US Virgin Islands : St John.

19 - 22th April 2013

The island of St John is pretty much all National Park except for a small section on the western tip around the the town of Cruz Bay. As this would be our final visit to the island  before heading west to Puerto Rico we decided to spend a few days on the south side where we hadn’t been before. But before I get into what we did and where we went,  I just want to mention a quick word to our fellow cruisers about  visa requirements for the US Virgin Islands. Forewarned is forearmed. 

Entering the United States Virgin Islands (USVI’s) on a foreign flagged yacht from the British Virgin Island’s (BVI’s) can be a bit of a pain if you, and / or your visitors, have purchased  an online USA 90 day  ESTA visa.This type of  visa can only be activated by arriving on a commercial carrier into mainland USA or her territories. So if you are in the BVI’s that will  mean finding a suitable place to leave your boat for the day and then hopping on a ferry to either St John or St Thomas. The ferry cost is a tad expensive at $60 per person but there is really no way around it..The fast ferries run out of both Road Town and Sopper’s Hole on Tortola and from Great Harbour on Jost Van Dyke.

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St John Island

Leaving the BVI’s in our wake a lively 15-20 kt breeze pushed us along from behind. We were heading to Cruz Bay  on the island of St John some 12 miles away. Here we’d where we’d meet up with our friend Ross who had to take the ferry across in order to activate his ESTA visa. Every so often we look back for the ferry but it was nowhere to be seen. Time slipped by and before we knew it we were halfway across and the ferry still hadn’t passed us, which it should have. The thought crossed our minds that it may have  been cancelled and that Ross was stranded back on  Jost Van Dyke. If that was the case it would mean turning around and bashing back into a stiff wind and big seas, and let’s face it, no-one in their right mind ever wants to do that !

A quick call to the ferry office kind of put our minds at ease. The man on the other end of the phone told us in a very laid back tone “no worry mon, ferry late, it will come”.That was all well and good for him to say, but did he mean later this morning, this afternoon or god forbid tonight. Pressing for a more accurate time frame the response was “ maybe 20 minutes, maybe 40 minutes, don’t know mon”. Once again this didn’t really instill us with confidence but then this is the Caribbean after all. Thankfully a half hour later, the ferry went tearing past us like a bat out of hell. It was a very welcome sight to say the least.

Our first stop after anchoring in Cruz Bay  was to check in with Customs and Immigration. With the paperwork taken care of we found Ross and went for a stroll through town and a bite to eat.There are loads of little eating places right along the waterfront and we settled on a cheery looking place with very friendly staff. The busy streets are a mix of local and tourist shops. It’s a funky little place but because the anchorage is very tight and there is a 2hr time limit we didn’t stay long.The wind was still pretty strong so we tucked up inside Cannel bay for the evening.

Little Lampshire Bay on the south side of the island was our next anchorage.The maps and guides that we picked up from National Park HQ showed a myriad of hiking trails criss-crossing the island. We chose the one that would take us to some rock carvings known as Petroglyphs.The trail led us up hill and down dale through dry creek beds and lush greenery.

After a hot 6 kms we arrived at the carvings. Some of them looked like they were from another world, not at all what I had in mind.

The following in an except from the signage near by . “These Petroglyphs were carved around 900-1500AD by the pre Columbian Tanio and their ancestors. The carvings exemplify the designs found on ceremonial Taino pottery. The  pool and symbols were sacred dwelling places and ritualistic sites for the spirits of their ancestors.The spring fed pool stays at nearly the same level despite rainfall, causing an interesting and perhaps intended mirror effect of the petroglyphs, a duality of the spiritual and living worlds often reflected in Taino art “

                                         

Back tracking  down  the trail we branched off towards the coast on the Reef Bay trail which took us to an old rum factory. The ruins were quite interesting and the big vats and some of the machinery used to make the rum were still intact. Not far from the ruins we stumbled across a couple of old graves. With no engraved headstones we could only assume that they belonged to either the owners or workers of the  factory.                                                                      

                                  

We visited one more ruin on our way back to the boat, The Great House. Again a lack of information left us wondering who had occupied this isolated place on the top of the ridge, miles from nowhere.

 

The walk back was not half as strenuous as the walk up. It had taken us about four hours for the round trip and was well worth the effort.  Back at the bay we found lots more ruins of what appeared to be houses . Some of the walls were made from pieces of coral joined together by mortar.They had certainly stood the test of time and were a credit to their builders.

