Adventures

After a nice sleep on board at the dock, we went through the boat checkout and debriefing. We left Tortola around noon for a wonderful sail across the Sir Francis Drake channel to the Indians. As usual, the Indians provided a wonderful snorkel and dive. We even rescued a ladder from the bottom for a nearby boat. On the way back to the boat, we came across a beautiful turtle that let us gaze in awe while she ate. We stayed there for ~15 minutes at depth, then made our way back to Bliss Point.

We grabbed a mooring ball in Privateer Bay on the SW end of Norman Island. There were tons of big fish swimming around our underwater light! That was fun for a while, when we doused the light at the end of the evening, there was a wonderful display of bioluminescence in the water.

We had to close the hatches overnight because of the storms rolling through the area.

Well that was a fun ferry ride today. About 1/3 of the way from St. Thomas, USVI to Tortola, BVI, one of the engines in the boat caught on fire! They were able to shut down the engine and douse the fire and we continued safely to Tortola on the remaining engine at about 1/2 of the speed as before. After our 45 minute ferry ride turned into a 2 hour slow motion ride, we finally made it safely to the dock.

We worked our way through the Covid and Customs procedures and boarded our vessel, Bliss Point – a 47′ monohull, tonight. All of the provisions have been stowed and we are shutting down for the evening, ready for our boat briefing in the morning, then sailing away in the early afternoon!

Will sail for PainKillers!!

Donate here:
Soggy Dollar Drink Board

I’m halfway there, the gate crew in Miami gave me a free seat upgrade on the flight to St. Thomas!

Flying out of Austin this morning had a great view of the new Tesla plant.

I can’t wait for a wonderful meal at the Pie Hole in Frenchtown, Charlotte Amalie, St. Thomas

The folks working the BVI covid gateway work extremely helpful checking our applications well after the close of business last night. They’re able to process all of us and approve all of our applications!

I received my green light from the US Virgin Islands travel portal. They approved my documents last night around 2:00 a.m this morning. That puts me almost there, now I need to get is the BVI approval.

Time to begin packing for my early morning flight tomorrow.

More good news, I was able to upgrade to business class on the return flights for $165!

Lori is heading to the islands tomorrow, I will be following along with the rest of the crew on Tuesday morning. Still waiting for my travel authorization with the USVI portal. I’ll start panicking if they don’t arrive in the morning. Packing will also be done tomorrow and soon we will all be frolicking in the Virgins!

It FINALLY looks like the sailing adventure that we had planned for June 2020 (British Virgin Islands) > postponed to October 2020 (BVI) > postponed to December 2020 (BVI) > postponed to March 2021 (Tahiti) > postponed to June 2021 (Tahiti) > postponed to June 2021 (BVI) is going to happen. We are making our final preparations and expect to be boarding our charter on Tortola, BVI on June 2nd!

So many preparations, hotels, transfers and airline reservations purchased and canceled for a single sailing trip. The number of times that Covid regulations and closures postponed this trip made me think we were living in a Gilligans Island episode!

It is now time to start packing the SCUBA gear and swimsuits!

We are now less than 14 days from our next adventure – circumnavigating the British Virgin Islands.  I can’t wait to play with the Lemurs on Necker Island, eat lobster on Anegada Island, SCUBA dive the wrecks of the Rhone and the Kodiak Queen, and swim in the Baths once again.  At this point we are closely watching the weather, getting all of the last minute details confirmed, preparations and provisioning are being lined up, documentation is being located, and Covid 19 tests are being scheduled.

See you soon in the BVI!