to move. Further more, the three remaining fishing lines and their lures, with sharp hooks, were getting all tangled.

I first disentangle the lures and lines which were dumped in the cockpit without proper spooling. We then lowered the head sail (perhaps we should have done this first) but the main could not be lowered with the wind behind us. I went in the water again, fighting the swell and current, to tie a modified clove hitch to the rope using one of our dock lines. The other end of this went over a winch. Whenever we had slack Helen winched us in while I kept the lines clear. We soon created enough slack for me to go down yet again and remove the fender and rope from our rudder/prop. It was saddening to see the damage to our lovely new paint job down there. Having removed this I had to make yet another submersion to retrieve my safety line which had now tangled itself round the same prop.

We tried for a while to reverse Dignity enough to loosen our dock line from the rope attaching the original floating fender to whatever was on the sea floor. To no avail so rather than risk having a nasty accident with tight lines I cut our dock line close to the knot losing about 3 feet in doing so. We were free. And a little exhausted.

We quickly lowered the main and motored round the corner to where we are now anchored.

Having lowered the dinghy I dinghied over to Iguana Island to clear in at the coast guard station. My first challenge there came when I passed a couple of guys looking to carry a large fridge up the dunes/hill to the school at the top. I had to offer to help but boy was it difficult and painful on the fingers. Next stop was the coast guard station to obtain permission to stay. My ‘Spanish for Cruisers’ bridged the gap between my lack of Spanish and their lack of English. I believe we ended up with permission to stay in these islands for two days. That’s more than we need.

Back on the boat Helen had sorted out the mess from two of our hand lines and I got to untangle the last. We had lunch then collapsed for some well needed rest.

We’ve decided to do not a lot this afternoon and stay the night here. In the morning we’ll try and climb the nearby hill for the exercise and the alleged great view from the top. We’ll then head north and anchor at the top end of the island. An early night to bed followed by a very early start will get us to Margarita sometime Thursday afternoon.