18th February

Osprey
John Bowering
Wed 18 Feb 2009 13:14
Here we are still at Sopers Hole. We had intended to get away early this morning but the forecast is not good so have decided to stay for another day. Our tour of the island yesterday was spectacular. We walked up to Denzel's - the car hire shop at about 0830 and collected the car, which turned out to have air conditioning. We then travelled to Nanny Cay to see where Paul May bases his yacht. A nice Marina but as with all the other facilities in BVI was very crowded. On to Tortola and a liesurely walk around the town. A very commercial little place geared almost entirely to the cruise ship industry - there were two cruise ships at the wharf and probably something like 3,000 tourist roaming the streets - we did not stay long! We continued north until we reached Fat Hog Bay. Here we found a lovely little restaurant on the waterfront and decided an extended lunch was in order. Very pleasant staff and environment and lots of veggie selections for Anita which made a pleasant change. We each ordered what we thought would be small lunches and which turned out to be very substantial and took us an hour to eat our way through - but then only about an 80% completion. After lunch we meandered to Beef Island across the causeway where the local airport lives. A very tidy but small strip geared only for inter-island traffic. We decided to take the scenic route from the north to south of the island - called the Ridge Road. This was incredibly spectacular as the road climbed from sea level to 1,600 feet in a very short lateral distance. Several times we did not think the hire car was going to make the climb as the revs and power declined to almost zero on the steepest gradients - steep enough that we could not see the road over the bonnet of the car. At the top the views were truly awesome and we can only hope the pictures we took will do some justice to them. The road took us along the spine of the island then down to the beaches on the north side. Some of the descents were also not for the faint hearted and completely unfenced or protected on the downhill side. Brake failure would have resulted in instant martyrdom. All in all a great tour of the island and we were back at the boat for 1500 having dropped off the car. We were over on Corcovada with Susan and Bill for sundowners at 1730, Thence to Pusser's for dinner. Whilst there the wind started to strengthen and by the time we left the palm fronds were being blown off the palm trees - quit dangerous if you were on their leeward side. The wind continued through the night and John was up at 0130 for a while watching Ospreys movements through some of the worst squalls. In the morning the wind was abating but the forecast still not good for the rest of the day with ten foot seas - so we will remain here one more day. The weather is forecast to improve during the afternoon and evening. Plan is still to head for Jost Van Dyke and then head north through the islands to Virgin Gorda.

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