As mentioned in the last post we had a great sail to windward for the 28 mile sail from Culebra in the Spanish Virgin Islands to Charlotte Amalie on St Thomas. Plenty of tacking for the last few miles as we came up the coast of St Thomas. We picked up a mooring buoy for lunch off Water Island which is within the overall bay that has Charlotte Amalie at its head. Interestingly these islands used to be owned by Denmark until bought by the USA in 1917. Charlotte Amalie was apparently a Queen of Denmark in bygone years.
More iguana
After lunch we then sailed on eastwards up the coast of St Thomas then motored through various small islands, through a very narrow passage and then across to Caneel Bay at the western end of St John. We had a couple of days in this area which is quite beautiful and scenic and also well protected and calm anchorages. We went ashore to check out the restaurant menu and were told we could not land the dinghy on the beach and at the jetty had to use a stern anchor (which we do not have) so back to Savarna. A short time later an American couple from Boston cruising on the yacht Discovery, and who we had met at the Jimmy Spithill dinner a few weeks back came by and when we told them this story they said we have a dinghy anchor we never use and gave it to us declining to take any payment. Very generous so we did go ashore, dropped the stern anchor and enjoyed an excellent dinner. Check out www.caneelbay.com
Caneel Bay
Virtually all of St John is a National Park courtesy of financial assistance many years ago from Lawrance Rockefeller. It is not possible to anchor anywhere in the park and it is a requirement to pick up a mooring (at a cost of USD15 a night). The benefits of this approach can be easily seen in terms of water clarity, fish life (especially turtles) and coral development.
Time to pay
The USVI's are noticeably different from the BVI's in that we see very few charter boats, most of the boats are sloops (rather than catamarans) and there are some lovely American flagged older style yachts around. These yachts do look very elegant and graceful, often with blue hulls, plenty of brightwork and in very good condition as compared with the more modern plastic European boats - of which we are one of course. We see that the sailing here is more like the NZ style whereas the BVI's are dominated by charter yachts of which some 75% are catamarans and beachbars - catering for charterers and tourists. Nothing wrong with that but we have been surprised by the contrast.
The gorgeous Honeymoon Bay on St John
The main town on St John is Cruz and we dinghied around there in order to do a clearance out only to find that this is not necessary. What a surprise. Cruz Bay was also quite different from our expectations - originally the centre of the islands commercial activities that were based on sugar production the Anneberg Estate being the most notable - now the ruins can be visited. The town itself has some great buildings replicating the plantation style.
Pam at the entrance to the Mongoose Centre, Cruz.
Internet access is always a challenge when travelling and we use a combination of local sim cards and wi-fi. The former always seem to be a bit hit and miss as we move through the various countries (islands). Wi-fi is fine if ashore however late last year we purchased a powered booster called "Wirie" that also acts as a hotspot on board that up to five devices (including the printer and phone) can access. This has worked well and anchored off the resort in Caneel Bay we were able to access their free wi-fi and get great access and probably the best speed since we arrived in the Caribbean just before Christmas. Suprisingly the access is completely open and unrestricted. Using the Wirie also enables us to access local paid services from on board. In Culebra we purchased 7000 mb's for one week for USD14.95 - a good deal if it had worked all the time. We suspect that the service was overloaded thus speed dropped and eventually no access.
National Park HQ - Cruz
From Caneel Bay we motored slowly up the northern coast of St John poking our heads into every bay and checking them out ahead of our next trip in April. We were particularly impressed with Hawkesnest Bay (sheltered, great beach and no resorts) and also Trunk Bay where there is an underwater snorkling trail.
Nice property Cinnamon Bay, St John.
After this quick look around it was then back to Soper's Hole to complete the clearance back into the BVI's and also to obtain an import licence as we are putting Savarna up on the hard at Nanny Bay for the next two months. So yesterday morning it was into the travellift dock (after running aground ion the marina just beforehand - no-one had warned us of the rock off the last pier) and then lift out a couple of hours after the scheduled time. The delay was useful as we completed the short term decommission and unloading before catching the ferry to Charlotte Amalie and spending a night ashore next to the airport before flying back to New Zealand.
Someone has to do it
Berthage and hurricane cradle storage is very difficult in the BVI's (and nothing available in the USVI's) so it is starting to look as though we will be back in Grenada for the hurricane season. But that is a decision we can defer for a few weeks more.
Cheers
Keith & Pam