Friday 22 Mar, USVI day 6, St.John: Sail around the island with Terry and Vicki.
Alarm wakes us early but so does the rain. It’s dark clouds and no sign of sun. We ask our new friends if they are still keen to come and we receive an affirmative. We pick them up from the shore but it’s only Vicki and Terry who come. Which makes sense. It is after all Vicki and Terry who are learning to sail, following our blog and thinking of adopting a similar lifestyle.
After showing them the boat and chatting over coffee, the sun comes out so we set off. Sailing is what they would like to do, so sailing we shall.
We plan to circumnavigate the island of St. John, clockwise. At first this means hard on the wind through the narrow passage between Tortola and St. John. But first tack we head direct north towards Jost Van Dyke, then tack back through the gap next to Soper’s Hole on Tortola. The water is flat, the wind is gusting nicely and we slice through the water upwind. Once in the narrows we have 2 kts of current under us and in this wind-against-current situation the water becomes very choppy. Other lighter yachts are slamming into it, but Cloudy Bay is doing her usual stuff, pushing these little waves aside in clouds of spray like they are nothing. It’s an enjoyable upwind sail.
This is the first time Vicki and Terry have sailed on anything bigger than a Soling day sailor which they have been learning on in Boston harbour, so it’s quite an experience for them. Terry is very keen to learn as much as he can and it’s a pleasure talking to him and explain all the things Oana and I usually do without even thinking: trimming the sails, putting Cloudy through tacks, use the plotter, AIS, autohelm etc. and all of a sudden you realize just how much knowledge we have gained sailing 18,000 miles over the last 3 years. I guess you could even say we are almost experts at sailing an HR54 …. by the name of Cloudy Bay!
Around the eastern tip of St. John we veer off the wind and head into the large bay that encompasses Coral Bay, Hurricane Hole, Elk Bay, Hansen Bay and several others.
First we visit Hansen Bay which has the apparently famous floating bar. And it does look popular with lots of dinghies and kayaks tied up to it. But in reality it’s just a portacabin stuck on a floating platform. Full marks for novelty, but not for us!
Instead we sail towards Hurricane Hole and go inland as far as we can reach, ending is a small but totally secluded bay, Princess Bay with just one mooring ball all to ourselves. There we stop and have lunch in our peaceful surroundings.
After lunch we sail out the larger bay then at Ram Point head downwind along the southern side of St. John. But the wind is light, only 9-11 knots, the swell is rolling us and there is not enough pressure in the mainsail to keep it pinned out. So occasionally the boom swings in the back out again with an undesirable bang. Not good. So because of that, and in the interest of time to get them back ashore to their awaiting friends, we furl away the sails. I set the propeller into overdrive and we motor the rest of the way down wind, around the western tip, passed Cruz town then back east along the north coast and finally back into Maho Bay. Around-the-island completed in 5 hours. We doubt it’s set any record! Maybe the slowest ever? 🙂
Terry and Vicki declare they have had a wonderful day out and promise to keep us appraise of their sailing next week (they are taking further training on a 40ft catamaran). We then drop them at the beach to their friends and bid our farewells. It feels like we have known them for more than just 24 hours. Very pleasant people.
Back on Cloudy Bay we relax, have tea, watch the sunset and decide that tomorrow we should declare St. John “done” and move over to St. Thomas. Maho Bay has been our home for 5 days now! Almost unheard of for us to be moored off a beach with no civilization for that long! We certainly have enjoyed staying-put and just relaxing in such a beautiful and tranquil place for a few days. But tomorrow we must get back to work …. haha.
During the evening we play on the PC with photos and video and we feel mosquitoes eating us. Maybe it wasn’t such a great idea to take the mooring as close to the beach as we could get! We are first in line to be nibbled!
