04/23/2009 British Virgin Islands (Round 2)

04/15/2009 John took off this morning. I received a call from Cliff. He was stuck in Philadelphia and would be a day late. No problem with that, I was ready for a day off. Cliff’s flight was delayed due to weather and he could not make his connection. That gave me some time to catch up on a few items around the boat.
04/16/2009 Cliff arrived around 3:30 today. We went off to the market, loaded up on our groceries. I decided I had enough of Red Hook for one week and we took off immediately for Jost Van Dyke. We are racing the sun across the channel to get in before sunset. We lost. We did make it into Great Harbor though.
After getting the anchor set, we took off for Foxy’s again. The atmosphere was the same, but Cliff was in love with the setting. It does sometimes take someone’s eyes to see the scene. The little town there on Jost is a few buildings along a main street that is sand. It sits right on the beach. This is such a different place for Cliff as he has just flown out of a cold dreary Michigan. We had a couple of drinks and worked our way down Main Street to Corsairs. I had to try their pizza.
When we arrived there, sitting in the dining area was Bruce and Dianna along with Margaret and Dave Wolf. Margaret and Dave are also members of CSYC. We sat and talked awhile and made plans to have a Past Commodore raft-up party Saturday night. I do recommend the pizza. The crust was fantastic.
04/17/2009 I am thankful for all of the friends I have. Here I am in the BVIs and I have Cliff on the boat, I was sitting with Bruce, Dianna, Dave and Margaret last night, just last week I had John on the boat and two weeks earlier I had my daughters on the boat. I am meeting another friend, Fred Rampey for drinks and dinner tonight in Road Town. Fred and I raced on his U20 in Colorado at several regattas. He is down in the islands working and had sent off an email indicating he would be in the area and was wondering where I was.
So with dinner plans in the making, and a lazy morning on the boat waiting for Customs and Immigration to open, we sailed out of Great Harbor and headed through the cut at West End. The plan was to sail over to the Indians and Caves. Cliff is one to always get a line in the water for some fishing. There hasn’t been an edible fish on the boat since he and Titus were on the boat in The Bahamas. We had a hit on the line and caught a Bonito. We had caught several of these when John was on the boat the week before. They are from the tuna family, but not an enjoyable edible fish I am told.
The wind conditions weren’t in sync with our plans. With the late start in the morning and the light winds, we decided to just sail over into Road Town. We were able to sail right into the anchorage. After working awhile to get the anchor to set in the grassy harbor, we went in search of Fred. We found him at his hotel that overlooked the water. We set off for The Pub. It is located on the water and a local favorite. Fred introduced us to the bartender that made a killer rum punch. It is good to connect with old friends. I had not seen Fred in a couple of years as he took off for Italy to work for a company and after he came back to the States, I headed off for my trip. Small world to be connecting like this.

04/18/2009 We had Fred on the boat for breakfast. Fred had a need for coffee in the morning and he had not found a place around the hotel to get any coffee before 8:00AM. I picked him up, gave him the 30 second tour of the boat and we cooked up some breakfast for the three of us. After dropping Fred back off to get ready for his next flight to somewhere in the Caribbean we took off for the snorkeling we did not get in yesterday.
We sailed over to the Indians for the beginning of a bunch of memorable swimming excursions this week. It is one of the great things about nature, you never know what you are going to encounter as it is always changing.
The water was a little churned up and made it murky, but the back side of the rocks was incredible with all of the fish swimming around. The amount of fish and different types that were grouped there was incredible. We saw schools of different fish that I have not seen in the past and had a good time swimming throughout the reef there.
After that we took off for the caves on Norman Island. Cliff got a big kick out of swimming into the caves and checking them out. I don’t believe he has swam into a cave before. They are not large caves, but they are deep enough that you need to let your eyes adjust to the lack of light. We then swam towards the north end of the reef. There I saw a sting ray and swam with it for about ten minutes watching it’s graceful flying motion.
We then made a stop at Willie T’s. For you that have never been here, it is a replica of a sailing ship that is converted into a bar. The stories we always heard about it was that this was a rowdy bar to go to. If a woman was to jump off of the upper deck topless, she would be given a Willie T’s t-shirt. Don’t think that is true anymore, as the first signs you see when entering the bar is “No jumping or Diving from the upper deck”.
We have dinner plans tonight. We are meeting to have the first annual CSYC Past-Commodore Raft-up Party in Great Harbor on Peter Island. We meet up with Bruce, Dianna, Dave and Margaret for a spaghetti dinner on No Rush. We had a great time just hanging out and swapping stories of our different adventures. Cliff had everyone in stitches from his funny stories of life. Next year Bruce is in charge of making this a bigger event (I just volunteered him).
04/19/2009 We slip the bonds of the raft-up this morning and sail off for more of Cliff and Bill’s Adventures. We sail east in Sir Francis Drake Channel towards Virgin Gorda. We have favorable wind and I am racing two other sailboats out here, even if they don’t know it. There is a 40 foot mono-hull, also known as a half-cat, and a 45 foot catamaran. I am pleasantly surprised on how well we sailed against them, even though we need to slow down to haul in another bonito. We are pointing higher and faster than both.
