We have made it to the BVI's!! St Thomas Bay, Virgin Gorda
Seaduced
John & Jane Craven
Thu 5 Jan 2012 00:58
This was the furthest planned landfall on our trip so we feel that we have achieved today. We had an 80 mile journey so had an early night last night with a plan to get up at 5am and leave by 5.30am. As I insist on a 'snooze' before actually getting out of bed at any time the alarm was set, grudgingly by John for 4.45am. When we got up it was black dark - a bit early then!! After a cup of tea it still wasn't getting any lighter so we had a 15 minute snooze, still dark, but after a further 20 minutes we were good to go and hauled anchor just after 6am. The trip out of Anguilla was going to be tricky as there were lots of fishing buoys on the way in which we needed to be able to see, so some light was essential. The winds had dropped overnight to even lower than expected and the direction was unpredictable from one minute to the next so, on went the engine. As the wind directions stayed unstable all day and we never really got more than 10 knots we ended up motoring all the way which was a shame but nonetheless here we are.
The BVI's and USVI's are a group of northern Caribbean Islands which are all very close together. The longest distance is less than 20 miles from Virgin Gorda to St John's. There are tons of bays to explore and days of calm protected sailing as Tortola provides almost an umbrella sheltering all the other islands from northerly wind and swells - that said where we are is the only anchorage not protected to the north and where is the swell due to come from for the next few days? - you got it - the north!! But there are reasons, 2 actually, firstly, we can do the dreaded clearance here, and secondly it was the nearest bay to Anguilla. We may well end up clearing in and moving tomorrow up to the Bitter End if the rolling gets too much, we can always come back here in a few days when the weather calms down.
Everyone we have met who has been here loves it so we will see what it is like and report back.