I was hoping for a tour today and in particular the tour to the islands. You have to be early, just in case, but I had to wait for more than one hour and a half before the first tourists turned up. It was a difficult day for the sales people to close a good deal of a tour with the few tourists that arrived at the parking. I tried to wait until the last minute for the island tour and in case negative I would decide to go to the island opposite, Cayo Muerto. The sales people knew me by now and knew what I wanted ideally for today. It would have been a good tour for them and a good tour for me. I transmitted positive energy and they transmitted a whole lot of sales skills.

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At the end it worked out and a young couple turned up who really were looking for something special. I could not tell if it was their honeymoon, but they looked at least like newly in love. The asking price was high for the tour to the islands and you needed quite some skills to achieve the asking price and not negotiate down and give up your profit. My driver indicated to me that possibly I would have to help out and pay more than I actually wanted. I was tired of waiting and this was the best chance today to go for the most expensive tour. I agreed.

The couple still went to the shops close by to organize a cooler, ice and some drinks. We left Chichiriviche and drove towards Cayo Sombrero, but just before reaching the island we turned into the mangroves and drove quite a bit up to the point where I could see the skyline of Tucacas. We stopped in the middle of the water away from both the main land and the mangroves. This was the home of the starfish colony. The assistant jumped into the water and dived to the sandy ground and returned with a starfish in his hands and passed him on to me. I was fascinated, I expected the star fish to be soft and maybe moving his arms but this was not the case. The start fish was hard, almost like a stone and did not move at all.

We moved on to Los Juanes, a very extensive low water area bordering the mangroves to one side, the open sea to another and a lake to yet another. My couple entered the transparent water which was low enough that you could perfectly stand.

Out of the mangroves appeared two couples with a floating sales stand and offered various types of seashells, oysters and shrimps with lemon. I refused, not because I was not hungry or I might not like it, simply because I expected the price to be out of my budget for the day. The couple accepted the offer to try mussels and to try more and more and ended up eating a plate of mixed seafood with onions and a special lemon, tomato, spicy sauce. The final price, for what started with simply trying was nearly 5000 Bolivares, same amount they had paid for the tour. That was the reason why I did not try in the first place.

We continued to Cayo Sombrero to be dropped off and picked up at an agreed time. I was a little disappointed about the golden and most expensive tour and decided to stay on board and return with my driver. I had been on Cayo Sombrero the last two days and did not want to stay another half day. My driver looked at me very surprised, thinking I had another technical problem and took me back to the village. I drove back to Tucacas for the better dinner and the better sleeping place. I wanted to spend yet another special day tomorrow working in my cyber.

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