*Bahia de Cata*

Over Easter Break this year I joined some friends for a trip to Bahia de Cata, a beautiful beach town about a couple hours away from Valencia. I'm so glad I got a chance to see this area before I flew home to the US!

Bahia de Cata 

(This is Playa Cata, "Cata Beach," one of the 4 beaches we visited in the Bahia de Cata area)

It was a long and windy trek to drive out to Bahia de Cata. We caravanned, a few of my friends leading the way in the car ahead while I followed with another friend in my car. When we were about a half hour outside of Bahia de Cata, I asked for a break. I was getting car sick from all the snaky twists and turns through the mountains! We stopped at the creek pictured below for a while to let our stomachs settle. The cold water was most refreshing to our warm feet, especially since it was a hot day and I didn't want to overheat my engine by putting the AC on full blast.

While we were here, I made use of the outhouse across the road. I turned around inside the outhouse to lock the old, rickety door, placing my hand on the big rusty handle. As soon as my fingers touched the metal, a largish slimy thing fell on my hand! Imagine how startled I was, especially since there was very little light coming in through the small opening above the door! I'm sure I gave a little shout as the slimy thing bounced off my hand and onto the floor. There it was, a whitish-orangish little blog with 4 legs, struggling to right itself on the ground. It was a frog! He was just as scared as I was, no doubt he had been sleeping, having dangerously wedged himself between the door and the wall. I let him remain in the outhouse, though warned my friends of his presence so they wouldn't have the same fright that I had.

The bird nests below at first appeared to be large dirty socks hanging from the tree. The smallest one was the size of half my arm! The longest ones are easily the entire length of my arm or longer. Our hostess at the posada said the bird is called "Samata," They are about the size of large crows, but with vibrant yellow tail feathers and yellow beaks. 

They make a most curious bird call when they are coming in to nest for the night. I was excited to see them sneak into their nests in the evening and emerge from the tops of these nests in the morning. The birds would either land at the top of the nest then pop straight down inside, or they would enter through a small hole they had created near the middle of the hanging nest. These were doorways they had prepared for themselves when they first made the nest, or perhaps created later when the nest stretched from the weight of the birds over time.

This tree was in the property right next to our posada (beach house/condo).

I was surprised and delighted to see that even outside the country of India cows can wander right into your path! This is the short road from the gateway of the neighborhood of our posada (beach house) to Playa Cata ("Cata Beach"). No cars can pass through it, but clearly the cows found a way in! I didn't see any farms or ranches in the city, but there must have been a cattle stall somewhere in the area.

I enjoyed taking pictures of the cows, but was rather nervous when I had to walk past them. They are a lot bigger than they appear! One of the white bulls grunted in my direction as I passed by, but thankfully they were all more interested in munching the bushes than in hindering my passage to the gate!

Just before sunset it looked like a storm was blowing in. It did rain a bit, but I was glad to snap this photo of the palm trees across the street from where we were staying.

I think it was our second morning in Bahia de Cata when we decided to drive out to Cuyagua, about a 20 minute drive from where we were staying. It was another trek through windy mountain passes, but thankfully it was only 20 minutes this time, and I didn't have to drive. On the way there were able to see some beautiful views of the beach, though it was hard to capture on camera.

There isn't anything specific to view in the photo below, except that this was the typical landscape that surrounded us on much of our trek to Cuyagua.

I kept this photo simply because I appreciate the abstract artistic appeal.

Coffee trees? We passed by them so quickly that we weren't sure what was growing in this small orchard!

Finally, Cuyagua! We were well ready to get out of the warm car and cool off in the ocean, although we could see immediately that the waves were not at all inviting. If you've ever spent a fair amount of time near the ocean, you know that some waves are too dangerous to enjoy. We almost met our match with these waves, but finally we did find a kind of sand plateau in which we could brace ourselves against the onslaught without being continually knocked to our feet.

