OEW in the VIs --Eight Days

     Ilene and I were guests of Bennett and Harriet aboard their ketch, "On Eagles Wings," in The Virgin Islands March 30 to April 6.

Day 1 -- Sat. March 30 Travel to the BVIs, Embark

     Flight from JFK to St. Thomas on American Airlines was pleasant, as was the bus ride from Grand Central to the airport (and the cab from home to the bus). Bus fare is $29 /person, round trip. At 6am, with light traffic, a short ride. Lene's Amex card gained us admission to the Admiral's Club for a 7am Bloody Mary for me! Not my typical breakfast drink; getting ready for the Caribbean!  Amex also got us the choicest seats: just aft of the bulkhead, with only two abreast and about eighteen inches of spare leg room. Fairly smooth flight, cab to ferry dock ($10/cap) and we just made the 12:45 ferry, which delayed its departure to take our bus load. It was a smaller, single deck, fully enclosed ferry and a good thing because the high speed pound into the seas kicked up quite a bit of spray, which the wind blew onto the boat. We ate the lunch we had brought from home en route and filled out the Customs etc. forms and were the second couple to get on the non-resident Customs line, saving an hour. We declared nothing, not even the food which filled one of our five small bags. Our cab driver, Frank, stopped at the Village Cay Marina for five minutes so I could run in and pick up Bennett's IPad. Frank was eating a roti, and from Domenica, so we had a nice time with him, reminiscing. He let Lene use his local phone to call Bennett who met at the Cyber Cafe on the beach at Trellis Bay. It is just east of the eastern end of the airport's runway, protected by a peninsula from the prevailing easterlies, with a sandy shoal in the middle.

   "On Eagle's Wings" is a 41 foot Dickerson ketch with a navy hull and a five foot draft built in 1979 and very well maintained. 

Much of her bright work, inside and out, was redone last summer and the dark wood gleams under many coats of high gloss varnish. We have the V-berth, forward, with our own head, and our hosts live in the roomy after cabin which has separate access to the deck and, through a very low port- side passage, to the saloon/galley. The generator was running when we got there and does so twice a day for two hours at a time, so there is plenty of juice for the electric percolator, stove, toaster, etc. Red Hoook, St. Thomas, USVI is in the background in this photo.

 The cockpit is square, lined with cushions all around and enclosed by a canvas and clear plastic dodger/bimini, except the aft end has mesh instead of plastic. The main and mizzen sails have stack packs, and the only fault of the high cut genoa is that the cars on the rails are "stuck" which precludes optimum trim. The masts are deck stepped. As is true of boats of this vintage, the dark wood used and smaller ports make for a darker interior than we are used to, but it rained heavily during the night and she is a dry boat. Someone ingeniously recently installed chocks on both sides of the forward end of the bowsprit platform according to Bennett. These permit the mooring lines to run over the top of that platform and thus avoid entanglement with the anchors on their bow rollers, hanging blow. There was only one mooring line, through the eye of the mooring bridle, attached port and starboard. I showed Bennett how to use two mooring lines, each led back to the same side where it started, and the new chocks to assure against chafe.

     I went ashore with Bennett with a mission: We sought to check out of customs at the Airport in anticipation of tomorrow's departure for St. John. We decided not to sail west to St. Thomas and Culebra, my original, more ambitious plan, but to spend more time on St. John. But the airport customs office handles only airline passengers, not boats, So we will sail to Roadtown tomorrow, Easter Sunday, to check out. We also picked up some laundry and very few groceries from the local market - 1/2 gallon of milk and four small yogurts for about $18!  Yikes!

     Dinner was at The Last Resort restaurant, on an island in Trelis Bay, attainable only by dink. Because of Passover, I had a limited menu choice. The food was OK but pricey, $166 for the four of us, with only two drinks and no deserts. But the service! A wait for more than an hour between appetizers and entrees! But it kept us there through the start of the musical performance. We had gotten an early morning start and were asleep by ten. A little bouncy in the mooring field with the rainstorm that forced closure of hatches.

