Today we left the semi-tranquillity of Magen’s Bay on St Thomas. It was a good stopover, but there were two sides to it. During the day the beach became fairly busy with visitors – possibly from cruise ships on the south of the island; then in the evening everyone went away and it became a peaceful Caribbean haven. We enjoyed our beach time and swimming at the end of our first day; however, we tried to land the dinghy the next afternoon way down at the end of the beach, and were told in no uncertain terms by some total jobsworth that there was no way we could leave our dinghy on the beach; instead we had to anchor it offshore and swim in; and if we did not remove our rubbish from the beach rubbish bin we would have to pay a $50 ‘fee’. Interesting – anyone would think they did not want us there.

Anyway. It is lovely here with so many green, hilly islands hidden behind each other in an Aegean sort of way. St Thomas has many stunning houses built right onto the edge of the cliffs – see today’s photo.

This morning we motored up through a few squalls to West End on Tortola (love that name) where we checked into the BVI. There is quite a bit of boat traffic here so they have set up a very efficient check in office.

We pulled out of West End as soon as we were done with the paperwork and enjoyed a beautiful sunny beat up to Norman’s Island, tacking in the bays. The BVI must be the charter catamaran capital of the world. The last time we came through here the charter fleet had been pretty much wiped out by a hurricane, but they have clearly rebuilt the fleet and there were loads of boats on the water. Catamarans do not sail well to windward, and OK it’s not a race, but with about 15 kts of breeze and Barracuda hard on the wind and stretching her legs it was like shooting fish in a barrel. But yes, they will take us on a downwind leg.

We have anchored for the night in Benures Bay on the north of Norman’s Island – very sheltered in the lee of the hills, quite isolated, with lovely water for swimming. There was another OVNI in the bay when we arrived; one of the few owned by an American and based in New England.

88 nautical miles to go to St Maarten.