We made it to The Baths. Cliff is in for another joy of his during the trip. I send him off to check out one area as I will take a nap on the boat and then we will take off for the south end of the Baths together. He comes back so pumped up from the beauty of not only the fish and swimming in the boulders, but of the exquisite villas along the beach there. We then took off for the Baths and Devils Bay. This was a different experience for me as I had not hiked amongst the boulders before and found the little pools and hidden areas in the rocks. We made our way down to devils Bay. I found this great rock to just sit on and watch the wave action as it went in behind a large boulder on the beach and swirled down the other side. It was mesmerizing to me.
We then sailed off of the anchor and headed north towards Gorda Sound and Leverick Bay for the evening. We sailed out past The Dogs and hooked into a barracuda. I decided that it was Cliff’s turn to release the fish. It gave a good fight, but we landed it and Cliff did eventually release it from the hook, no easy feat. We then tacked a couple of times and sailed into the Sound and picked up a hook for the night. We went ashore to get some wi-fi and test out the local drinks. There is a Pusser Store there, but they did not have their own bar. The painkillers are still not as good as the Pusser bar on Marina Cay.
04/20/2009 After stopping at the dock to pay for the mooring, pick up much needed water and a bag of ice we sailed off for Great Dog. I have not snorkeled this island before. Even though the bay opened to the west, it had a pretty good north swell coming in and crashing on the rocks. Decision time, do we go in or not. We decided to give it a try. We were use to swimming in the swells rolling through the Baths, but this is different with no baths, but a steep cliff the whole way around the bay. We started to swim I n and found that we could get real close to the rocks even with the wave action. When you got close enough to the rocks or cliff, you would be blinded by all of the air bubbles in the water and then that was the time to turn around and head to another area. The highlight of this swim was watching a school of Sergeant Majors just washing back and forth in the swirl of the water between a couple of large rocks. Cliff described it best as a bunch or elementary kids on a ride at Disney.
After hauling the anchor we had a great sail down wind. I took a nap on the coach house deck and Cliff was up in the nets. We had a gentle 2-3 foot swell that the boat rode on. I needed to gybe the boat and head in for our next stop and Cliff wanted nothing to do with it. He just wanted to keep sailing forever.
We headed in to Guana Island. This island is located off of the north shore of Tortola. When I was down here with my family we anchored off of the same point one night. We did not swim it though. The memorable part of that night was the fluorescent jelly fish we saw. This time it was a little different. We snorkeled in towards shore and I came across a school of fry. They are about the size of a minnows. It started out a pretty good size school. As I swam more towards the school it was thicker and thicker with more fish. I made it to a point when I could not see a couple feet in front of me the fish were so thick and then all of the sudden, I had a large fish swimming straight at me. My first thought was shark, but then it saw me and turned away. It was three foot tarpon. Cliff had a similar experience. He was swimming along and through the fish he was startled when he thought he was head to head with a turtle. It turned out to be a rock with a couple of sea fans attached to it. Your mind and eyes can play some funny tricks on you when you are out of your normal element.
After that great time we took off to finish the great sail we interrupted for that snorkel experience. We had a good sail into Cane Garden Bay. This is a new one for me. I had heard bad reviews about this bay. It turned out to be wonderful. My favorite bays have an opening to the west and protection from the seas and trade winds. This bay is one of those. It rivals my other favorite bay of the Virgins, Francis Bay on St. John. It has good holding for the anchor and a gentle swell from the ocean. I can see how mono-hulls don’t like as the ones I saw rocked with the swell. We just sat nice and easy with no problems. The beach is a gorgeous stretch of sand and there are several bars that sounded like they had some live music going on.
The reason I like the west openings of a bay is so you can watch the sunset. We had a beauty this evening and capped off a great day on the water.
04/21/2009 Today was an interesting animal. We raised the anchor and sailed out of the bay. We headed off for Sandy Cay. This is another park of an island that was deeded by the Rockefellers. It has a very nice white sand beach wrapped about half way around the island. Cliff swam in and I took the dinghy in with the camera and shoes for some hiking the trail. We were in there early before the crowds started to show up. It wasn’t that crowded, but it is fun when you have a whole beach to yourself. I did follow the trail around. There are plenty of lizards and hermit crabs crawling in the wooded area.
After a quick swim, we headed back to the boat for lunch. From there we went to an area I had not heard about until talking with Bruce. On the east shore of Jost Van Dyke there is a bath area. It is a series of rocks that block most of the wave action and creates a pool. You can sit in the pool and when large waves crash towards you, they are broken up by the rocks and a lot of air bubbles are created that make the pool like a jacuzzi. We met some other sailors chartering a boat there from Michigan and Florida.
Then it started getting strange after that. I became very agitated. I was agitated at the bar tender at the bar by the anchorage because he did not have a drink I was looking for, I barked at Cliff, and with Customs and they didn’t do anything that I should have been upset with. I talked with Cliff and he said his energy level was low also. We believe we had become dehydrated. The weather pattern had shifted more out of the south and Cliff indicated that he thought today was the hottest day of the whole trip for him. There was also plenty of humidity. Things did clear up after the sun set and all is well now. After checking out of Customs, we sailed the boat over to St. John and spent the night in Francis Bay.
