BVI family trip report<br><br>I will tailor this report to highlight our experience from a family standpoint as there are many trip reports for couples/adults only. Hopefully families who are considering a similar trip will read it and take the plunge! You will definitely not regret it. Hopefully it won’t be too long or boring???? There were five of us ( 2 parents, 3 kids—6,9,12) on a 3800 from moorings. We mostly ate on board as I have a difficult time paying for $25 for an entrée for a 6 yr old. We are not big drinkers either although I did dutifully try at least one painkiller at each stop! Before proceeding, I want to thank the people on this board as their help was invaluable and I am sure we would not have had nearly as good a time without their suggestions. I especially want to thank Michel (sailonline) and GeorgeC1 who gave me so much good advice. <br><br>Left San Francisco for overnight to O’Hare and then on to STT on United. Trip went well and we arrived in STT on time. I had arranged for Smith ferry to pick us up at airport to catch ferry to West End. This went well and we arrived in West End and were picked up by Moorings on time (which I thought was pretty good it being Easter Sunday).<br><br>At Moorings base we were able to check in and have boat briefing right away but had to wait until next morning for chart briefing. We did a sleep-aboard the night before. We had chartered a 3800 Cat using owner’s time I saw on sailonline. I recommend sailonline to all my friends now because this turned out to save us about $3000! The owner was very nice and the whole deal went very smoothly. We were not treated any different by Moorings even though this was an owner’s time charter. The cat was in good shape and everything seemed to be in good working order.<br><br>I had provisioned with Bobby’s which arrived late (7:30 PM instead of 6:00PM but this was actually good cause I was having the boat briefing then) but again it was Easter Sunday. The people were great from Bobby’s!<br><br>My husband and kids spent the first evening and the first morning at the pool. If you eat at the Moorings base, ask for the sandwich menu as it is about one third the price and better food choices for kids anyway (thanks for the tip on this George!)<br> We left at about 10:00AM and headed for Benures Bay on Norman. With the recent storm the wind was directly against us and we got our first taste of what it is like trying to go upwind in a cat. It was impossible to get much closer than about 60 degrees and we had little headway. Finally ended up motoring the rest of the way. We wanted to stay at Benures because the Bight sounded too noisy and crowded to me. We didn’t have any trouble anchoring there but in the night the wind shifted around quite a bit with it pushing us back towards the rocky shore. We had out about a scope of 5 with all chain so though we worried we didn’t move much or get close to the rocks. The snorkeling was great at Benures with the best being between the two major anchoring areas off a little beach. Beautiful coral and many fish. The kids were delighted to see their first sea turtle soon after we got there. My six year old was initially apprehensive to snorkel in water well over her head but within minutes was shuttling around in her PFD without hesitation.<br><br>The next day we motored over to the caves which were quite rough with incoming storm. I would have to say that we preferred Benures to the caves despite their reputation. Winds were above 15kn in AM but died down to less than five by the afternoon. We had to moor fairly far away and dinghy over due to the number of people there. Interestingly, as we were dinghying (?sp) back a moorings boat passed by and yelled something about a hurricane! It turned out to be a tropical storm off Bermuda but they looked like they were high tailing it back to base! We left the caves and tried to sail up to Manchioneel Bay on Cooper but wind now non-existent so had to motor. Manchioneel was crowded but it was nice to have a mooring ball after a restless night at Benures. Went ashore and had a few drinks and made some sandcastles. Beach was OK but not as nice as I had expected. It rained off and on most of the day.<br><br>The next day we got up early and motored over to the Baths to avoid the crowds. Despite getting there before 8 AM, it was already very crowded and mooring balls were in short supply. Also it was very rough! Wind was out of the West and it rained very heavily all the way over from Manchioneel. Several attempts at first mooring ball were unsuccessful as ball didn’t have a line to attach to and my husband was unable to get to line below the ball. Several people waved us on up to free ball that was close to shore. With wind coming from west and heading directly into wind and parallel to shore, we approached the ball. Just before we got to the ball in 20 feet of water by my depth meter we hit a rock!!! This was absolutely the scariest, worst feeling I have ever had in a sailboat (although I am a novice). Because we had a cat it was easy to maneuver away from the submerged boulder but I never want to do that again. Things got very quiet on the boat for awhile but we found another outside mooring ball and tied up there. We surveyed for damage and luckily didn’t find anything other than maybe some scratched paint. Rudder and prop untouched. I consider ourselves very lucky and wonder why the national park buoy is so close to a rock like that. I later saw a monohull tied up there and