I just got back from a week in the BVI. In stark contrast with almost every trip I made last year the weather was wonderful. Back to the BVI I know and love! Actually sailed the entire week without having to reef the main and the sun out every day. Last year we almost never saw the sun and had a reef in the main all the time. The only good weather week we really had last year was in Oct in the heart of the hurricane season-go figure!!

Observations from this year. Bringing half the cloths and twice the money will no longer work. Bring half the cloths and 3 times the money! Everything seems to have gone up this year. Saba rock buffet is up to 29.00. Taxi to Loblolly bay up to 8.00. Moorings balls 25.00 (increase was last year). Cruising taxes and other fee's going up 1 may.

Despite the cost increases tourism seemed to be booming. There were far more charter boats out this year then the same week last year. The Moorings and I suspect all charter companies are seeing record bookings. The Moorings is hiring more res agents to cover the demand.

Cruise ships were everywhere! However you can for the most part avoid them. We skipped Cane Garden Bay this year for the first time ever for that reason.

Everyone was talking about Tradewinds. It also seemed that every local on the island was owed money by tradewinds however I suspect that was a bit of an exaggeration. I did speak with two of the smaller companies that took tradewinds boats. Both reported the boats were in terrible shape. One reported that after going over the boat they had 7 pages of problems they felt had to be fixed before the boat could be placed in Charter. The other company said they would not take another Tradewinds boat due to the condition of the ones they did except. Lots of rumors as to why they folded that I won't post here since most involve missing money.

The snorkling and diving was excellent this spring. We saw far more turtles, rays, lobsters and larger fish then we had in recent years. Large Lobsters seemed to be everywhere when we went diving. Turtles were everywhere including seeing several of the huge sea turtles offshore. Fishing was OK however we only caught two small Wahoo this year in the one day we fished contrast to Dec when large Wahoo seemed to be jumping into the boat.

Overall we had a great trip however the cost increases are starting to worry me. Starting to wonder if the time is coming to look for another place to sail. Still love the BVI but double digit increases every year are going to start pricing people out of the market. Keeping my fingers crossed the logic will finally prevail and the sanctions will be dropped against Cuba. It will be an amazing sailing area when that finally happens.

George