Playa Caldera on Venezuuela's outer island Tortuga

Alarm was set for midnight and what a surprise to see our neighbors Debi and Rob on Wind Shear already sitting in their cockpit waiting for us to get up. They wanted to send us off. We sure had a good time with them, especially Manuela with Debi on all the shopping trips. They are planning to finish up their work and follow us in a couple of days. At 00:30 we left the dock and headed into the dark night. We had no moon but the bay was lit with the light of the city and we coasted out of the bay. As we entered the cut between Isla Boracho and Chimana Grande a current chopped up the water and after we had passed Boracho the back wash swells had left. We had about 13 to 17 knots of wind the whole trip and a 6 foot swell unfortunately on the beam and Manuela wasn't feeling to good. Sid did the first watch and never really got any sleep. It took us 10 hours to get to Isla Tortuga where we anchored in 10 feet of water in Playa Caldera on the north eastern tip of the island. Caldera is a one mile long half-moon beach with white sand and sand dunes. From the anchorage we can see the large reef across the beach where a little fishing village and airstrip which on the weekends is a busy little place bringing in tourists for the day from Caracas.
We were anchored for about one hour when a dinghy approached us. It was two Venezuelan Coast Guards and wanted to see our papers. We were surprised about that as nobody every told us there was a station here. They were very friendly and wrote up the paper work in the dinghy. Then he wanted to see if our flares were up to date. So one came aboard and followed Sid down below. After all was done they sat with us in the cockpit for a beer, invited to visit them at the station on the island and told us that we could stay one months here and also one months in the Roques, wished us a good time and left. There was only one other boat here, we had the place to ourselves. With the sunset the warmth of the day disappeared and it got down right cold that we made some hot toddies. We needed blankets for the night as it was 75 degrees, wow, we went from summer into winter LOL.
Early I woke up to what I thought was the daily power outage when the AC would turn off, but then realized with a huge grin on my face that the refrigeration pump had stopped, we were not on the dock any longer but in an most beautiful anchorage. We didn't do anything but relax all day and watched as one boat after another arrived. Venezuelans don't anchor their boats, they park them, not one boat sits the same way. It is the weekend of Valentines Day and on the 15th Carnival starts, therefore this placed will be hopping.
Planes flew in and out all day long and we had fun watching all the boats park. The good thing is they all will leave on Tuesday again. So here we are enjoying Paradise in and on Paradise and are waiting for our buddy boat Wind Shear to arrive.