08/14/07 Laguna Grande the most peaceful anchorage ever

Laguna Grande is by far the most peaceful anchorage we've ever been to, every afternoon after the now daily tropical rain showers it clears up, the wind dies down and it gets so quite that we catch ourselves whispering with each other. I don't even turn the fans on at night as they disturb the peace and quite. Two nights ago we had the meteor showers but unfortunately that was the only night the sky was not clear, it didn't clear until 3 am and we missed the peak of the shower, but still were able
to see some impressive shooting stars. This is probably the only anchorage too where pelicans fish at night as the water is full of phosphorescence and the old pelicans having problems catching fish during the day can see them now lid up at night and therefore feed at night.
Ross and Beverly on Raft joined us and two days ago we left early at 7 am to hike up the tall mountain. Linda stayed behind baking bread and keeping and eye on the boats. Ed, Sid and I are still not over the hump with our colds, so climbing up the very steep hill side was especially tough for me with my filled lungs. I was huffing, puffing and coughing up the hill and felt like 80 some years old. Sid and Ed did better but admitted that it was a tough climb. First we had to cut our way through some
shrubs and cactus to get to the ridge, that was Sid's job as he brought a machete. I think it only took us about 40 minutes to reach the top and it was worth the huffing, puffing and coughing as the reward was incredible. The view was just spectacular, we could see a huge portion of the mainland, both sides of the Araya Peninsula and over to Isla Margarita as it was crystal clear. Our boats in the anchorage looked like miniature toys and almost don't show up on the photos and we could see the entire
Laguna Grande with it's many rounded bays and islands. We rested for a while awing over the magnificent view then the guys had an idea to go down a different way, great. You have to know there are no paths here you make your own. So we hiked further and the guys were studying the down slope run and saw a ridge that went back to the landing we came from via a dry river bed. If you ever skied a black run this is how steep the climb was down 2/3 the hillside to the ridge with loose rocks and cactus.
Down we went following the boys until we reached the riverbed and they realized it was a 20 foot cliff to climb down. Ed and Ross went for it, Beverly and I stood there starring at the cliff and Sid chopped away on cactus and found us a pass through hundreds of cactus to a an area where we could just step down to the riverbed, what a guy. Then we followed a very narrow riverbed towards the water and on several occasions Sid had to hack cactus out of the way for us to pass. 2 1/2 hours later we arrived
exhausted at the starting point. Impressed and happy with our accomplishment everybody admitted next time we'll come back down the way we hiked up. We really had a great time. Sid exserted himself on the hike and was feeling really ill with a fever, I'm not over the hump yet either and neither is Ed so we'll be resting a couple extra days here.
In the meantime a tropical depression TD4 is on it's way to the Eastern Caribbean and prognosis are for it to turn into a major hurricane. So lots of boats are scrambling around and trying to get out of the path of the hurricane. Yesterday's prognosis were it was headed for Trinidad/Tobago and Grenada which places us on the map for some of the weather, although it has to cross a lot of landmass before making it here. Today we learned that TD4 is headed north from us so we are fine and out of harms
way but from Guadeloupe Islands up to the Virgin Islands boats need to get to safety. A lot of boats are heading this way now, we're just glad we are where we are.
Change again in the direction of now Tropical Storm Dean, he's heading more south again which places Trinidad/Tobago and the Testigos Islands which are just a bit NE of Isla Margarita. So we're staying put where we are as we are in a very well protected anchorage.