Feeling pretty stuffed after the long hike in the noon day sun the rest of the afternoon was very laid back. A bit of swimming, a little snorkeling  an early dinner and off to bed.

          

          

We spent two more days on St John and again both days were full on. Saltpond Bay  a little further along the south coast was just the most idyllic spot. A crescent shaped beach with wonderfully clear water greeted us as we made our way into the anchorage. As this bay is also part of the national park you must use one of the mooring balls provided, but during our stay no-one came to collect the fee.

 

Turtles swam around the boat and the sea floor was littered with conch shells ready for the picking. Park regulations say that you can take six conch per day per person which we did. Conch is like a large rubbery snail which when marinated in lime juice and mixed with peppers, onion and tomatoes makes a fabulous salad. The trick is to get the flesh out of the shell in one go, not an easy thing for the novice! Apart from some great snorkeling we hiked over to the Saltpond and on to the ocean side of the bay where industrious visitors had left their mark with unusual  beach art from an unending supply of broken coral.

          

From there we climbed the rather taxing hill to the top of Ram’s Head passing through pastures of amazing Turk’s Head cactus along the way. I reckon they look like little people watching you.

        

          

                       

On the way back down my faithful pair of sandals had a major blow out.The trusty pair of Rivers that had carried me through over 30 countries since leaving Sydney back in 2006 finally turned up their toes.They could take no more and their soles were laid to rest in the park trash bin at the end of Saltpond beach.    

 

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One last whirl around the British Virgin Islands.

4th – 19th April 2013

Our final weeks in the BVI’s were spent showing a long time friend from Australia around. Ross, the hubby of my best friend Pam, had flown in from Portugal following a delayed  delivery of a yacht across the Atlantic, he pulled the pin after waiting 5 weeks in Lisbon for the weather to settle down. Ross was last on board GWTW before we left Sydney back in 2006, so  it was nice to have him with us and  show him this part of the Caribbean that we like so much. His timing couldn’t have worked better as we were docked at The Moorings charter base marina  in Tortola for a couple of days finishing off some fiberglass repairs to the boat, so moving his gear onboard didn’t require the usual salty dinghy ride. The Moorings base is very impressive with berthing for over 500 charter boats. The place hums with activity and runs like a well oiled machine on any given day, but particularly so on  charter guest change-over day.

Aussie cruising friends, Karel and Phil  from “Tehani Li” were anchored just outside the marina while we were there, and they joined the three of us one evening for a swim and a couple of “painkillers”  by the pool. Welcome to the cruising life Ross !

Two days later with our  repairs finished we headed over to Norman Island where we caught up with Toni and Bruce from “Remi De”. Pretty soon Ross got the hang of how we spend most of our days out here. Apart from an endless list of boat chores, we’ve found that hiking, reading, snorkeling and catching up with friends, manages to fill in our days quite nicely.

This year we’ve had three sets of visitors join us in various parts of the Caribbean and the one thing that’s amazed them all  is the incredible clarity of the water. Liam and I are used to it these days but for first timers, it’s just mind blowing. There’s usually an abundance of pretty reef fish and a good mix of colourful  corals.The underwater world just never ceases to amaze us.

From Norman Island we day hopped north stopping at many good anchorages and snorkeling spots along the way. They included the 1867 wreck of the steamship HMS Rhone lost during a hurricane, Deadman’s Bay on Peter Island, where Ross got up close and personal with a turtle, Marina Cay which has a fabulous reef and the huge and very popular rock formations of The Baths.

                  

 

As always, our life out here on the water is dominated by the weather. We’d been in the weather god’s good books for a while but now strong winds were  forecast over the coming days, so we high- tailed it to the protected waters of North Sound on Virgin Gorda. Here we met up with more friends, Daryl and Annie off “No Rehearsal”. You really don’t have to go far before you bump into someone you know around here. We’d heard that the rather new and very gucci Yacht Club Costa Smerelda, sister club to the one in Porto Cervo Sardinia but not nearly as stuck up, put on an excellent lunch so the five of us decided to give it a whirl and we weren’t disappointed .The staff were super friendly and the food and prices good value. It was just a shame we didn’t take our swimmers with us as hanging the pool for a few hours would have topped off the afternoon perfectly.

                                                                              

 

 

 

 

 

 

            

Continuing on our 3rd circumnavigation of the BVI’s this season, we said goodbye to our friends and sailed over to Monkey Point, although we are yet to see any monkey’s there. This is a bay where the big Tarpon hang out and it was pretty neat swimming with them.

