British Virgin Islands (BVI) - Big Vested Interests

We arrive in the British Virgin Islands and see a poorly named, but accurate boat name. The hurricane six months ago has had devastating effects. The town has a lot of buildings still destroyed and a lot of associated rubble and mess about the place. The photo above is from Road Town, Tortola, the capital. We arrive in Virgin Gorda, a smaller island but the first place we come to where we can clear in. 

This is the set of marina shops that Virgin Gorda has, all non-functional. We ask for Diesel but they have none, for petrol they direct us up the road. When we arrived, we anchored and I went ashore to clear in - took hours as the staff were late opening and were a bit slow to process me. I need to make sure Eamon is registered correctly as he will fly out of Tortola, BVI. Eventually we are cleared and I return for the crew, we head into the marina and dock the dinghy at the dinghy dock. The marina looks rough. A uniformed guard bustles up and says "first I don't like where you put your dinghy and second I need 2 dollars for each person coming ashore on the dinghy dock" We say we have only come in to buy fuel and she admits they have none. She relents and lets us stay for 20 minutes free, if I move the dinghy over to her dock. <sigh>.

We had also come ashore to get a diving permit as BVI has some tremendous diving, all tagged with buoys but requiring a daily registration fee. Alas, the office is shut, there is a national park office along the coast at an area known as "the baths" which has large boulders and lovely pools between them, as well as superb beaches. It is too far too walk and too tricky to get a taxi so we take the boat.

There are buoys for the yachts so we take to the dinghy and search for a dinghy dock. No luck, after asking someone, we are told there are  buoys for the dinghies as well and we are expected to swim ashore - they want to keep their national park pristine and think dinghies on the beach would clutter the place up too much I suppose. <sigh> we don't fancy swimming and resolve to call over to Tortola island and get out permit there.  All the sails in BVI seem to be 5 miles apart so it won't take long.

Arriving in Road Town Tortola we discover more devastation

Apart from the Governor's house which is in perfect condition now.

The local ferry company has left one if its ferries parked in a strange place.

We finally call at the marine natural park office to get our permits, it is derelict, which given the hurricane is fair enough, what is not fair is that they have not posted a notice as to where they are operating from. However we ask various passersby and are redirected to a government office that houses the fisheries conservation office. When we finally get there it is has crammed in two other government departments including the one we need, We pay 24 USD for a days diving for 4 and a further 18 USD for a days diving for three as Eamon has to fly home. All in a good cause.

More devastation

This is the local supermarket - still fully functional, just a bit drafty. Then we walk to the marina

A really sad old lady, it has been there for 6 months.

Many docks are gone, the ones that remain have obstacle courses on them, and missing cleats

This is the fuel dock.(box at at top right) We asked and said they could give us 50 gallons, we bring the boat in, past various obstacles a few days later and are told no Diesel. <sigh> but we call in at Nanny Cay Marina a mile or so up the coast and have more luck.

Whilst Village Cay Marina is pretty wiped the sunsail charter fleet is all lined up across the bay, and a pile of broken boats too. The charter fleet looks fairly complete - more ominous is that they are all still in port. People must have cancelled or redirected their charter holidays elsewhere. Actually every where we went there were free bouys - Peter has experience of chartering in the BVI and says he misses the headlong dash of 3 or 4 boats chasing the last buoy at 4pm every afternoon. Currently bays are 25% empty.

So sad, six months lying there

The BVIs are not all post apocalypse, the sunsets and remote bays are still beautiful, except the hills are missing trees. Peter says the odd cafe is missing too. We called at a bay on Normans Island. Basically a beautiful sandy beach with a new! log cabin/cafe/restaurant and a bay full of moorings. It has 30 boats moored for the night and the drink and music clearly flowed. We came in late after diving and stayed on board. The boat next to us kept its engine on all night and partied until midnight or so - music and a women with a braying laugh that may well have been a mating call. I suppose loud parties go with the territory. The main town has devastation, we had a drink and pizza in a cafe that was just about doing business, few cafes or shops are open. Yet 5 miles away the holidaymakers are oblivious. It makes me reflect that the BVI and maybe the Caribbean is about the haves and the have nots. Rich people come and play here, locals live and get by.  Though they are cheerful about it.