Day 2  -  Trellis Bay to Sopers Hole to Maho Bay, St. John, USVI

     We beat our way out of Trellis using main and jigger -- and engine. OEW is heavy and hence rather slower. Once east of the east end of Tortola, we gradually clocked around the island to Sopers Hole, which is also known as West End. This was a slight change from yesterday's plan to visit Customs in Roadtown, due to easier anchoring or mooring there. Once south of the island we were on a very broad reach for most of this passage, at about 260 magnetic, until we closed the NE shore of St, John, and jibed onto starboard tack at about 310. We passed through two regattas, but the racers were rather spread out and we needed only two very slight course adjustments to avoid close encounters. On the southbound reach, we were overpowered during a wind squall: not too much heeling, but the rudder full over could not maintain course. So we doused the main and ran on the engine and jigger (mizzen) the rest of the way. This passage took us about four hours.

     In the Hole, we could not find a mooring so anchored. With 50 feet of water, this meant 150 feet of chain. Our first try dropped us back much to close to the other boats and when I yelled this back to those in our cockpit, the people in the other boat said Amen. So we went further upwind for the second, last and successful try. OEW has an elegant two part lock on its windlass, to hold the chain, 

but the windlass is rather slow moving to lower and pick up chain, I estimate less than a foot per second, so it takes a while. I explained my method of checking that the anchor was holding. Bennett and Lene dinked off to customs on the north side of the Hole and returned to pick us up for a jaunt to the south side. There: lunch at Pussers, a bit of shopping by Harriet and I got a postcard, showers, three Gallons of RO water, two gallons of gas for the dinghy engine, and $100 of groceries.

     Our second leg was only about four miles, WSW out of the Hole, through the Whistling Cut and into Maho Bay. We flew the genoa alone, without the engine, on a very broad reach, with a jibe. The sail was wisely cut small, for these windy waters, only about 120 percent, with a high foot which is good for visibility, though I did miss holding onto her sheets while standing on the foredeck with the boat hook preparing to grab the mooring pennant. The main winches, self tailing, made handing this sail easy. The furling line, however, cannot be easily lead to a winch with the present location of its turning block, and it was hard to pull in,

      At about 1830, after G and Ts, we dinked ashore, landed on the beach without mishap, found the small danforth anchor and its rode in the dink's locker, tied its bitter end to the end of the painter, tied the anchor to a tree and climbed the 168 wooden steps the the cafeteria. Easter dinner of gazpacho, salad, bread and butter, water or iced tea, ham, chicken, potatoes au gratin, green beans -- all for $23 and in a unique, high, outdoor, but covered barefoot cafeteria among the aging hippies and a lot of kids. My two prior experiences of this place had not been in as high season -- tonight it was bustling! This is a truly unique and wonderful place but its very long term lease is expiring and so-called "development" will replace it by next year. I am very happy to have experienced it,

      Down the steps, their edges painted white to enhance flashlight aided visibility, to the beach. The tide had come in a bit so it was good that we had secured the dink so well. But getting her off the beach was not as successfully managed as getting her on. A small wave, but higher than the others, drenched us and left about 1.5" of seawater in it. Good thing we did not bring electronics ashore. A game of cards and then to bed.

 Day 3. Maho Bay to Cruz Bay to Christmas Cove, St. James Is., St. Thomas, USVI. 

     A somewhat rolly, restless night -- my sleep less than ideal. After breakfast we took off under main and genny for Cruz Bay, capital of St John, to check in with US customs, with plans to then moor off Caneel Bay to enjoy: the beach, hiking and a gourmet dinner at the posh Caneel Bay, Rock Resort. But the restaurant is closed Mondays so another change of plans got us to end the day on a mooring off St James Island, a small island off the SW tip of St. Thomas. This was a partial reversion to the original cruise I had plotted back in NY, which had included St. Thomas.

     We anchored successfully in Cruz Bay on our second try, dinked in, cleared Customs, paid for last night's mooring ($7.50) shopped with the girls, had fish at a restaurant for lunch, returned to the boat and sailed to St James. Our morning sail was four miles, but longer because we broad reached way north and gybed, and the afternoon session was only three miles, both pretty much west, with the wind pushing us. So this was not a taxing day, sailing wise. We found we could not furl the genny without the winch, which apparently has been a problem for OEW for some time, and also for ILENE, both boats have problems with their roller furlers.