04/22/2009 We slipped off of the mooring in the bay and made for a two hour sail to Charlotte Amalie on St. Thomas. We need to check into US Customs and after lunch I sent Cliff back to the airport. It was a great trip and has been a busy month with all of the friends and family I have had visit. I thank all of them for coming down and spending their vacations, time and money with me.

04/14/2009 British Virgin Islands (BVIs)

04/08/2009 This morning we are going to the British Virgin Islands. We pulled the anchor and motored directly into the wind out of Coral Bay until we could turn the corner of St. John and there on the view is the British Virgin Islands. The BVIs has become the mecca of sailing and cruising. The Moorings started their world-wide business here chartering boats. When we chartered here as a family in 1999, I would describe it as sailing on Pueblo Reservoir with clear water. The water is real clear here and all of the sailing is by sight. You barely need a chart here. There is a ring of islands around the Drake Channel that keeps the waters fairly protected and as I am learning on this trip, the trade winds make for consistent weather and wind direction.
We decided to sail into Jost van Dyke to check in with Customs and Immigration. After turning the corner of St. John we had to sail northwest that allowed us a downwind sail past West End and over to Jost. After we dropped the anchor in the Great Harbor, John said that there was a guy on the boat behind us waving his hands. I had not noticed as I was concerned about setting the anchor. When I looked over it was Christian from Camelot. I had not seen Christian since San Juan. He had his wife with him and we were able to have a beer before John and I set in for Customs. As I have been told, you will keep running into the same people along the cruising route.
After a painless check in with Customs we paid a visit to Foxy’s. Foxy’s is known world-wide amongst sailors. It is the bar everyone needs to stop at least once when in the islands. Foxy is a music man and created the ultimate beach bar for fun and craziness. We had our introductory pain-killer rum drink and lunch. It was pretty quiet when we were there, but I am sure that night it was hopping.
After lunch, we pulled the hook and motored over to Little Harbor. Christian was anchored there and we spent the evening having drinks on the bow of No Rush catching up on our experiences since we last saw each other.
04/09/2009 We made the decision to go all the way to the eastern end of the BVIs. This means that we need to beat into the wind all the way to Virgin Gorda. The destination is the Bitter End Yacht Club. We spent all morning and into the afternoon beating into the wind and waves. I wanted to make one stop along the way.
I need to get my snorkeling fix in and I had not been in the water in the last two days. We stopped at George Dog. This is a small island I stopped at when we sailed here before. There is a good reef there to snorkel on. I was amazed at how crowded it was when we arrived. I have not seen crowds anywhere like I was seeing here in the BVIs. It is probably due to Spring Break, which is high season down here, and also Easter Holiday Weekend. We saw some good fish, but the highlight was seeing the sting ray and nurse shark. This is the first shark I have seen since December.
After a good snorkel we set the sails again and beat our way into the north end of Virgin Gorda. We then made it to the BEYC and picked up a mooring ball for the evening. It was crowded here also. It appears that there were many boaters from Puerto Rico that came over for the holiday weekend.
04/10/2009 After a late start today, we had a great downwind sail out of the bay and around the north corner of Virgin Gorda. After I gybed the main sail, we set the spinnaker for a fast run in the trade winds. This is we did all of the pounding for the day before. We made our way to The Baths.
The Baths are a large pile of boulders about 2/3 of the way down Virgin Gorda. After we anchored and had a light lunch, I got my first snorkel in for the day. I have never snorkeled here before. It is one of the most talked about areas in the Virgins. There was some fish life there, but the high light is swimming in amongst the boulders. I would time my runs in between the with the wave action. There are many areas to explore and beautiful conditions.
After snorkeling and taking a nap, we set the sail again and headed for Marina Cay. I have stayed here the first two times when I visited the BVIs. It is a small island with a large reef around it. On the island are a marina, restaurant, and small resort. After we caught a mooring ball for the evening, I went for my second snorkel of the day. I need to work harder at getting a couple of snorkels in a day.
The reef is lot less lively than I remember, but the coral formations are really incredible. After dinner we went ashore to the bar for some of the famous Pusser Rum Painkillers. The Pusser Rum bar in Road Town was the originator of the drinks. I had some Painkillers at the Pussers in Annapolis and was disappointed as it did not appear that they put much rum in the drinks. That was not the story here in the islands. You are able to order Painkillers as #2, #3 or #4. That is two parts rum, three parts rum or four parts rum. When I make my own, I usually on make two parts, because three parts can put me over the edge real quick and I have never drank a #4. We ordered up #2s. I watched here mix the drink. It consisted of a glass of ice, then half the glass was filled with rum and the other with the Painkiller jungle juice. These are the real thing. Someone needs to talk to the bar tenders in Annapolis and get then straightened out. By the way, if you are interested in making your own Painkillers, the recipe is 1 part Cream of Coconut, 1 part Orange Juice, 4 parts Pineapple Juice and 2, 3 or 4 parts rum. This is served over the rocks and for the special touch, you can add a sprinkle of nutmeg on top.