We see a large number of beautiful views

Well, ok, the shot above may well not be one of them, Eamon has to leave, or attempt to leave the day after this shot was taken. His three weeks had flown by, some good dives, some good sails, but good company at all times.He earned the T-shirt.

In the end Eamon gets a txt that his flight is delayed 3 days... He had booked an interisland flight from the BVI to San Juan in Puerto Rico and then a through flight with American Airlines - San Juan to Philadelphia and then a second AA flight to Dublin. The UK and Ireland are being hit a double whammy by the Beast from the East (Siberian cold and snow) and Storm Emma (winds and snow) and airports are shut wholesale. It would have suited him to get stopped in Philly as he has relations there but AA are postponing the pair of flights, he would have been stuck in Puerto Rico. AA are unable to split the flights, which is weird but Eamon's travel agent manages to get him on Delta Airline flights to JFK and then onto Dublin, of course the dublin flight gets cancelled but at least he is stuck in New York, where he also has family. It finally takes him from Thursday lunchtime until Monday afternoon to get home but I suppose he enjoyed the mini adventure.

 Approaching Normans Island in the dark

 The next morning all is quiet

 Doros tries to walk across the water to the punt - it doesn't work, but, hey, any wash is a good wash...

I do like this area and may canvass to have Christmas here next year, with all the beaches and divesites within a few miles of each other it is a good place to holiday, it gives money to someone - not too many of the locals but maybe it all helps. I hope they can rebuild soon and are blessed with a hurricane free 2018. D.V.

We dive the wreck of the Rhone and also a set of rocks called the Indians, I'll put up the diving shots first.

 The propeller, we swim through this of course

 That's a shark, but is is (a) shy and (b) fast

 and that's an Eamon

 And that is not allowed to be our lunch, according to Marine park rules

 peek a boo, I see you

 Not my day for catching them - there is something interesting trying to get away - he succeeded 

 More Eamon

I amuse myself by swimming in and out of these pillars annoying the fish.

The next day we dive the Indians.

In Ireland I often try and get to both ends of big rocks

Using my dive mask as spectacles (they have proper lenses in them) and my wetsuit booties as climbing shoes is not easy...

Underwater is pretty, albeit with a 2 knot+ current.

There is a big boy waiting under our punt!

And finally a few videos - I will upload separately as before.

Sint Maarten St Martin Potato Potaatoe (Aardappel/Pomme de Terre)

We leave St Kitts at 22:00 at night and arrive at St Martin just after first light - we had 30 knots at times and more uncomfortable rolling in a fair size swell. When we arrive the weather starts to improve and finally the last three weeks of stronger winds are over for a while - a week or two we think. The Sea is a lovely colour, we anchor off and the Captain goes in to clear customs, immigration, port dues etc. Only takes an hour.

A note about the name; St martin is an island split by a "border" the south bit is Dutch and called Sint Maarten, the North bit is French and called St Martin. However there is no sign of any dutch influence here - feels very american actually, with a main "strip" full of cars and a plethora of restaurants, cafes, pubs, and casinos. Locals are only allowed in the Casinos 4 times a month although this is unenforceable of course.

The anchorage in Simpson's bay is only used by a few yachts - most go through the lifting bridge to a large inland sea, there is a further bridge in the North for french yachts to come into the lagoon, and there is a bridge bisecting the lagoon too - with a lifting part too. There are fees to lift the bridge and it only opens a few times a day, we elect to stay outside, the dinghy and outboard are working well - Doros the Outboard "Whisperer" talks sweet nothings in the outboard's ear every day.

The customs dock is to Port before the bridge and Simpsons bay yacht club is to to starboard after passing under the bridge in the punt, it has a dinghy dock and cheap beer, coffee and free Wifi - what's not to like. Nice staff, one from Armagh.

The bridge can pass superyachts, tight enough!

