Our group of three couples had three nights at Guavaberry Spring Bay prior to getting the boat on July 6 for our third BVI sailing trip. The three bedroom, Flamboyant, at Guavaberry exceeded our expectations. The three private ensuite bathrooms were a particularly pleasant surprise. It gave us a taste of a land based trip, and you could see the wheels turning in everyone’s mind about the possibilities of coming back with grandkids.
Snorkeling was our main activity throughout the trip. Spring Bay, the Baths, and a new-to-us beach, Mountain Trunk Bay, got us started. We drove the new road for dinner at Hog Heaven and stopped for a drink at Leverick. Top of the Baths, especially the pool, is a favorite of our group.
Picked up Incommunicado, a 2004 38’ Lagoon, from Mike at BareCat in Sea Cows Bay. We sailed her on our last trip in 2007 and really liked the layout. We also got a good deal…summer rate and 10 days for the price of 7. She is five years older, but had no significant issues during the trip.
We headed for Jost Van Dyke, as we wanted to attend church on Sunday and knew the Methodist church was an easy walk from the dinghy dock in Great Harbor. We hadn’t spent much time in Great Harbor on our two previous trips, and decided to take advantage of the mooring balls that have been installed.
We started with Sandy Cay, Foxy’s Taboo, and the Bubbly pool. Next day we snorkeled Sandy Spit and went on to Great Harbor where we had Foxy sing us a song about Seattle and ate his outstanding BBQ on Saturday night. Joyce, at the ice cream shop, attends the Methodist church and was able to give us the details on what time to be there. Tony, at the grocery next door, doesn’t attend there as he belongs to another denomination, but he pulled out a guitar and the musicians in our group were able to play and sing along with him to the inspirational songs he had playing on the sound system.
It was a delightful church service on Sunday morning. We were warmly welcomed and enjoyed the visiting speaker from Tortola.
Wrapped the dinghy painter around a prop as we got ready to leave for White Bay that afternoon. Doh! We usually used davits for the dinghy so no one was assigned dinghy painter duty. Got it freed without too much trouble, but by the time we got to White Bay Sunday afternoon, no mooring balls were available, so we turned around and did some snorkeling around Sandy Spit. Back to Great Harbor for the night.
Monday am, we got water and ice from Sherman in Great Harbor while my husband walked down to C&I to check us out of BVI for a trip to St. John. He came back empty handed as he didn’t have the necessary boat paperwork and a search of the boat didn’t turn it up. A phone call to the owners by Mike at BareCat eventually got us all the numbers we needed, but we decided to head to White Bay for the day and put off St. John until Tuesday. Plenty of mooring balls at White Bay and all the normal fun there. Olivia, who runs a small souvenir shop near Gertrudes, and her daughter Beyonce recognized us from church the previous day. One of the highlights of being on JVD for a few days was starting to recognize people and have them recognize us. For instance, we met a little girl named Charlotte at the Bubbly pool, then saw her again at Taboo and again the next day in Great Harbor. We later saw her picture in the paper as having graduated from the JVD Methodist pre-school.
That night, in White Bay, we noticed a large fish swimming near the boat. We shone a flashlight on it and several more showed up. Before long there were dozens and dozens of large tarpon schooling in the light of the flashlight and feasting on the small fry. Bats would occasionally dart through the light and we aren’t sure if they were after bugs or the tiny fish that were jumping to get away from the tarpons. It was simply amazing. I’ll try to post pictures. One of our party got in the water with them for a few minutes.
Tuesday we checked out of BVI and into/out of USVI, uneventfully. We spent the next three days moving from mooring ball to mooring ball near good snorkeling spots along the north side of St. John. It was great to be able to snorkel right off the back of the boat. We saw some great coral, plenty of rays, beautiful fish, and lots and lots of turtles. One of our party got some great underwater shots, so we were able to match his pictures to the pictures in the books to ID the fish.
We walked around the ruins at Caneel Bay Resort, hiked up to Peace Hill and the ruin there, and spent some time at the Annenberg ruins near Leinster Bay. A huge treat was dinner at the Maho Bay eco-tourism resort and the glass blowing exhibition. We “rescued” a stranded dinghy at Waterlemon Bay, by letting them use our cell phone and by getting their motor started. They had rented an inflatable for the day from Cruz Bay and had run into some problems.
All in all, St. John was wonderful.
On day 7 of 10, we checked back into the BVI at Soper’s Hole. We had a birthday dinner at Pussers and did some shopping.
Up early on Saturday to get to the Indians for early morning snorkeling. The waves were a bit too strong there, so we picked up a mooring ball near the Caves. We were there for the sun coming over the hill and the schools of fish having their morning feeding. Saw our first spotted eagle ray. Moved over towards Pirates and went in for drinks. Back out to the Indians, but no mooring balls available, so we snorkeled in the bay on the opposite side of the Bight from the Caves. Saw spotted ray number two among the amazing rock formations. Back to the Bight for the night.
We were first at the Indians the next morning. We rescued a Sunsail monohull who wrapped the mooring pennant around their prop. They were on day two and part of a flotilla.
After the Indians, we headed toward the Dogs, but because of heavy seas, changed plans and ducked into Trellis Bay. Did some shopping there before heading over to Marina Cay for the night. Noticed a Sunsail monohull on the shore near Marina Cay. Before it finally got free and on its own mooring ball, it also floated into a large power boat. There was a flotilla there and we hoped it wasn’t our friends from that morning. Never did find out. We had a relaxing last afternoon at Pussers and on the boat.
During the two weeks we were together, our group read and discussed a book, The Hole in our Gospel, by Richard Stearns, which talks about extreme poverty in much of the world and our response to it. Reading gut-wrenching stories of war and famine and disease was quite a juxtaposition to the dream vacation we were experiencing, and generated some heartfelt discussion.