04/11/2009 Today for me turns out to be a carbon copy of my first day ever sailing in the BVIs. Carolyn and I came down here on a full chartered catamaran courtesy of a sales contest from Motorola. I am not sure if that trip changed my life forever, but it did introduce me to multihull sailing as the boat we were on was a 43’ Catana.
We pulled anchor and took off sailing from Marina Cay to the Indians. Once we turned the east end of Beef Island, we had a downwind sail. We popped the spinnaker and had a great sail all morning. On my first trip down here on the Catana, that was my first time ever seeing an asymmetrical sail. Here I am now living the life. We sailed to the Indians and found a mooring buoy to hook up to.
The Indians is a set of rocks located off of Pelican Island and just north of Norman Island. This a beautiful place to snorkel that I had experienced from past experiences. On one side of the rocks, the water is about 30’ deep with a straight wall down to the depth, and on the other side it is a shallow reef with many crevices. I believe this was the most fantastic snorkel I have had since I started this adventure. It was because the water was so clear and the assortment of fish and corals. None of these was the best by their own, but it was just a perfect combination. This is one experience that exceeded my expectations.
After lunch we slipped off of the mooring and motored over to the Caves. This is another famous snorkel area in the BVIs located on the west edge of Norman Island. We were lucky to find a mooring there. There are a lot of mooring balls in the BVIs. I always thought this was more for the charter boats or to keep boaters from dropping anchors on coral reefs and damaging them. The issue I run into is the water is so deep. I only carry 150’ of chain for my anchor. In typical weather that allows me to anchor in about less than 40’, but if the weather kicks up, I would not want to be in any water deeper than 20-25’. The reason behind this is what is called anchor scope. A rule of thumb is to put out 7:1 ratio. That is for every 1’ of water you should put out 7’ of anchor rode. With chain, you don’t need as much, but when the weather kicks up, you should have more.
We swam the reefs and I went into a couple of the caves to see what is to be seen. There is not much fish life in the caves as there are plenty of people in and out. The interesting sights are the high ceilings with the fragmented rock and the pick coral attached to the rock. It is a thin layer over the rocks and lights up really nice in the limited light of the caves.
When we made it back to the boat, I had planned on taking us into The Bight. This is a anchorage within Norman Island. It was still early in the afternoon and John and I decided to keep sailing and we went back to Jost Van Dyke. This completed the same trip as we took back 1995. I did have a sad moment though. As we were sailing towards Jost my second favorite hat blew off and was donated to the sea gods. It was my old faded blue Windrider hat. I started wearing it when my son and I crossed to the Bahamas in 2005 after I lost my then favorite Mount Gay 2003 San Diego NOODs hat. I alos wore that hat when I won the Windrider Nationals. It is amazing how we get attached to things. I will now need to find a back up hat for my favorite Mount Gay 2006 San Diego NOODs.
After dinner, John and I went into Foxy’s to see what kind of party life was going on. I have never seen Foxy’s so dead at night. All of the people there were eating a buffet dinner and just sitting around. We had a drink there waiting to see if things would pick up, but not a chance. We walked down the “main” street and found another bar at the end of town called Corsairs. We went for another drink to see what was happening there. It was the same with a few customers having dinner. For Foxy’s and Corsair’s, at least they had some customers. Every other place along the street did not have a customer. We noticed around the bar there was a lot of Colorado memorabilia. I asked the owner about all of the stuff and he said he was from Colorado. It turns out he lives there also. But not just Colorado, he lives in the same county as me. Some of you may know him. His name is Vinnie. He is more famous in the area as being the owner of Rocky Mountain Harley Motorcycles located on Santa Fe and County Line. If you ever make it down this way, stop in and see Vinnie. The pizzas they make there look like some of the best I have seen. I will make a stop on my way back through next week.
04/12/2009 Happy Easter. Today we motored over to White Bay. This is a picturesque little bay with a really great beach. There are not many beaches in the BVIs compared to Puerto Rico or the Bahamas. We slid in behind the reef and dropped anchor. This beach has changed a lot since I was last here. The last time I was here the only business on the beach was the Soggy Dollar Saloon. It was named after the wet money people had in their pockets from swimming into the beach. Now the whole beach is covered in establishments. Also the last time I was there, there were four of us and we had the whole beach to ourselves. Within an hour we had power boats from Puerto Rico anchored all around us.
I did get a chance to swim to the beach and walk the beach from end to end. We decided to leave there as it was getting extremely crowded with boats in the anchorage and sail over to Tabogo Island. This island is about 2 miles due west of Jost Van Dyke. This was more to my liking. There was only one other sail boat on a small beach. We dropped the hook and snorkeled around. There are very neat rock formations around the island to swim and check out. The coral was good also.