cringed just seeing it. The wind had shifted around to south by then though so they were probably okay. After tying up off Devil’s bay we dinghied ashore which was difficult as surge was strong. Just as we took off for shore the Corinthian (BEYC) dumped about 40 snorkellers at the Baths. They worked their way around to Devils bay so we did the Crawl over to the Baths. The kids liked the path to the Baths and this turned out to be the highlight of the area. At the Baths some other tour group arrived and by 9:00 there were dozens more people with identical towels hiding almost all the sand at the baths. The water was full of people and due to the surge there wasn’t a lot to see. We hiked back to Devil’s bay and dinghied back to the boat. We left the area at about 11AM and I would have to say that we were all very disappointed with The Baths after hearing such raves about it. We tried to sail on to Gorda Sound but again the wind never really got much above 5 knots so we motored most of the way. We got to the Sound in early afternoon and went ashore to use pool and shower. Had a nice dinner at the pub and generally just relaxed.<br><br>The next day we decided to spend another night here moored at BEYC. We dinghied over to Eustacia sound and reef which we really liked. The reef was very shallow and great for the kids. The beaches in this area are very nice and very few people. The kids spotted a manta ray and followed it for a while. Later we went into BEYC to use pool and have a few drinks. Gave the kids dinghy captain lessons with my younger daughter being particularly adept at steering!<br><br>The next day we got going early with Savannah Bay our goal. The winds were still light at 8-10 kn but we were able to broad reach down to Blowing point and carefully enter into the bay. I must say that Savannah was the highlight of my trip and exactly what I was looking for in the BVI. The beach was absolutely beautiful with white sand and almost no one on it. The snorkeling was also excellent with many fish and beautiful coral. Next time I would like to stay overnight here if possible. By the time we left the winds had picked up to 15+ and we sailed over to Marina Cay averaging about 5-7 knots. Went in to Marina Cay and had snacks and drinks.<br><br>We left Marina cay about 8 the next morning and motored over to Monkey point to snorkel. We really enjoyed this area as well with calm snorkeling and a nice little beach to play on. Lee Bay looks nice and plan on exploring this next time we come. Left Monkey pt around mid day and sailed down to Cane Garden Bay. We moored easily here and went ashore here to shop and play on the beach. The beach area was nice for sand castles and playing in water. Spent the evening listening to the battle of the bands that night!<br><br>Left Cane Garden Bay early to get to Sandy Cay. There was quite a bit of wind and surge out there but dinghied ashore and had fun playing on the beach. Snorkelling was difficult as surge and waves were up and reef area was under waves. From Sandy Cay we motored over past the new Foxy’s which doesn’t look to be open yet but there are about 10 mooring balls there that look like they would be nice to stay at if no surge. We anchored at Green cay and had lunch and swam. Very nice beach and area. We motored over to White Bay but we couldn’t find any space to anchor so went back to great harbor where we anchored. Saw lots of people have trouble anchoring here and I couldn’t check my anchor because the visibility was so poor. We went in to Foxy’s which had disappointing drinks and food. Overall Great Harbour wasn’t so great. A big cat came in later and anchored right over our anchor and was very close to us all night causing some restless sleep and late night checks. Throughout my stay I seemed to see people anchoring in very strange ways. Rarely did I see anyone put out anything approaching a scope of 5. What seemed most common was to let out about a scope of 2 to 3 and then go in reverse until it caught. This wasn’t how I was taught but I never saw anyone drag so maybe this sort of technique works too. <br><br>The next day we motored over to White bay to get a spot when the people left in the morning. We got a nice spot and spent a good part of the day on the beach, sitting in the hammock and trying out real and virgin painkillers at soggy dollar. Kids played on a water trampoline down the beach too. White bay was really very nice and I would like to stay here overnight sometime too. I snorkeled a little on the reef but surge was very strong from southeast. We left in early afternoon and had to motor directly into wind for 2-3 hours to get to Deadman's on Peter. This was to be our last night on the boat so we wanted to be near to Road town. Deadman’s is a very nice beach which we had entirely to ourselves. We didn’t get a chance to snorkel here but kayaking was fun. Because the surge was from southeast this area was well protected.<br><br>Our last day….sailed over to Road Town and arrived about 10:30 for check-out. I got a chance to see a lot of the other boats that had recently returned and concluded I had spent too much time cleaning out our boat. Moorings took us over to Lambert Beach Resort which we liked (except the food) and we left early the next morning Beef Island to SJU to O’Hare to San Jose (Oakland flight cancelled).<br><br>As I said it was a great trip (my husband said it was the best vacation we have ever had) and we will definitely be chartering again soon.<br><br>Lori<br>