17 March 2012 Gorda Sound, BVI
We had a lie-in and then pottered about for most of the day. I managed to get an Internet connection, so I caught up on updating my website. Glenys read a book and made up an itinerary for the next two weeks, so that we make the most of our short two week stay here in the BVI.
In the afternoon, we went snorkelling in a couple of places. The water is lovely and clear and there is plenty of healthy reef. I’m looking forward to going scuba diving.
We were invited over for sun downers on “Melvin” by Terry and Julie. Four beers later, Glenys magically produced a pizza for our dinner which really hit the spot.
18 March 2012 Gorda Sound, BVI
We were up early and keen to go for a dive. We motored over to the Dog Islands aiming to pick up a Marine Park mooring. I was annoyed because, of the five moorings that were on the Marine Park map, three were for commercial Boats only and one was missing. I have a guide to some of the dive sites and it would appear that all the moorings in good dive locations are reserved for dive boats. So why have I paid $100US for a mooring permit? I’m hoping that there are more moorings in the more popular places - otherwise I’ll be really grumpy…
Fortunately, we were able to pick up the only yacht mooring available. It was 50 metres from the dive site that I wanted to do, so we put our gear into the dinghy and tied the dinghy off the commercial mooring – at least a dive boat would still be able to use the mooring.
The dive was called Bronco Billy and was excellent, going through an underwater arch and through canyons cut into the rocky island. The water was nice and clear and there was a lot of fish and reef life.
It was raining when we surfaced, so we sorted out our diving gear and motored over to Great Dog Island to check out the Marine Park moorings there. This is a more popular place and there were four yacht moorings and two commercial moorings. We might come back here for a dive.
We motored back to Gorda Sound and anchored off Prickly Pear Island near to “Notre Vie”. We ran our dive compressor and filled our two tanks ready for tomorrow. We went to Happy Hour at Saba Rock with “Notre Vie” and had two Pussers Painkillers, which are extremely lethal rum cocktails.
As we were leaving the bar, we spotted “Blackthorne Lady” anchoring, so we went over for a quick chat. We’ll come back here tomorrow and have a beer with them.
Glenys made a cracking Beef Vindaloo for dinner.
19 March 2012 Gorda Sound, BVI
We had a late start and then went around to Mountain Point to do a dive. We picked up a yacht mooring which was (again) 100 metres from the best dive site. A tourist snorkelling boat came in and picked up the commercial dive mooring over the dive site, so I went over and they said that it was okay for us to tie our dinghy alongside them on their mooring.
It was a good dive called Mountain Point. We spotted a Nurse Shark lurking in a small cave, went through an underwater canyon through the headland to a deeper reef. The water was clear and there was plenty of sea life to look at. I took some really naff pictures because I didn’t position my strobe very well – I really need to do some more practice.
We had lunch while on the mooring and then motored back to Eustatia Island, which is a little bit off the beaten track - there were only three other boats in the anchorage. We anchored away from everyone else and ran our dive compressor for 40 minutes.
After half an hour of chilling out, we decided to go to the anchorage in Gorda Sound through the coral reefs. The light was pretty good so it was fairly easy, if a little stressful. The minimum depth that we had was 3 metres which is quite deep.
We anchored off Saba Rock and went to Happy Hour with Ian & Jacqui from “Blackthorn Lady”. One beer and two Pussers Painkillers made it a very convivial reunion. It was great to catch up with them again. They were going to go up to the East Coast of the States, so we were hoping to bump into them along the way, but now they’re planning to spend the hurricane season in the Dominican Republic. I hope that we’ll see them again somewhere.
20 March 2012 Gorda Sound to Haulover Bay, Cooper Island, BVI
We set the alarm clock, dragged ourselves out of bed at seven o’clock, pulled up the anchor and had breakfast while we were motoring along the coast of Virgin Gorda. Our aim was to get down to The Baths and pick up a mooring before the hordes of charter boats arrive. The Baths is an area where there are huge granite boulders on the shore creating a series of caves and tunnels. The sea floods in, creating still pools where the sunlight causes interesting lighting effects. It’s a very popular place and the thirty or so moorings are quickly taken.
We arrived at The Baths at half past eight to find that all of the moorings were already taken and there were ten boats in the anchorage further up the coast. The rules for the Marine Park forbid anyone staying on a mooring overnight, but it’s obvious that people picked up the moorings yesterday. It was chaos with dinghies flashing about and people swimming ashore. We decided that it wasn't worth the effort because the peaceful caves wouldn't be very peaceful with hundreds of people milling about.
We turned south west, unfurled the jib and gently sailed to Ginger Island where we picked up a Marine Park mooring. Again there are six moorings around the island and five of them are commercial only. I can feel a stroppy email coming on.
We did the same as previous days and took our dinghy to one of the commercial moorings where we did a great dive called Alice in Wonderland. It has lovely coral reef ridges with sandy patches between. I had my camera set up better and took some good photos of a big Spiny Lobster that I found under a ledge.