These gentle giants can grow as long as seven feet and weigh in at at 45kgs! The ones that we shared the water with were around 4-5ft long, and that was plenty big enough for us.

Along with a heaps of other types of fish, literally millions of tiny bait fish live here as well. At times they were so thick you couldn’t see anything else. That was until Mr Tarpon came along looking for his dinner and then bait fish made like the parting of the Red Sea.

After a few hours of snorkeling we moved over to another of our favourite places, Cane Garden Bay on the north-west side of Tortola. 

The shoreline  here is dotted with little cafes and sand-between-your- toes type beach bars.There is usually live music in the evenings and Myett’s serve a great eggs benedict for breaky.  As a added bonus there is also a good supermarket just a stone's throw from the beach. The bay has a lovely feel to it with the long white sandy beach backed by a line of beautiful palm trees. It’s a popular spot with both charters and cruisers. The charters pay their $30 and  take the mooring balls and the cruisers set up camp in the front row on their anchors. This arrangement works really well for both types of sailors.

  

Tortola, the largest and most populated Island in the BVI’s ’s stretches 19 x 5km with it’s highest peak sitting at 530m.We’ve sailed around it many times but have never ventured inland. As the forecast wasn’t brilliant for the coming days hiring a car for a little sightseeing sounded like a good idea.The island is fairly mountainous and  we were told that most of the roads were very steep and narrow. That could make for an interesting trip!

Setting out early we headed  south-west past the locally famous Bomba Shack, a well known beach venue that hosts raging full moon parties. Judging from the amount of underwear adorning the outside of the shack it seems that it’s a weird tradition to leave a used memento behind, testament to a fun night out we guessed. Not quite your family friendly scene me thinks.

      

Moving right along our next stop was at a popular tourist stop named Sopper’s Hole.

 

Sitting at the far western end of the island this is the first port of entry for anyone sailing across from the USVI’s or islands further west .It’s a smallish bay that’s dominated by marinas, mooring balls, ferry traffic and surrounded by brightly coloured shops and restaurants. Completely by chance we ran into American friends Ashlyne, Ross and their son Kyler from the catamaran “Good Trade” who had  just an hour before arrived from Puerto Rico. It had been over a year since our paths had crossed so our unplanned meeting  morphed into a chatfest and coffee stop.

Ross had been with us for only 12 days at this stage and he was very quickly coming up to speed on who all our cruising friends were and what they had all been up to. Driving further along the south eastern  shore  we passed through the busy main settlement, Road Town, and then continued on to Trellis Bay, the most easterly point on Tortola. From here our not so fearless driver Liam, (he really doesn’t do steep, narrow, winding  mountain roads very well)  took us back up the sheer ridge that runs the length of the island, over the top and back down the other side to Cane Garden Bay.

            

To be honest there’s not a lot of exciting things to see on the island, but for a day out away from the boat there was plenty  to keep us occupied.

Time waits for no one  and with that in mind the following day we took off to the Island of Jost Van Dyke. We’d been here many times before but had never made it to the “bubbly pool”. As the north wind had settled down over the past few days we knew that the surf wouldn’t be gushing in over the rocks and making the water “boil”, but we decided to hike out and  give take a look anyway. When the swell is really pumping the pool can be quite dangerous and apparently a few weeks before a tourist had been sucked out through the rocks with the surge and died. That certainly was not an issue on our visit.  

With the bubbly pool ticked off the list we moved further down the Island on to the next attraction, White Bay home of the Soggy Dollar Bar.The bay isn’t technically a bay as such but more a beach which is sheltered by a long offshore reef. The sand is incredibly white and the water colour is to die for. On a sunny day it’s pure heaven. White Bay is on the “A” list of tourist hotspots in the BVI’s and that is defiantly reflected in the number of charter boats that come and go during the day. The good thing is that they rarely spend the night  leaving this little piece of paradise for people like us.The photos below from the Soggy Dollar’s web cam are the proof of the pudding

  

At the far end of the beach, less frequented by the tourists, is “Ivan’s Stress Free Bar”.This little gem, which we much prefer, definitely lives up to it’s name as you can see in the photo on the right.The Soggy Dollar Bar may lay claim to being the birth place of the “Painkiller” but Ivan’s has it’s own signature beverage, “The Bushwacker”.  Made with coconut cream, kahlua, rum and  crème de cacao it’s goes down like a milkshake. Sipping one of these little beauties under a palm tree is about as good as it gets.

