{"id":3512,"date":"2014-01-31T18:02:56","date_gmt":"2014-01-31T22:02:56","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/svecho.com\/?p=3512"},"modified":"2014-01-31T18:33:02","modified_gmt":"2014-01-31T22:33:02","slug":"a-bit-of-the-virgin-islands","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/svecho.com\/?p=3512","title":{"rendered":"A bit of the Virgin Islands"},"content":{"rendered":"

We spent several days exploring St. John USVI and found it to be a wonderful cruising area with several beautiful beaches and plenty of great snorkeling.\u00a0 Much of the island is National Park which has served to protect the land and sea from too much development.\u00a0 We visited several spots and did a great deal of snorkeling as well as a few great hikes.\u00a0 The vibe here is very different than St. Thomas where things are much busier and built up.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

\"Lots <\/a>
Lots of rainbows here <\/div> <\/div> <\/div>
\""Deliverance" <\/a>
“Deliverance” visits some harbors to bring supplies to the boaters. <\/div> <\/div>
\"Bubbling <\/a>
Bubbling Pool at Diamond Cay Jost Van Dyke <\/div> <\/div> <\/div> <\/div>
\"Lot <\/a>
Lot of turtles in St. Johns <\/div> <\/div>
\"Just <\/a>
Just one of many pretty harbors <\/div> <\/div>
\"DSCN2373\" <\/a> <\/div> <\/div>
\"Sugar <\/a>
Sugar plantation ruins <\/div> <\/div> <\/div> <\/div>
\"Pretty <\/a>
Pretty Flower <\/div> <\/div> <\/div>
\"Moored <\/a>
Moored in St. John <\/div> <\/div> <\/div> <\/div> <\/div>\n

 <\/p>\n

\"Raising<\/a>

Raising the BVI courtesy flag.<\/p><\/div>\n

On December 30th we entered Great Harbor, Jost Van Dyke to clear into the British Virgin Islands.\u00a0 We had to work hard to find an acceptable spot to drop anchor since it was so crowded, Jeff was so hyper focused on maneuvering the boat that he missed seeing all the topless women on the boats.\u00a0 Apparently Foxy’s Bar<\/a> in Great Harbor and is the spot to ring in the new year – touted to be on par with Times and Trafalgar Squares.\u00a0 We were looking for something a bit quieter so moved over to Diamond Cay once cleared.\u00a0 We thought it would be far enough from the fray, however, just before sunset the harbor was besieged by 40 to 50 charter boats racing in<\/a>, throwing off anchors and getting the music started.\u00a0 Those of us already situated just stood in awe as anchors were dropped atop ours, we hoped not to get hit and wishing there was enough daylight to get to another anchorage.\u00a0 The music blared all through the night even though those playing it had long since passed out.\u00a0 Sleep for us would have been difficult in any case since the potential for boats dragging anchor was great, Jeff kept an eye out for trouble.\u00a0 Turns out this is an annual New Year’s rally.\u00a0 The next morning we asked for their itinerary to be sure not to cross paths with them again!<\/p>\n

It is a different group of people touring this area, there are those who charter bare boats, those who are land based on a particular island, and those who are cruising like us.\u00a0 As is always a highlight in our journeys, we have met so many great people who are just out exploring; Matt & Sierra were staying at an Eco Lodge on the island and came aboard to visit one afternoon while we were in Leinster Bay; we anchored next to TC, Emma and Joe from Pensylvania at Little Harbor on Peter Island. \u00a0 They\u00a0 were on the last night of their charter not looking forward to heading back to the snow.\u00a0 They helped us get situated with a shore line and shared their extra provisions.<\/p>\n

\"Happy<\/a>

Happy New Year!<\/p><\/div>\n

New Years Eve we met Judy from Ontario, she was spending a few days in Cane Garden Bay on Tortola before picking up her charter with a group of friends and was kind enough to share her table with us for a fun New Year’s Eve celebration.\u00a0 We also reconnected with Clair and Andy from Eye Candy who we originally met while awaiting “Sandy” in Portsmouth Virginia.\u00a0 We then met Mel and Mitch on Private Dancer, turns out that we had several mutual cruising friends.\u00a0 We have also connected with some of the boats we met while in Puerto Rico over the summer, Capt’n Tom offers days trips aboard the historic HB Welch<\/a> and Amy and Leo who offer a charter service aboard their beautiful catamaran Hypnautic<\/a>.\u00a0 The islands are also peppered with mega yachts and we may have had a sighting or two of “Lovey and Thurston Howell”.\u00a0 Wish we were\u00a0 better with taking pictures of the people we met but did get one of Judy.<\/p>\n

\"Charlotte<\/a>

Charlotte Amalie Harbor<\/p><\/div>\n

These islands are also a popular cruise ship destination and an island’s population can increase by the thousands if there are a few cruise ships in the harbor. We found that while Magens Bay on St. Thomas is in fact a beautiful beach you can\u2019t see the beach if there are 6 cruise ships in Charlotte Amalie \u2013 it\u2019s completely covered with people!<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\"Magens<\/a>

Magens Bay St. Thomas<\/p><\/div>\n

 <\/p>\n

All in all these islands are heavily traveled but the crowds can be avoided if you work at it and it is well the effort!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

We spent several days exploring St. John USVI and found it to be a wonderful cruising area with several beautiful beaches and plenty of great snorkeling.\u00a0 Much of the island is National Park which has served to protect the land … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3512","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p2y1a7-UE","jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/svecho.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3512","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/svecho.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/svecho.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/svecho.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/svecho.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=3512"}],"version-history":[{"count":12,"href":"http:\/\/svecho.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3512\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3675,"href":"http:\/\/svecho.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3512\/revisions\/3675"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/svecho.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=3512"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/svecho.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=3512"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/svecho.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=3512"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}