Good Things About Much Maligned Marinas

 At the end of our long passage from Anguilla, we chose to enter the Marina in Spanishtown, Virgin Gorda, rather than anchor outside its entrance. The BVIs has a Customs and Immigration office there making it a "Port of Entry" It is located only 150 yards walk away from the dock. We could have anchored outside Spanishtown but ILENE had not been at a dock since April of 2011, except briefly at fuel docks. Like all girls, she needed a bath and scrubbing with soap and water, not just a rain rinse.  And at fifteen cents per gallon, metered, we decided to give her a treat. In fact fresh water from a hose was the primary reason I had wanted to get on a dock. Before her bath I cleaned the rust off her stainless steel so it shines. Stainless steel is not supposed to rust, you thought? In fact it should be called less rusting steel. 

And the Marina has hot showers, under which one can stand for minutes, unlike on the boat where water is limited. The showers felt great! 

The marina had wifi as well,  though balky. And it had a chandlery, a small supermarket, a few restaurants and we did not have to lower the dink to get to them. 

Another advantage of marinas that we had not realized before is that they foster friendships. True, we have made friends by dinking over to other people’s boats, or they to us. But one advantage of the loss of privacy that exists in marinas is the proximity of other boats. 

         Liz and Bert were finishing up a charter on a Beneteau called “Island Time” before heading back home to Cordova, Alaska. Actually, Alfie was our good will ambassador to Island Time. She had wandered down the dock and was brought back to us by Bert. Liz stayed and talked with us. She suggested a much less expensive and more thorough way to see the fjords of Alaska as compared to Princess Lines, for example—the State Ferry, from which you can get off in each port for as many days as you like. An hour later Liz came back and asked us if we would like their excess provisions that would otherwise be thrown away: produce, several cans of tonic water and most of a bottle of Bombay Sapphire Gin. I said yes, of course. But by the time I thought to invite them to SG&T (Sundowner Gin and Tonics), i.e., to drink their own stuff, they had sailed away.  

Our bow was six feet from the stern of John and Missy’s beautiful 48 foot Tayana, “Tenacious” from Texas. They travel with Lovey a miniature paper trained pooch half the size of Whitty.  John is an engineer with lots of experience sailing in these waters and before we left he gave us a route of nice spots on the trip through the Bahamas, where we have never sailed. Tenacious was awaiting a weather window, a period of time with less wind, for a planned long passage to Antigua.

         We spent two nights in Anagada, a 14 mile sail to the north, and then returned to Spanishtown for (a)  its location, a short hop from Roadtown, our next stop on a busy next day and (b) its wifi. This time, no boat bath being needed, we saved our $53.75 per night by anchoring outside the marina and dinking in to use the wifi. While there we checked out our old slip and talked for a while with John and Missy.

Both of these couples will look us up in NY as we will search them out if we ever get to Houston or Cordova.

The final advantage of much maligned marina’s is that tied to a slip you don’t roll.

We will use Marinas from time to time, while continuing, most of the time, away from docks.