The Araya Peninsula

To escape from the bustle of Cumaná, we decided to make a day trip to the Araya peninsula. It's attached to the mainland, but is long and thin and so the most efficient way of getting there is by sea. Little boats depart every couple of minutes, so we took one, and after a bumpy ride of twenty minutes arrived in Manicuare. The peninsula's main attractions are the salt mines and the old Spanish fort, both in the town of Araya, so we rode in the back of a pickup truck (I'm not making this up, I swear) along a lumpy road to there.

Araya has Venezuela's biggest salt deposits, and that attracted the Spanish a couple of centuries ago (must have wanted it for their paellas). So valuable was salt (whence "salary", by the way) that they built a fort to protect the mines. Eventually the area flooded with water so the Spanish left, but now the Venezuelas exploit the mines for themselves. The company used to be called "Salaraya" - quite a clever pun, I thought - but was nationalised post-Chavez, and is now "Ensal". It's hard to see much salt mining going on - it's all enclosed behind high walls - but we caught glimpses of massive expanses of white salt flats. The fort is still in pretty good nick (for Venezuela, that is). There's no gate or anything, so you can just clamber around it (like the wild goats do). We took a few nice pictures, paddled in the sea, had a drink in a bar and then caught a different ferry back (bigger, and direct from Araya itself to Cumaná). Very pleasant day, all in all!

So, Isla Margarita tomorrow. It's one of the most exclusive places in the country, full of rich Venezuelans, so it should be in better nick than Cumaná :-).