Road Town and delayed departure.

Road Town:
Village Cay Marina, as Eye Candy were still close by so we decided to go out for a meal we ended up in a very nice place called The Dove, the food and wine was excellent all of us ate very well then had after dinner drinks too. I think we all enjoyed the walk there and even more coming back after eating so much. I'm ashamed to say I forgot to take the camera with me. Never mind next time.
Eye Candy left the following morning to go to Virgin Gorda, sad to see them go but we will catch up later as we go further south through the islands.

Yes thats Don up there

Enjoying a painkiller

Roosters are everywhere and are very "street savy"

Andrew and Don looking for SSB snags

Departure, not to be!

Well the plan to leave Road Town was "scuppered" if you pardon the pun,  on Thursday we were almost ready to go to the US Virgins for a repeat scout about in St John, we knew the anchor light had failed, (for the landlubbers its the light at the top of the mast that you have to use at anchor or on a mooring ball so other boats can see you) Ours was, a LED which was very bright and used very little power but our mission was to find another. Failure, none to be found so one of the old kind went back in.

Friday 10th Jan: Checked out of the BVI's then off out into the M1 again, the wind and sea throwing everything it could about, we consider ourselves lucky we were sailing downwind with up to 33 knts and we were flying doing almost 8 knts. The journey only took just over 2 hours and we were on a mooring buoy in Caneel Bay.
Re the last post and the rigging problems, still not sure if our solution has worked yet to stop the creaking, guess we won't know until we try sailing upwind and on the various points of sail, we live in hope.

Caneel Bay has changed a little since last season we are sure there were mooring balls and the one we chose was at the resort end where the resort ferries are whizzing about every hour or so and making things a little choppy. Anyway we had to go into Cruz Bay via dinghy to checkin with US customs, just another form to fill, passports stamped, documents checked, fingerprints taken and our photo's taken. The US customs is very efficient and it didn't take long at all however we had arrived just before a huge charter boat came in with at 50 - 60 people to checkin too otherwise I dread to think how long it would have taken phew! Oh almost forgot to say its a good job there was nothing to pay as Don had forgotten his wallet, I think it was an excuse not to buy me an ice cream.

Cruz Bay 

Cruz Bay the nice bit except for the ferries

Jan 11th Saturday: Oh dear we had a rocky rolly night again, so morning we kept a sharp lookout for another buoy closer to Cruz bay making the dinghy ride into town much shorter.
We went into Cruz bay, tied up and visited "our old haunts" not too much changed and free wifi in the park by the ferry docks. Great lunch taken and I found a new cocktail, Lime N Coconut, it was silly to ask what was in it but its very refreshing, of course 2 kinds of rum with fresh lime, coconut and lots of ice then blended, very nice, Don likes it too but he had a "Bushwhacker" that was good too,  way too many ingredients for me to list, I need a blender now, its no use buying one here they use 110 volts like the US.

Sun 12th Jan Sailed to Francis Bay picked up a ball again.
Had a decent non rolly night.
We took the dinghy ashore on a little bit of private beach then had a couple of hours snorkelling on the reef, lots of life but again the visibility wasn't that great.

Our bit of private beach on Francis bay

The following day we met a couple I recognised from the dinghy dock in Cruz bay so as we went past their yacht I mentioned that we had seen them before, after hearing their Scottish accents and Don replying we agreed to meet later that day. It turned out they were both originally from Glasgow but live in the USA. They too well Jim had sailed from the Chesapeake area, Sue flies down as I have been hearing lots of ladies leave the guys to do the long haul stuff, hmmm.

Anyway after a few drinks yarns aboard "Sail Doc" we returned and the following day moved onto Great Lamesure Bay ready to cross to St Croix.
Great Lamesure is a pretty much lonely spot, just a deserted bay and 2 more yachts moored. The afternoon was spent snorkelling, yet again a little rolly night, we need to find somewhere  less rolly for a decent sleep.

BFN
Don and Glenys
Agua Therapy