LEAVING BONAIRE

Sailing by the north end of Bonaire, the image of the island changes. Charming Kralendijk is replaced by rocky coast, only here and there white spots indicating small beaches.
Only here, in the north, the mountains rise high above the water, making the island visible for sailors from a distance.

 

The tall cacti, hidden among yellow blooming thorny bush, will in a month or two, when the rainy season ends, reclaim the lowlands and the hills of this desert island.

The three days sailing from Bonaire NE would have been uneventful but for a good catch of about 20 pounds tuna, two wahoos and a cero. Coming within the sight of Puerto Rico, we hooked two large barracudas. We were able to save one, we unhooked it and let it swim to life. The other we couldn't.

Skipjack tuna

Wahoo

But how uneventful is it really, when you we are sailing in a light of a full moon, reflecting off the sail fish, escaping the bow of our sailboat? When the only sound  we hear is the song of the waves against the boat?

The unfortunate wind direction from ENE brought us to Boqueron on west side of Puerto Rico, about 120 NM west of our intented landing. We slept a few hours, then motor sailed 40 NM to Ponce. There we reported to US Customs and Immigration and had another near unpleasant encounter with the US authorities. We got away with a written warning for disposing trash in the marina trash container. The fine for that is $5000. We didn't know about this regulation. We thought we were so good saving all the waste until we landed and not trashing the beautiful Caribbean Sea.

Slowly we were tacking and motor sailing east, leaving the anchorages before the daybreak to avoid high winds and waves.