      Off St. James Island we took one of the 22 free moorings (not for use by vessels greater than 65") and snorkled. The others snorkled and saw turtles, a moray eel, some fish, etc, I used fins but not mask or tube, and swam to about seven other boats and chatted with the folks aboard, a mix of people who make the VIrgins their home and tourists like us on charter boats, with a concentration of Midwesterners. One big boat, Runaway, an 82' power boat captained by Jim Ringland and his wife as mate, was on the mooring in front of us, with Captain and his wife, who have been doing this for 30 years, doing maintenance between engagements. He said that most of his clients were repeat business. no liquor license (one is needed here in the Virgins) so it is all you can drink., for about $3500 per person for a week if there are six passengers. Check out: sailrunaway.com.

     Then we had our only dinner aboard, a plate of green salad, each with 1/4 pound of shrimp. Healthy!  A bit of reading and then to bed. The weatherman had predicted zero possibility of rain, and he was wrong -- we had several brief showers of varying intensity during the day, but the night was cool and dry.

Day 4 -- Christmas Cove, St Thomas to Caneel Bay, St John.

     Nice eggs with cheese scrambled in and fried red tomatoes with our breakfast coffee after a good night's sleep. Thanks, Harriet!  I took a lot of the photos in this blog post. We explored getting water out from between the hull and the deck of the dink, mixed oil into the gas and put two gallons into her fuel tank, and explored locking the engine to the dink.

     We sailed the three miles to Caneel Bay, but made it about eight miles because the sailing was so nice, with genoa and mizzen that we just made a lot of grooves in the water for an hour and a half before taking a US Park Service mooring near the resort entrance, lunching aboard and then going ashore to explore. See St. Thomas's east side in background.

     At the resort's dinghy dock, which is about six feet above sea level, requiring one to climb up the side where horizontal planks provide footholds (because the other side is the ferry dock), the hotel staff member told us the same rules as two years ago: feel free to walk, swim, and dine BUT don't walk in to town!  To walk, hike really, on a nice rugged and hilly trail, which we plan to do tomorrow morning, we have to leave the dink on a beach, a bit west of the resort -- a bit closer to town. I guess the purpose of this rule is to avoid overcrowding of the dinghy dock. They have another rule, which is needed when the wind is from north of east, and which they enforce every day, including today, when the wind was south of east, i.e. from behind the island: stern anchor must be deployed. OEW's dink has one and Bennett used it for the first time. Between the stern anchor pulling the drink away from the dock and the painter pulling it toward the dock, the dink is kept still and from bashing against the dock, avoiding detriment of both.

      The resort has a number of small sailboats and sit-on-top plastic canoes, on the beach, available to hotel guests gratis, but not to freeloading folks like us, at any price. After strolling and visiting the gift shop (Lene now has a new stylish straw hat), we sat in beach chairs for a while and swam for a while. The girls wanted to shower and particularly to wash their hair, and imagined that they could do so after a beauty treatment at the spa, but no -- no showers except for paying guests.  So no Spa services were purchased and they did the best they could in the sinks in the public restroom. We bought drinks at an outdoor patio by the sea, lounging on comfortable sofas. Harriet lost her glasses but they were turned in at the office.

      Back to OEW for more relaxing, reading or whatever before dinner, which was another dink trip in. En route, we stopped at the raft, filled out a park service envelope and put our $7.50 in the box for the night's rent. We had made reservations at The Sugar Mill, a large round restaurant on a gentle hill above the grounds.

The best food at the resort -- except for the Turtle Cove restaurant, which was closed at the end of the high season a day or so ago, requires long pants, and is available, at even higher prices, only to hotel guests. We enjoyed our food and wine, and then, after a stroll of the grounds in the darkness -- the paths have low illumination, we took coffee at the beach, dinked back to the boat and had a good night's sleep. During our walk Harriet spotted two very small, deer, rather unafaid of humans, sitting on the croquet court. Harriet is the nature girl among us. She is the one who spots the cats, turtles, dolphins, lizards etc.

Day 5.  -- Caneel Bay, St, John, USVI to Sandy Cay and Little Harbor, Jost van Dyke, BVI

      After breakfast we dinked to the beach for a short hilly rocky walk to the overlook from the NW side of Cruz Bay. The elevation gives a good perspective both close and far, Here is Cruz Bay, the Capital, with the anchoring area to the right (with three catamarans) , from which one dinks to Customs, on the left side of the peninsula that juts into the bay, center:

And looking to the west is St. James Is. on the other side (the leeward side) of which, we had moored the night before.