Our immediate impression of St Maartin is many signs of devastation, lots of the cafes have either tarpaulin roofs or no roof and are operating out of temporary shacks. less than 25% seem open for business. On closer inspection many of the bigger buildings are non-functional, they may look ok at a cursory glance and then you realise there is no roof, or that all windows are missing. A missing roof means the interior has been trashed by water. A local taxi driver tells us building materials like sheets of plywood have tripled in price, and you need to wait unknown lengths of time for delivery. Tradesmen are not available, no-one has any money to rebuild, only some are properly insured, government state aid is slow or non-existent. We learn that in the BVI that large contractors do not trust the government to pay and the UK had to act as guarantor for a contract to replace power wiring. Fraught with problems as one politician insists his house gets wired up first, and then another politician and another- the wiring is done in an uneconomic order rather than systematically. This is a BVI story but this type of problem may well be endemic in the Caribbean.

 This church in the poorer part of Philippsburg is open for business from an adjacent  marquee

 This roof belonged to a building 100 yards away, we talked to a man whose mast was carried away by a catamaran flying through the air - his boat hull was untouched. One report says winds were sustained at 180 mph with gusts to 220. Another says winds hit 280mph which is gob smacking.

At least they are rebuilding the churches. I hope prayer keeps them safe this summer.

I had thought after a singular event like a hurricane disaster it would be all hands to the pumps and it would get sorted, people rise to occasions, flourish in adversity... the reality is that it must be like wading waist deep through a quagmire to get things done, profoundly depressing and it must knock the stuffing out of people - it would be ok if it was just the odd building or so, once the number of buildings hits a critical mass there is too much competition to get things sorted. I do see some building work going on, and people seem cheerful, or at least realistically resigned to their fate.

Then there are the boats. The charter industry here lost 80% of its fleet, it has ordered new boats to the extent that the boat factories in France have the next two years of production spoken for  - a private individual wanting a new boat from some factories will be on a two year waiting list.

Worse is the private yachts, whether insurance is a problem, maybe the age of the owners mean they don't have the energy to cope or the loss/damage is too heartrending to do anything other than walk away I don't know. What is clear is that there are many wrecked boats sitting untouched 6 months after Hurricane Irma.

We see similar (worse?) devastation in the British Virgin Islands, the charter companies are doing ok but private yachtspeople not so much. Hurricane insurance for yachts in the Caribbean is interesting, I am insured with Pantaenius - one of the high quality insurers; they allow various scenarios to offer cover in this area - you must lift the boat out, dig a trench, line it with tires, sink the boat, remove the masts and they will cover you  - but they raise the excess to 20k, You are also allowed to dock in a hurricane hole (mangrove swamps), This didn't work in St Martin this time, the mangroves disappeared.

It is not all bad news though, we find a working sports bar to see Irelnad win at the rugby - Doros has the t-shirt (and the beer) to prove it.
We go across to the nearby town of Phillipsburg where cruise ships call - not that frequently now.

Nice beachfront with associated cafes, usual "cruise" shops

We also go to the beach at the end of the airport runway - famous for thrill seeking eejits

You guessed it, lots of people put themselves in harms way for the "thrill"

 We have enough wit to watch from the nearby cafe (it being beer o'clock when we arrive)

This is a small one - the KLM jets come in lower!

 We also visit the french quarter (half!) and find that there is some devastation but more seems to have been fixed, the nearby fort offers good views of Marigot bay - the french capital

 The french bit seems much more chic, even if some of the roofs are still "tarped" The shot above also shows the inland lagoon. - the two halves of it are visible, Also nice view of St Kitts - the shadowy tall island in the very far background.

 There is a good marina here, although this is on the North coast with prevailing winds it does seem sheltered.

After this brief visit to St Martin we have a beer and go, the wrecked boats where one thing,  the broken buildings that had not yet been fixed where another that made us want to leave, I may revisit in a years time as there are lots of chanderly and repair shops for boats, although prices are very high.

With light winds we leave at noon and arrive in Virgin Gorda at first light, a quiet pleasent sail with (finally) full main and number 1 genoa. I remove the bimini so we can steer by starlight and moonlight - magical sailing, finally!

Videos from St Kitts Dive

Fish galore, bit like diving in a tropical fish tank

Lionfish are a major problem in the Caribbean and it is getting much worse. An invasive species that has no natural predators, The female produces eggs every 4 days! we need to kill them.

Finally a turtle, I shot this for Alan who was keen to see one.