Venezuela - Los Roques

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Venezuela

We didn't get to see too much of Venezuela, we were tempted by a cheap flight and free camping on the Carribean Islands of Los Roques, an Archipeligo of Coral Islands just off the Venezuelen coast. So we spent 8 days there relaxing on the beach.

Life was simple, we caught a boat to one of the small Islands called Crasqui and pitched our tent on the beach and spent the days swimming and snorkelling. We had to bring all our food and water from the main island, Gran Roque, and we cooked everyday on our little gas cooker.

After 3 days we caught another boat to an island called Fransiqui. The story was pretty much the same here, great snorkelling and swimming and 3 islands to explore. Dave went on a few coconut hunts and was quite successfull so we had fresh coconut every few days!

The wind blew consistently at 15-20knots everyday and so we had to hire windsurfers to make the most of these perfect conditions! We wish we had our own kitesurfing equipment with us but we only get that later in our trip.

Other Info:
The camping is free which is great but there are no facilities - you just need to get a permit on for the duration of your stay from an office on the main island. Camping isn't recommended on the main island (Gran Roque) because there have been thefts there. But on the smaller islands it is safe.

When you land on Gran Roque you will get off the plane and walk past a little beach shop called "Oscars" - the guy who runs this (Oscar) is the best contact you can have on the island. He'll take you wherever you want to go by boat and come and collect you a few days later.

We camped on 2 smaller islands Crasqui which had 2 restaurants on it but there is no running water or toilets on any of the islands. There are a few locals that live on Crasqui island but they pretty much kept to themselves and we had no trouble camping there at all.

The 2nd island was Francisqui which was our favourite island. No one lives on this island - there is a restaurant that is open at lunch time when all the tourist boats arrive but everyone leaves the island by 6pm. You need to camp away from the Mangrove trees here as there are lots of mosquitos under the trees.

You need to bring plenty of water with you (for bathing as well as drinking, between the 2 of us we used about 3 litres of water a day), you can buy most things on Gran Roque (main island) there are a couple of "supermarkets" there. We had a camping stove and cooked our own meals. Food is expensive on the island (as you would expect) and there isn't a lot of fresh food. There aren't any roads or cars on any of the islands so you really have to bring everything you need with you, a tent and some sleeping mats is all you really need (you can hire snorkelling equipment and there is a windsurf centre too).

The weather was hot and windy while we were there - there's not much shade on the islands either so if you can take some sort of sun shelter.

If you go be prepared to rough it! It was a great feeling getting back to Caracas and having a shower.

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