Then we sailed to the west (sandy) side of Sandy Cay, a small dot on the chart, off the east end of Jost van Dyke, shown here in the distance.

We used mizzen and genoa and did the trip in one close starboard reach, because the wind remained far enough south of east. We did not make great speed but the ladies were quite comfortable and we had plenty of time, On Eagles Wings does not point very close to the wind. She is not unduly wide at her widest point but a lot of this width is carried for a lot of her length, creating more interior room forward and aft.

     Sandy Cay (and Trellis Bay, where Lene and I embarked) are the only two "new" stops for me on this trip to the Virgins.

We prepared to anchor here, but then noticed a number of small red mooring buoys. They are free, but not for overnight, and indeed, for only 90 minutes, though with no crowd that day we overstayed the limit a bit. To the left is the route to Anagada, and on the right is the north side of Tortola, where we spent our last day, looking back at Sandy Cay and Jost.
Other boats' crews dinked ashore, but Bennett and I swam. I walked as far as I could in both directions along the high, wide sandy beach, until it was replaced by rocks, making barefoot ambulation uncomfortable. You can see the rocks at the left in the picture. We met a group of Germans who were chartering and one of them had attended the same rock concert in a Baltic city that Bennett had also attended back in 1970!  We saw a sign which listed the island's 17 "though shalt nots". I had not thought there could be so many, especially since non-removal of rocks, coral, flora and fauna are all covered by one prohibition. But it keeps the place looking good; the paths seem to be raked clean daily. We met a young man who we had met at Maho Bay, with two young bikini clad crew; they had come seven miles across the open channel from Maho in his dink! Did I mention that the winds were light? A stone alter with brass plaque says the 13.65 acre island was donated an a nature preserve in 2002 , by a Rockefeller. Hence the raked paths?

      We motored about a mile to our mooring in Little Harbor, a/k/a, Gardner Bay, the easternmost of the three harbors on the south side of Jost, and took a mooring. On two prior trips we had dined at Sidney's Peace and Love restaurant here, but were captured by great press for Harris's, the shack next door. Lene and I dinked over to make reservations (here, as at Sidney's, you place your order when you make your reservation, so they can have the right number of portions available -- we had three lobsters and one grouper)  and then to the grocery store at the other side of the Bay. We got a six pick, but no fruit, and the lettuce is not for sale -- only for the restaurant, sorry.

     Dinner was disappointing. It was probably the great press Harris has enjoyed. Apparently, the proprietress, Cynthia, is what transforms the shack into a place of enchantment, but she was off in St. Thomas, buying food. We met a group of French Canadians from a 54 foot Hanse, which was moored next door. The price was reasonable, especially when the $30 nightly mooring fee was waived, and the seafood was delicious.

     A cool dry, quiet night.

Day 6 -- Little Harbor to White Harbor, JvD to Roadtown, Tortola.

     After breakfast, we made a short run without sails, from Little Harbor to White Harbor, a mile or two west on the south coast of Jost. I had visited this harbor briefly, on my first sailing trip in the Virgins; perhaps it was 1995. I recall only how scared I was as we entered one of the passages through the reef that protects this anchorage. This time, armed with more experience and GPS, it was easy. We took a free day mooring and all but Lene dinked ashore. We sat on beach lounges in front of Ivan's Stree Free bar for a while. I walked the length of our western half of the beach and swam out to talk with a catamaran with a flag of St. Vincent and the Grenadines. It was chartered in the BVI's by two German couples and their kids, all from Cologne, from a charter company that operates in both SVG and here

     Then it was time for the final passage, back to the Village Marina in Roadtown, Tortola. We returned a day early because our captain, Bennett, must officiate at a wedding in California.