After a relaxing afternoon we sailed across the channel to St. John and caught a mooring buoy at Caneel Bay. This is part of the National Park System. I have since found out that it is extremely hard to anchor anywhere in the park and we are expected to take moorings. The cost is $15 a night. This does help the coral and sea grasses, but not somewhere a cruiser can spend a lot of time due to the cost. We then took the dinghy into Cruz Bay to town. There we found a bar with some good live music and a Texas Bar with chicken fried steak for dinner.
04/13/2009 Today was a good lazy day for me. After breakfast we took the dinghy in and cleared through Customs and sought out a wi-fi hot spot. As we were catching up on email and such the rain started and stopped and started again. I am sure the locals are happy to see the rain as so much of the area is dry and brown.
After lunch we headed back to the boat and slipped from the mooring. We motored over to Francis Bay. This is another bay in the National Park. Located next to this bay is Maho Bay. This bay is famous for the camping available. The national park has built tents on wooden platforms that look out over the bay. This would be the ultimate in camping. We didn’t do a thing here the rest of the day. We just hung out, swam a little and just enjoyed the quiet. Pictured here is the best sunset I believe I have seen since Boqueron in Puerto Rico.
04/14/2009 Physical exercise day. Today we went ashore and did some hiking. St John was owned by the Dutch until 1917. As most of the Caribbean, the primary crop was sugar. We hiked to the ruins of a sugar plantation that is being cared for by the National Parks. There is a nice walking tour of the plantation, or what is left of it. You can see some of the construction here in the buildings. I had read about how they would use brain coral as a building element as to its ease of cutting.
We then walked out to Lanteen Bay. It is another beautiful bay and you can see a lot of the BVIs from here. We made a 5-6 mile walk today and headed back to the boat. I could tell I haven’t been putting in a lot of miles on shore after that walk.
After lunch we pulled the anchor a sailed in a good stiff breeze to Christmas Bay. This is located on Great St James Island. This island is located on the southeast corner of St. Thomas. While there I went for a good long swim into the shore. It felt good to stretch out like that.
After relaxing there for awhile, we motored over to Red Hook for the evening. This is the second largest marine facility in St. Thomas. There are several marinas, marine stores, restaurants and shopping. I will let John go from here to catch his plane and I will prepare for Cliff’s arrival. We had a good dinner at a Mexican restaurant for our last night together on the boat. It has been a good trip for John to see his old haunts and I have had fun seeing new places.

04/04/2009 US Virgin Islands

03/31/2009 Today was a big shuffle at the San Juan airport. After a relaxing day on the boat and the girls packing and getting ready for their flight back home, we set off for the airport. We made a stop at Burger King on the way to the airport.
I have found that many McDonalds’s and Burger King’s have wi-fi in the restaurants now. And talking with many cruisers, it is amazing how much the independent cruiser is dependent on the ease of communications through the internet. Ten years ago, there was no internet. Prime communication was either by post card, letters and the occasional telephone call with dropping lots of money into a pay phone. I am now e-mailing, blogging, sending location updates via SPOT, doing my banking, etc. with the ease of finding a hot-spot to connect into.
I made it to the airport in plenty of time for the girls to check-in and then sit around for a little bit before they took off. An old time friend of mine that I made acquaintances with when I bought my trimaran, John Schnackenberg, flew in on schedule and I picked him up. He is planning on spending two weeks with me in the Virgin Islands. Twenty years ago he spent about five seasons down here running a charter boat. John had built a Farrier F-25 and had quite a bit of multihull experience when I met him. He was a tutor to me when I started to sail Tri-to-Fly as I was all new to the multihull experience.
He is now living in Sarasota, FL and when he is not running his painting business is still playing hard between sailing, hunting, skiing and traveling.
04/01/2009 April Fool’s Day. After finishing up some on-line work, getting fuel, provisioning we took off from the marina. We started out sailing towards Culebra. We had a good sail for about three hours and started to run out of time. It was time for the iron genoa, also known as the 9.9 HP Yamaha. We made it into the anchorage on the northwest end of Culebra that I took the girls to. We made it there at about 6:00 and as soon as the anchor was dropped and set, John went for a dive off the boat to baptize himself after being away from the Caribbean for twenty years.
04/02/2009 This morning we made it to shore and hiked over to Flamenco Beach. It was a good hike and the seas had settled down since I was there with the girls. There was a low gentle swell coming into the beach compared to the six foot breaking waves when we were there. After we walked the beach, it was back up the trail and over the hill back to the boat. We went for a snorkel on the reef heading south this time. As I jumped off of the boat I saw what I have been looking for a long time. I had my own barracuda shading under my boat. I haven’t been seeing any large fish. This one was. The barracuda like to hang out underneath boats to shade from the sun. It just sits there as I swam around. I was amazed at all of the fish and coral life. It was even more spectacular than last time.
After lunch we motored down to Dewey and caught a mooring ball for the night. We walked around town a little bit more than when I was there with the girls.
04/03/2009 Today we set sail again against the trade winds for St. Thomas. We had a great sail setting off on five mile tacks with good winds. We made it into Charlotte Amalie. This is the largest harbor in the area where all of the cruise ships arrive. As I was dropping the anchor, right next to me was Bravo 2 with good cruising friends Wendy and Graham from Canada. We spent the evening having drinks on the bow of their catamaran. They announced that they are getting ready to cross the Atlantic for a trip to Europe. The last time I talked with them they had pretty much squashed the plans for Europe. I am glad to see that I am not the only one that wavers on plans and then goes forward.
The only cruise ship for the day was heading out of the harbor as we were entering. It is a pretty town from the water. The main road for the island runs along the waterfront and there was loud music going until about midnight. The hill side is all light up with the homes and streets. John said it looked like Christmas to him. It was pretty neat from the water.
04/04/2009 Today we ventured ashore. I have heard all of the horror stories about Charlotte Amalie. As for myself, I do not see the issues. It may be that the local governments have been working really hard to clean up the communities and make it more tourism friendly. I needed to find Customs to determine whether I needed to check in. There is an office right on the docks where we were anchored. I have had conflicting information as to whether I needed to check in with Customs when entering from Puerto Rico. The definitive answer is no.
I have friends from the yacht club in Colorado that travel to St. Thomas every year, Bruce and Deanna Budy. They offered to meet us that the marina and give us a driving tour of the island. We had a great time seeing the beaches and views from the top of the hills. We stopped and had a good lunch in an Irish pub in Red Hook. The beaches are wonderful here and I see how people can make this a vacation destination. We had a good time traveling and seeing the island from a different perspective.
04/05/2009 Today we reciprocated with Bruce and Deanna and took them for a sail. We sailed over to Trunk Bay on the island of St. John. It is a beautiful crescent white sandy beach. It is part of the US National Park System. Just off of the beach there was a stand for some cheeseburgers in paradise. We walked the beach and sat and relaxed.
These two days gave me a chance to become closer friends with Bruce and Deanna. I have known them since I joined Colorado Sail and Yacht Club in 1997. When the club was struggling Bruce had made great efforts to keep things running and “volunteered” me to be Vice-Commodore the year he volunteered to be Commodore. The club was in such dire straits that I am not sure if Bruce was ever elected Commodore, but I know I never was. We are both real happy to see how the club has grown and prospered since those days.
04/06/2009 One more day in Charlotte Amalie. I wanted to tour the town a little bit. From the bay it looked like a neat place to visit with its architecture and history. We didn’t make it too far into town when I remembered that I wanted to go to a local chandlery.
We asked directions and given instructions to catch the local jitney. This is the local public transportation. Here in the USVIs they use one ton Ford pick-ups with a seating platform mounted on the chassis. These will typically hold 16-20 people. The cost is only $2.00 anywhere you want to go. We rode up the marina and found the chandlery I was looking for. The downside was that they did not have the cruising guide I needed, but the good news was that their other marine store located in Red Hook did.
We went back out on the road and stopped a jitney heading in the general direction of Red Hook. I asked the driver if he went to Red Hook and what the cost was. He indicated he did and the cost was $2.00. Off on another adventure. On this cruising trip, I think my favorite times have been using the local public transportation. I get a chance to meet locals, but finding a ride to where I am going is also an adventure. One of the favorite shows for my family is the Great Race. My kids always wanted to do this with me and using public transportation in foreign lands is a lot like what happens on the show.
John and I made it over to red Hook and found the chandlery. They did indeed have the guides I needed and also chart kits that I could not even find in the US. Another task completed.
04/07/2009 We headed towards the BVIs today. We are planning on making one or two stops to get there. As always down in this part of the world, the wind is blowing out of the east. With that in mind, as a cruiser, you either need to sail your boat by tacking back and forth to go forward or drop the motors. As sailors, we opted to the tacking and sailing all day. We would go on 5-7 mile long tacks away from the islands and then back in. This makes for real casual sailing, even though both of us are racers. With John on the boat we are trying to optimize the sail trim and keeping the boat moving as efficient as possible.
We sailed to Salt Pond on the east end of St. Johns. It is located just before Rams Head. We caught a mooring ball there and went for a swim. It felt good as I usually don’t swim in major harbors or harbors that have lots of cruisers and not much tidal current as the conditions are pretty bad with all the waste going into the water. When I made it back to the boat we decided to move on from there. There was a bad smell in the air, like and outhouse. We think there is a pond across the ridge from where we are and that it had a decay smell coming off it.
We sailed around Rams Head and into Coral Bay. We anchored in Coral Harbor for the night. This is a sleepy little town with a lot of construction guys and cruisers. We went into a town and found a local bar that had some live music. They also had on the TV the NCAA Women’s Final. It is the first time I ever watched women basketball. It was more interesting than the men’s final the night before.

03/27/2009 Spanish Virgin Islands

03/24/2009 Today I pick up my daughters, Sara and Amanda, from San Juan airport. I am excited that they are able to come down here for a week to share this life with me. I can’t say it started out with a bang as we worked to provision the boat, but they seem to be enjoying the day.
03/25/2009 This morning was a day of work trying to clear up some banking issues and waiting for the parts for the auto-pilot. The banking issues might be resolved, but the parts will not until next week when I bring the girls in. The delivery did not make it turned out to be a very busy day and they did not make it as far as the marina. The parts should be at the marina when I return. We can only hope.
After working through all of those details, we set off for Palominos. It is an island about 5 miles out from the marina. It is mostly leased out to El Conquistador. After a pleasant motor over to the island, we caught a mooring ball provided by the Department of Natural Resources. We went snorkeling on the reef that the mooring surround. I was really surprised by how dead the reef is. We moved from north to south along the reef and the north end was nothing but a pile of dead coral. There is no live coral and only a couple of fish. As we moved south along the reef, it did come alive a little bit with some live coral and more fish, but a lot less than I would expect for a place that has the mooring balls and where there are plenty of charter boats bringing out customers for the snorkeling experience.
After that we went ashore to the beach to try out Sara’s skimboard. This is a thin board that as you run down the beach, you throw it on the thin water of an out-going wave and then jump on it to skim the water and sand. It takes a lot of timing, balance and energy. This board was invented out on the beaches of California where they have long flat beaches, compared to the short sloping beaches here in the Caribbean. It took a few tries, but Sara was able to get some good rides. Amanda and I took a lot more time and I believe we each only got in one half decent ride each.
As we were on the beach, a front was rolling in and started to bring rain. The people from the hotel started lining up on the pier waiting for the ferry to pick them up and return them to the hotel. We played in the rain as we were wet and had nothing better to do. We did make it back to the boat and had one of those all night rains. It was also a slightly rocky and windy night. I was disappointed that I had us in an anchorage that had some roll until I remembered that I had two months of this kind of weather. How easy we forget the different conditions.
03/26/2009 After the rocky night on the boat, I put up the main sail and took off of the mooring. Once I cleared the protection of the island, I saw how rough it really was from the front moving through. There were 5-7 foot seas on the channel. We were actually tucked into a pretty good anchorage considering the weather.
The wind was blowing 17-20 knots out of the NE. There is a chain of islands and rocks that form sort of a back-bone that runs from Cape San Juan out to Culebra. I tacked to the north all the way to the chain and then threw in another tack that carried us all the way to Culebra. This was about a 15 mile run and the best sail I have had since I made it to Puerto Rico. I have been on the south side of Puerto Rico and Vieques and that blocks the winter trade winds from the ENE. Now in the open water, and with the front, I had good winds from a good direction. No Rush jumped like a racing horse out of the blocks and sailed fantastically.
The plan was to go into the bay with the town of Dewey, but we made it in such good time, I decided to sail up the west coast towards the north end. There is a beach there that was protected from the weather and a good place to anchor for the afternoon to go ashore.
After we anchored, we were befriended by a family from Australia that has been cruising for a little over a year on a 46’ Leopard Catamaran. They boat the boat in St. Thomas and after refitting, they crossed the Atlantic to Western Europe and then back to the Caribbean. They are heading west to the US to cruise the eastern seaboard. After that they expect to sell the boat and head back to Australia so the boys can finish school.
We went ashore and found a path that took us to Flemenco Beach. It is considered the second most beautiful beach in the world. It truly is a beautiful beach. There was good surf coming in from the ocean due to the front and we had a great time playing in the surf. We also got in more time on the skimboard. Amanda picked up a raspberry on her knee from a spill on the beach. That was after she rolled her ankle walking over to the beach and getting some nice scratches on her other leg.
After a couple of hours playing there, we made our way back to the other beach. I took the girls back to the boat and grabbed my snorkel gear. The girls won’t interested, but I always need to see what is under the water. The reef here was the most lively reef I had seen since being in the Florida Keys. The fish population wasn’t the biggest I have seen, but there were many different kinds. What blew me away was the amount of sea floral. The live coral is so dense, I would almost consider it a forest. There are many different kinds and colors. It was well worth the swim to see it.
After that we slipped the mooring and sailed down to the town of Dewey. It is a small town with two ferry docks. There is a people-only ferry and a separate vehicle ferry. We took the dinghy in and walked around town for a little. It is a quiet little place and most of the shops were closed when we arrived. There was a large regatta sponsored by Heinecken there last week and I am sure the locals are all recovering from the onslaught of the racers for the weekend.
03/27/2009 After a calm night on a mooring ball provided by the town, we raised the main again and sailed over to the eastern end of Vieques. Two days of sailing. What a dream. The seas were choppy with 3-5 foot seas from the aftermath of the front. The skies have cleared and it is a beautiful day. As we came upon the eastern point of the island there were good seas crashing into shore line.
We sailed around the point and as we were making such good time, I decided we could stop in a bay, Bahia Salina del Sur, that used to be part of the military install here on Vieques. The Navy used this installation for practices and maneuvers, that included strafing live bomb drops. This had been going on since the late 40s until local protesting brought the end to the use of the facility in 2003.
As we were entering the bay, we were hailed on the radio from range control that recommended that we abandon the idea of entering the area as there are still live munitions that are being cleared and cleaned up. There was also a crew on shore using demolitions. We sailed back out of there and headed to Playa Plata Beach and Ensenada Honda Bay to hang out for the day and anchor for the night.
03/28/2009 Today we sailed for Sun Bay. The third day of good sailing and it was all down wind. This is a large bay that I stayed in on my last trip to Vieques. There is a large beach and good protection from the trade winds. We are also in walking distance to the village of Esperanza.
We ran into an Australian family that we met in Culebra. They are about 18 months into their trip. Peter and Sharon stopped by after we anchored and talked for awhile. They are traveling with their two school age boys, John and Harry, along with an American they met in Europe, Alex and their niece that just graduated from high school, Sarah. They bought the boat in St. Thomas, sailed to Ft. Lauderdale to outfit it and then sailed to Europe for a season. They are now back in the Caribbean and trying to decide what to do next. They have the boat up for sale and are heading for the US until the boat sales. It is time to get back home as the boys need to get back in school to finish their studies.

We then went ashore and walked the beach and into town. We stopped at a local waterhole, Bananas, for lunch and did a little shopping from the local artists.
After we made it back to the boat, I put on the snorkel gear and headed out looking for lobsters. I haven’t caught any yet, or even seen any. I was told they are in the area. As I was swimming along, I found a rocky shoal along the shore line. It is an interesting area with the rock formations and how erosion allowed the shelves to collapse. I found some interesting fish and spotted my first lobster since leaving the States. I went back to the boat to get my tickle stick, gloves and net. I found the lobsters again, but need some guidance and practice to catch a lobster.
We then went over to and visit with our new Australian friends for drinks and snacks. It is always interesting to talk with other cruisers about what they have done and learned. We are also able to share what our lives are like from different countries. They are not all that different, but different enough to be interesting. The girls were able to share about going to school and being rugby players, talk about world sports.
All of us then went ashore and walked a trail that took us to Mosquito Bay. This is the bay that has the high concentrations of bio-luminecences. Instead of taking the dinghy in from the sea side, we just swam right off of the beach. We had to wait for dark and all of the paying customers using either the electric engine driven pontoon boat or the mass of sea kayak users. It was just as good as the last time.
03/29/2009 After a good breakfast we set the sails again and headed to Green Beach on the northwest corner of the island. A fourth day of good sailing. The girls have probably got in a higher percentage of sailing than anyone else I have had on the boat. My good luck charms. Sara went ashore to do some shelling and Amanda and I took the snorkel gear to do some exploring. I was amazed at the underwater structure right off of the shore. We swam for a good hour and saw many live corals and fish. I saw a fish here that I had saw in Sun bay. I am not sure of what it is, but it has a square face with big black eyes. It reminds me of a teddy bear. It has a sad face and the fish is quite shy. It is something I have never seen before and get a kick out of finding it.
After lunch we sailed across the channel and back to Isla Pineros for the evening anchor. As in the past, it has been a quiet anchorage that we did not have to share with anyone.
03/30/2009 This morning we got up early and motored over Puerta del Rey Marina. After cleaning up the boat, we checked in, picked up the parts I ordered for the auto-pilot and signed for our rental car.
First order of business was working to straighten a banking issue I have been working on for the last couple of weeks. Thank goodness for wireless in McDonalds. I was finally able to resolve to the issue and all in well in the world again.
After that we headed for El Yungue National Forest. It is the only rainforest in the US. The first thing that grabbed my eye as we entered the forest was the tall stands of bamboo. We spent time driving into the park and stopped at the visitor center. At the visitors center there is a 20 minute movie about the rain forest, the plant life and animals. The forest, as all forests, are essential to our living on this planet and the Forest Service has worked real hard to make this a great place to visit. The first thing that grabbed my eye as we entered the forest was the tall stands of bamboo. We went up the Yokahu Tower. It reminds me of the Will Rogers tower located up on the hill above the Colorado Springs zoo. There are many trails that can be hiked into the forest and up to the peak. Hiking will need to be saved for the next trip to the park.
After the park we headed off for San Juan. The plan was to go to the Bacardi Rum Distillery. We decided we didn’t have time. We made a stop at West Marine. I have a pair of flip-flops I have been wearing and when I was on the beach at Culebra, a wave caught them while I was walking along the beach and ripped the toe strap out of both shoes at the same time. West Marine replaced them free of charge without any questions. A good reason why I do a lot of my shopping there.
After that we decided to make a trip into Old San Juan. We were on a shopping excursion and some sight seeing. This is an old Spanish town with two forts, many squares and parks, narrow streets and interesting architecture. I could spend days here looking around at the forts, parks and such. We stopped in a couple of shops that sell only Puerto Rican or Caribbean made merchandise. Sara was on the hunt for spices that we had bought on our last trip to the BVIs and found them in one shop. The next shop had art work from Puerto Ricans only. They bought gifts for family and friends back home. They got a kick out of the owner. He asked if they were on the cruise ship and when they said they were sailing on my boat, he just talked to us for the longest time. He is also a sailor that kept his boat in the same marina that we are staying in. He ignored everything going on around except for our conversation.
After that we had a good dinner at The Green Parrot, a Latin food restaurant. We had fried Plantain Nachos, sautéed potatoes and some of the most tender ribs we have ever had. It was a perfect end to a great trip with the girls. I am so happy they were and able and decided to make the trip down here.