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Ondas del Lago
Contributed Content
Steve Sleightholm
Steve's Venezuela Memoirs
The Creole Beach
Steve Sleightholm's Venezuela Memoirs
The Creole Beach
Oh glorious summer break from high school!!!
Creole had purchased a spit of land toward the mouth of the lake beyond
Palmarejo and was beginning to build a beach club there for its employees. Many
of the fathers were spending their weekends there working on the main pavilion,
etc. Dan Allen Sweeney's dad, Dan, was contributing his time as well.
I think it was Dan Allen who suggested that we go the beach for a week as I
recall and so, Dan and his brother Sherman, Randy and Mike Lanciault and I were
dropped off at the compound. We brought a canvas tarp, machetes, sleeping bags,
a cooler of ice with eggs bacon and butter and, a fry pan, straw hats, a Coleman
lantern and bathing suits and a strong belief that we could overcome any
obstacle.
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We built a lean-to out of scrap lumber and threw the
tarp over it for shelter from the elements and we built a small cook
fire just outside the entrance. We were ready for fun!! A pontoon
platform had been anchored to the lake bottom about 100 feet off shore
from the beach and we would swim out to it and lay there toasting in the
sun (that contributed to why I now have premature liver spots on the
backs of my hands). |
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When the tide was going out the water current off the beach was very swift
and the platform took on a significant slant against the current and became
something like a ski ramp. That made it even more fun.
There was a little cantina not far from the beach and we would head over there
for cervesas. A local fisherman had caught a huge sting ray which lay out in the
sun and I cut off its tail which was about three feet long and dried it in the
sun and it became a wicked whip that I had for many years.
The wind would whip through the coconut palms along the beach and we learned to
eat scrambled eggs without biting down in order to avoid the grating of the sand
in teeth. Ummmm, good eggs.
There were a number of areas where the land jutted out into the lake with
shallow bays and you could walk across the bays to explore them but you had to
shuffle your feet so that you did not step on the many sting rays that lay
covered with sand and invisible to the eye. If you walked far enough along the
beaches you would reach the mouth of the lake where the water turned to salt
water and you could look out into the bay at the mouth of the lake. It was
beautiful.
At sunset I used to go out to jutting points of land overhanging with palms and
I would sit and watch the splendid sunsets and then the lights of Maracaibo
starting to wink in the distance across the lake.
Now nights were a different matter, we all crowded into the lean-to and
attempted to sleep but you could hear a crashing and shuffling in the underbrush
which kept us awake. So we decided to find out what was making the racket and
taking the Coleman lantern in hand and arming ourselves with machetes and poles
we had cut for hiking around we started looking for the source and what we
finally located were land crabs. Huge ugly things with one massive claw. The
hunt was on!! We were able to catch a number of them and we tied them to a palm
tree and went back to get some sleep but the mosquitoes kept us up most of the
night. In the morning we determined that the crabs were edible and we found a
sizeable bucket and filled it with fresh water and boiled the crabs and had a
fine feast. After that land crabs in the immediate area became scarce.
I recall walking out into the lake until about waist deep at night with the
Colman lantern held high and waiting for the fish to swarm around me and I used
to flay away at them with my machete. Never got one as I recall but darn near
sliced my legs as the blade would twist when it entered the water.
I remember that Mr. Rincon, the husband of our former Spanish instructor at the
staff school had set up a small campsite in a little trailer down near the beach
where he was camping and he invited us over and offered us fresh oysters that he
picked from the rocks at the entrance to the lake and he invited us to go out
with him which we did and you could lean over the side of his skiff and pull
large oysters from the stones. We filled a bucket and took them back to his camp
and had fresh oysters on the half-shell with fresh lime juice, catsup and
Tabasco sauce with a cold cervesa.
The Sunday we were to return, Dan Allen's father arrived on the scene towing a
ski boat that he had borrowed from someone. He put it in the water and began to
tow Dan Allen and his brother, Sherman, and eventually invited the rest of us to
ski. I had never water skied before and I could not get the hang of getting up
on the skis. Each time, I incurred a fresh-water enema and finally stood up but
Dan's father's boat was very powerful and he would open the throttle and I would
skip across the water with my legs spread and Dan's father gave me the nickname
of "Flecha" which was the name of the high-speed passenger catamarans that now
operated from Cabimas to Maracaibo. If you fell off the skis when the boat was
at peak speed you actually bounced along the waves before you went under. For
you who knew him, Dan Sweeney's father was the greatest guy. He loved kids and I
think he had a bit of kid in him. My father and mother were longtime friends of
the Sweeneys.
That week has remained burned into my memory ever since. I have clear pictures
of the beach compound, my friends and their parents there and the things we did
-- that contributed to another great summer in Venezuela.
We returned to the beach several times that summer to swim and while away lazy
summer days with our friends.
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