The wind was stronger and rather due east and we sailed from Jost to Sopers Hole, but had to motor the rest of the way because everyone wanted to avoid beating east in the Sir Francis Drake Passage. Bennett did a picture perfect job of the final approach to our starboard side tie up at slip A-7 in the centrally located Village Cay Marina. On our dock were two boats waiting for weather windows to cast off for long distance passages: one is soon to depart for Narragansett Bay, RI, and the other did depart later that evening for the Azores, enroute to Europe! Bennett and I took the dink across the inner harbor (short water ride vs. long walk around) to The Moorings yacht charter base, to visit The Golden Hind chandlery in search of a 31 gallon Plastimo triangular fresh water bladder to replace the existing leaky one, but they had no triangular ones in stock, so it will be ordered from Defender Marine ($155) by the next of the four partners to use the boat. Then all the line neatening, shore power attaching, laundry, etc. and oh yes, checking back in at BVI customs, before showering and a gourmet dinner at The Dove, Tortola's award winning restaurant. Yum!

 Day 7 -- Lay Day on Tortola

      With the departure of her Captain this morning, OEW became a dorm, instead of a sailing craft. We rented a car and drove to the NW coast of Tortola for lazing in loungers and eating. First stop was Sebastian's where we lay by the beach, looking over to Jost and Sandy Cay before a seaside lunch. I had roti, which became a favorite during our prior two winters. Then after a walk on the beach, we drove to The Sugar Mill, built on the site of such a mill, where we read and talked by the round tiled pool, in the footprint of the oxen who turned the stone that ground the cane juice from the stalks (The dry stalks are used to fuel the fire that boils off the water, turning the juice to molasses.) I had a nice conversation with a woman, Jane, who spends about one third of here time here and the rest divided between Chicago and Northern Michigan. She is a photographer and singer who went to school near us in NYC. They had good free showers so after a refreshing dip and tiring of so much leisure, we dressed for dinner: collared shirts, shorts and shoes.  Talked with a man who sailed a lot, about Bermuda and Maine, and another, a physician, turned professional author, who had come to Tortola looking for a Hylas 54. Then a good dinner, a safe drive back over twisty unlighted roads while driving on the "wrong" side of the road, and to bed for a good night sleep. How could we be sleepy after doing nothing all day?

Day 8 -- Travel Day -- BVI to USVI to USA

    We kept the car and I used it to transport LOTS of baggage and the two girls from the marina to the ferry dock. I put in a couple gallons of petrol and turned it in at the rental place by the marina. Walking into the terminal I heard: "You left the back pack on the boat!" We tried to call Bennett, who knows the combination lock number, but it was not quite 6 am in California. Harriet gave me the combination as she recalled it.  I first checked the car at ItGo car rental. Nope; not there. At the boat I looked in through the locked side opening port. The bag was located! But the combo number, as recalled, was not the right number. The polite young man at the marina office did not have the combo number. "Could you please call Tony, who cleans the boat, for me; he knows the combo number." He did, warning: "But Tony is Adventist." No phone on the Sabbath. "Could you call Art, the leader of the four men who own OEW?" He did, using a 607 area code (I gave him $3 for the call), and Art was home, gave me the number and the rest was easy.

    The ferry ride, past so many of the places we had visited, was fun, until the end -- in Charlotte Amelie, St. Thomas. Three ferry boats had arrived at about the same time, each loaded with tourists with luggage who had to off load, pick up luggage and go through USVI customs and immigration to catch cabs to the airport. Ours docked last (about a half hour of standing off the dock). Never had emailed news that our flight had been delayed for two hours been so welcome.

     At the airport -- chaos. Too many passengers for its capacity. Saturday is the day that charters start and end so everyone is at the airport. Remind me not to try to fly out of St. Thomas on a Saturday! The line, after you got your boarding pass, to deposit your checked bags into the hands of the airline's baggage scanning machine, was well over an hour long. But the perennial partners, private enterprise and corruption, have stepped in to give preferences to people with money, which is probably part of the reason why the people without money wait so long. For about ten dollars per person, you engage a porter who whisks you and your party and their bags to the head of the line, where you give over the checked baggage and go to the shorter line for TSA scanning, complete with the traditional shoe and belt removal routine.  So having packed, breakfasted and left the boat at 8, we boarded the plane shortly before 3. Uneventful flight, except nice conversation with a lady who heads Pepsi's IT group, from Vancouver, now in Westchester. Landed 7:15; home by 9:00 and welcomed by the kids: