Page 25 - Yachter Autumn/Winter 2022

evening.The outboard had no problem, just operator error although we did discover a lack of oars. Dinner on board as we had just provisioned. Luckily one of the crew had
a bottle of rum and some pina colada mix. Surprisingly, the bottle of rum disappeared very quickly.
Tina valiantly woke at 06.45 every morning to open an app on her iPad that allowed you to book a buoy for the princely sum of $40 a night.You had to have the
app open and be sitting with finger poised at 07.00 ready to pick a buoy.They had all gone by 07.02. Every day Tina secured a buoy for us, which took all the hassle out of finding a buoy or anchoring. Not purist but stress free.Tina is to seven of us now known as Lady Buoy.
Monday began with a mandatory swim first thing, after Tina had booked our next buoy and some breakfast. Our lunch stop was to be Diamond Cay.
A quick blast across to Diamond Cay allegedly to see the sea breaking over Cape Wright; it wasn’t, but what a beautiful location, we managed to pick up a buoy
and noticed that many other boats were shuffling around to get the prime positions. Another swim then a leisurely run down
to Great Harbour and a night in Foxy’s bar. For a strange reason we had decided to eat on board that night again, so we left the bar as it was getting lively.What is interesting in the BVI is that the pontoons for all the bars are about a metre above sea level varying slightly, with tide and it’s very disconcerting to see the younger crew deftly put a leg up and gracefully climb onto the pontoon.As opposed to some of us on Susie Sea having to heave ourselves onto our bottoms, turn round onto our knees and then get up not so gracefully, but thankfully we hadn’t fallen in. Getting back into the dinghy was slightly easier but the rum helped arthritic joints.
The next day,Tuesday, saw us repeating
our passage but rather than beating we had a lively and fast sail into American waters heading for Bight Bay on Norman Island and the world-famous Willy T’s floating
bar, re-established after the hurricane sank the previous old trawler.Whilst one of our crew did the famous (big notice; do not jump from the second deck) jump from the second deck he didn’t do it naked which would have meant drinks for free.After a burger and beer, we ventured out to Pelican Island and the Indians for snorkelling.Then onto Peter Island where our buoy was waiting for us.
Wednesday saw us heading to the famous Baths on bottom end ofVirgin Gorda.At first it looked as though we wouldn’t be able to pick up a buoy, but we spotted one close into the shore where we swung in about 2m Susie Sea draws 1.5m. Some ventured ashore to trek the path from the beach through
the access rocks with single way passageway to get to the rocks.Yours truly and the two rear commodores decided to soak some rays on the trampoline.The two commodores having been out all morning were sensibly
sun creamed all over. I had it all over face, arms and legs but was wearing a sweatshirt. A bottle and a half of cold white wine
later foolishly and lazily I took my top off without applying sun block. Oh dear what a mistake! Top was on for the rest of holiday.
That evening sailing past Spanish Town we went up to Necker Island and into Gorda Sound where Lady Buoy had secured us a buoy off Saba Rock.The wind was blowing about 25 knots over Saba Rock and across the moorings. Much fun was had watching kite surfers and wind surfers screaming across and through the moorings. Some went ashore to the Bitter EndYacht Club, rebuilt after the hurricane, for provisions and they say they didn’t have a drink!! Dinner was ashore on Saba Rock in the Saba Rock Hotel which filled the whole of the rock. This too had been completely washed away during the hurricane and had to be rebuilt. Very American but the staff were excellent as were the rum punches and food.
Thursday saw us doing the big sail of the week all the way from Saba to Anegada all of 12 NM.We aimed to leave Gorda Sound to
CRUISING REPORTS 25