The picture below doesn't do the waves justice at all. However, it wasn't so much the size of the waves on this beach, but the POWER. In fact, the reason you don't see anyone swimming out there is because of the waves. There were some surfers further down the beach, but obviously they are used to strong waves. The rest of the beach-going folk were lounging safely in their beach chairs on the sand, only stepping in ankle deep to cool off.

I was delighted when I realized that what appeared to be shifting sand was in fact a little crab, crawling close to my chair for some shade. He was very skittish, so I wasn't able to get a close-up of him, but I got a few different angles of him anyway.

Street dogs are an part of the every day experience in Venezuela, and the beaches are no exception. I used to avoid them, but this one was so cute I decided to allow him to eat the scraps as I finished up my fish for lunch. He was my buddy for as long as I was eating. When it became clear after a while that I wasn't going to offer him any more, he quietly got up and searched for another feeding opportunity.

Here is the entryway to the rooms we stayed in. Mosquitoes were forever plaguing us here, but it was a pretty entryway.

Here is the backyard view of our place, looking out at the workers cabins. Our place had a maintenance man, a housekeeper and a cook could stay overnight in these cabins if they wanted to.

Some of the other guests and us made full use of these bushes as a drying station for our clothes! Everyday we would put our suits and towels out here to dry.

This was the view into another property over the fence, taken from the outdoor showers. It became a running joke that I was using these outdoor showers instead of the showers in our rooms. The water wasn't hot in either place, but we did discover that the water was warmer in the outdoor showers than in ours! For that reason I continually showered outdoors at almost every opportunity.

I take photos of the bougainvillea almost every time I see them. It's almost as if I think I'll forget how vivid they are unless I capture them every time.

I loved how this little hallway looked, kind of like stepping from one world into another. It was a very simple hallway, but the paint and brick colors worked together in an artistic fashion.

The pool was in fact very small, but we enjoyed sitting by it and certainly were refreshed when we jumped in it after a day in the ocean. Slightly chilly showers were not as effective at washing off the saltwater as the pool was! I'm sure our housekeeper wouldn't have been thrilled to know that was partly why we jumped in the pool, but we felt we were in no worse state than any other guest who might want to hop in. There is a little circular hot tub just beyond the pool as well, which we also found to be refreshing after having soaked in the pool for a while.

It took me more than one glance to realize that the mess of hanging twigs below were in fact some of the same sock-like nests that were hanging from the tree! It was impressive to see that the nests were easily the length of half my leg! I think this branch and nests must have broken off of one of the trees.

I love how huge the mango trees are. There was one growing in the property next to us.

It wasn't yet the season for mangos, as you can guess from the green skin of the fruit. These mangos are only half-grown. They will be about twice this size and will turn half pink or red when they are ready to be eaten.

I can't remember what this beach was called, but it was a local one. You can see the man-made rock barriers as well. I'm not sure what the barriers were for, though. Normally these barriers are built parallel to the shore to break the waves, but these must have been built for some other purpose.

The rocks were attractively set against the water, but somewhat dangerous. As you can see, they are jagged. They weren't easy at all to walk on, much less be bumped against if you were in the water. Some weak swimmers ventured to close to these rocks not long after I took the picture and began to drown! The waves were somewhat strong and it is difficult to get away from rocks while fighting waves at the same time. Thankfully the lifeguards were well trained and quickly ran in to rescue the couple with their child.

It was still the dry season when we were at these beaches, otherwise this dry hill would have been covered in lush green.

Up till now I've always focused on the beautiful in Venezuela, but I finally decided to capture some of the rundown areas of the country. Surprisingly, these dilapidated buildings were very close to a fancy beach-side restaurant and the rest of the beach area. Unfortunately there don't appear to be any laws enforced about getting these types of buildings demolished. These will probably continue to slowly break apart over the next hundred years!

I was fascinated by the surprise of black sand! It was mixed right into the regular sand. I don't know what makes black sand as opposed to white, but it was neat to see! I'm not sure if it was the glint of the  white sand atop the black, or if there was gold sand mixed in, but whenever the water washed over the black sand, there was a golden glint. It was impossible to catch that glint on camera, but I hope someday you will get a chance to see it for yourself.