Hacienda Bukare

Late in the afternoon, we flew along the coast of Venezeula to Carupano in a propeller plane. You could look down and see the coast most of the way.

Humberto, who does most of the driving for Hacienda Bukare, was waiting for us at the very small airport. He'd brought the bus, which seats eight or ten, to get us. We spent a lot of time in that bus over the next few days.

The drive along the coast and into the mountains was breathtaking! We arrived at Hacienda Bukare just before dinner.

a week in Venezuela

We're just home from our first break from the chocolate business - a week on the Paria Peninsula followed by a few days at Juliet's place in New York City .

No one told us before we arrived at the Caracas airport at midnight that the bridge between the airport and the city had been out for over a month. The only way to get to Carcacas, where we had a hotel reservation, was to take the road through the mountains, and that would take somewhere between 3 and 8 hours. So we stayed in hotel near the airport and flew to the Paria Peninsula the next day instead of driving the rental car we'd planned to rent in Caracas.

The following morning we went back to the airport and bought one way tickets to Carupano, the capital of the state of Sucre. You'd think we'd have bought round trip tickets, but for some reason the airline, Avior, wasn't selling those. We found out why later on!

Since our flight wasn't until 3:30 in the afternoon, we went to see a little of La Guaira, the oldest port city in Venezuela.