 

 

Leaving White Bay in our wake we motored around the headland to Great Harbour for our last night in the BVI’s. By now  Ross had seen just about everything the BVI’s had to offer,it was time to move on. Tomorrow we’d cross the border and sail across to the island of St John in the US Virgin Islands.

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Houston… we have a problem!

Yes I know, it’s been a while but we’re back.

Our Computer had a fatal meltdown and has just been rebuilt. Many thanks to Brian, the technical guru here in Beaverton Oregon.  So now we are up and running again, ready to pick up where we left off.

More postings coming soon!

Hang in there.

Thanks.

Annie and Liam

Chilling out in the BVI’s

17th March –4th April 2013

It was nice to be back in the British Virgin Islands after our little side trip out to Anegada. This part of the Caribbean really feels like our own backyard, we’ve been here so long and know it so well. t will be sad when in a way when we actually have to move on. Over the next two weeks we revisited many of our favourite bays and hung out with Remi De, No Rehearsal, and on their days off, our long time friends Gordon and Ginny who now work as captain and crew on a 45ft catamaran for Festiva Charters.

Deadman’s Bay on Peter Island is up the top of our list when it comes to lovely anchorages.

The snug bay, crescent shaped beach backed by palm trees, clear water and lots of  turtles and stingrays make it a special place for us.

As with  quite a few others in this part of the world it is a privately owned Island with a rather ritzy resort and a couple of very expensive homes high up on the hilltop that are available for rent. Apart from the anchorage itself, a couple of other things we like about the place is that it is very cruiser friendly. The management are quite happy to have people like us stroll around the resort, hike the trails and make use of their restaurants and bars as well as  their free wi-fi signal. They have even set as side a part of their beach complete with chairs and a the sign saying “For the use of visiting yachtsmen”, and presumably they mean yachtswomen as well !

 

While we were here Liam notched up another year on planet earth. Although the banner behind him in the picture says 60th, he was a tad older than that this year. I just couldn’t find a banner with the right number on it. We celebrated with the crew from Remi De and of course their two pooches, Ollie and Marley.

 

 

From here we moved a few miles west to another of our favourites, Norman Island. It used to be called Treasure Island back in the days of pirates because here they hid and buried  the treasures that had been looted. Some strong southerly winds were forecast and “The Bight” at Norman was a great place to hang for the next seven days until the strong winds had gone through. Norman is also a private Island and like Peter Island has everything we cruising folk usually have on our wish list. Free internet, somewhere to eat out if we want, clear waters, good snorkeling and diving and excellent holding for our anchor. There is also a runabout boat operated by a very enterprising fellow, which services Norman, Peter and Cooper Islands. “Deliverance” makes it’s rounds through the anchorages  and for a reasonable fee sells fresh fish, bags of ice, bread, beers, ice-creams, magazines etc and also will take away your garbage. What a great little business to have.

Another attraction, if you can call it that, is a floating bar-come-restaurant called the “Willie –T”. It is very popular with the holiday makers on the charter boats. Every day they rock into the bay and dinghy loads of happy revelers spend many hours imbibing at the bar. It’s a bit of a tradition that  after a few drinks you climb up on to the roof and jump off into the water below. Most people doing this are clad but as the afternoon wears on  and  the alcohol starts to remove their inhibitions some actually take their clothes off. Not a pretty sight at all and we much prefer it when their leave their gear on.. But the attraction of this place for us is not what goes on above the waterline but more  about what ends up on the seabed below. You see it’s like this, the silly people jumping off forget that they have money and phones in their pockets and sun glasses on their heads. The water under the Willie-T is 30ft deep so without scuba gear the owners of the lost items can’t recover them.You getting the picture here? So a little pastime for Liam and Bruce (Remi De) was to dive under the bar every couple of days and scoop up the booty. Bruce had much more lucrative finds than we did and his net result was 15 pairs of expensive sunglasses, a few cameras and phones and over $300 in cash. Not bad for a 10 minute dive every so often. So the island really did live up to it’s former name.

 

During our stay here at Norman my girlfriend from Sydney wrote asking if her hubby, Ross, could drop in and stay a few days . He was in over in Portugal to help deliver a boat across the Atlantic to the Caribbean. After 5 weeks the boat was still not ready and Ross could wait no longer. Of course we said yes to having him visit and he was due fly in in the next few days. We had also arranged for some more  fiberglass work to be done on the boat which meant that we would already be  in a marina so his timing couldn’t have been better. More about Ross’s visit in our next blog update.