After lunch, we motored around to Manchineel Bay on Cooper Island to buy some spare O-rings for our dive tank. The bay is packed with over fifty moorings – there is no place to anchor apart from a very deep patch at the south east end. After getting the O-rings, we went a mile around to Haulover Bay and anchored close to the shore under some big cliffs. There was only one other boat in this lovely place. Why on earth are people paying $25US to moor very close to other boats?
By the time that we had filled our scuba tanks and ran the watermaker, it was four o’clock. More boats had started to arrive in the anchorage and, by sunset, there were another ten anchored. The moorings in Manchineel Bay were obviously all taken. A Hallberg Rassey 41 called “Windfall” anchored close to us, so I went over and invited Per and Leana over for a beer. They’re Swedish and must have different customs to us because they arrived at half past five and didn’t go until nine o’clock by which time we were starving. I guess that they had an early dinner. Glenys rustled up a Spanish Omelette which quickly disappeared.
21 March 2012 Haulover Bay, Cooper Island, BVI
We had a bit of a lie in, chilled out for a couple of hours and then went for a dive on The Marie L which is a wreck of a 90 foot long freighter and three smaller vessels that were sunk specifically as a dive site. The water was clear again and the wrecks were interesting. There was a huge Barracuda inside one of the cabins which looked very threatening as we approached it – we kept our distance, but I managed to get a couple of good photos through a porthole. We saw a Lionfish for the first time in the BVI. They’re definitely well-established throughout the Caribbean.
After lunch, we had a nap – the four dives in four days have obviously exhausted us. Then I filled the dive tanks, ran the watermaker and it was time for a beer. We were invited over to “Windfall” for sun downers and managed to escape at half past seven. There were heavy rain showers coming through, so we had dinner down below for a change.
22 March 2012 Haulover Bay to Great Harbour, Peter Island, BVI
It was overcast and raining when we dragged ourselves out of bed. The weather brightened up, so we decided to have a day off diving and go over to Road Town to see if the exhaust elbow gasket has arrived, get a load of laundry done and buy some food – it’s been a week since we've been near a grocery shop. However, as we turned the corner out of the anchorage, we could see huge rain clouds building over Tortola, so we changed to Plan B and went to have a look how crowded the moorings were for the wreck of The Rhone.
There are six red, general use moorings and loads of yellow commercial moorings and to our great surprise there were two red moorings free, so we picked one of them up and did a scuba dive on the RMS Rhone. This Royal Mail Steamer was hit by a hurricane in 1867 and while trying to escape to the open sea, was forced onto the rocks on Salt Island. The wreck is split into two main sections – we did our dive on the deeper bow section which is very good. The water is very clear. The wreck is collapsing, but is still in remarkable condition considering that it sank one hundred and fifty years ago. There are thousands of fish that gather beneath the wreckage, in some places hundreds of large snappers in shoals.
A heavy rain squall hit just after we climbed back onto Alba, so we had to wait for an hour for clearer weather before dropping the mooring. We motored over to Peter Island and had a look at Deadman’s Bay, but the swell was hooking around the point of the bay making it rolly. The next bay was Great Harbour, which is not the best anchorage in the world as it is very deep in the middle. We anchored in a depth of ten metres near the north east peninsula. The wind swirls around in the bay and an hour later, we had to re-anchor because we were being pushed very close to the shore.
We filled our dive tanks and ran the watermaker again- we use quite a bit of water when we go diving because we rinse out the diving equipment. We had a quiet night in.
23 March 2012 Great Harbour to Key Bay, Peter Island, BVI
It rained a few times last night and there are stronger winds when the squalls go through. We left Great Harbour in the morning and anchored in Benures Bay on Norman Island. It’s quite sheltered in the bay, but the wind swirls around. There were only two yachts in the bay when we arrived and both of them were facing in completely opposite directions, so it was difficult to tell where to anchor.
We dropped our anchor in 10 metres of water near a yacht that was in the centre of the bay. The guy on board had definitely gone “tropo” – over sixty years old, shaggy grey beard, a beer belly and naked as a jay bird. Not the most pleasant sight. Initially, we were fifty metres away from him and close to the shore, but we started to pirouette around the anchorage in the light winds and ended up too close to the tropo yacht for my sanity.
So, after lunch, we motored around to The Bight which used to be a fantastic anchorage, but is now covered with the dreaded moorings. There is nowhere to anchor other than in very deep water or very close to the shore near a beach bar which is bound to be noisy. We left in disgust.
We motored over to Key Bay and anchored in the constant wind, off a nice beach next to a small island – ideal. The sky was mostly overcast all day with squalls giving long periods of heavy rain, so we just hunkered down and read our books. There’s an area of low pressure over the Bahamas which is causing this horrible weather – we’re going to have to get used to more variable weather as we head north.
It was miserable in the evening, so we had our Chicken Enchilladas down below.