Sopers Hole | Tusen Takk II

On March 9 we checked in at West End, BVI, and spent the night at a mooring in Soper’s Hole. Early on March 10, we moved to Road Harbour, where we anchored briefly outside of Wickhams Cay. We were there to pick up four guests for the day: Rasmus and Kari Morvik and Terje and Kirsten Seim, all from the Kristiansand area of southern Norway. They had flown in to San Juan, Puerto Rico for several days of visiting that island before boarding “Brilliance of the Seas” to the Virgin Islands. Their cruise ship arrived at Road Harbour just about the same time we did, but there would be a short delay while they had breakfast aboard and then found their way off the huge ship.

While we waited for the appointed time, we were surprised by a dinghy visit from a sailboat anchored nearby. Paul, aboard Distant Shores II, had recognized our vessel and came to say hello and present us with a gift. Paul and his wife Sheryl are videographers that produce a television series entitled, naturally enough, Distant Shores. We had appeared in one of their programs, an episode that featured a rum-tasting party aboard Seaman’s Elixir hosted by Linda and Steve Kraskey in Culebra way back in March, 2007. Anyway, Paul presented us with a copy of the rum-tasting episode! How gracious!

Barb stayed on board while I took the dinghy in at 9:30 to Village Cay Marina, in order to fetch the four Norwegians for a short visit. They had but one day in the BVIs, so we had to pack a lot into a little time. We crossed over to the Indians for some snorkeling and then in to the Bight for some lunch on board and then watched the rum-tasting episode. Then, a brief visit to the always-raucous Willy T’s for an introduction to “pain killers”. And then a hustle back to Road Harbour in order to get our friends back on board the cruise ship by 4:15, so that they could continue on to Guadeloupe and Barbados and back to Puerto Rico.

All too brief. Vi gleder oss til å se dem igjen i sommer.

March 31 addendum: the pictures marked below with (TS) were provided by Terje Seim.

: Brilliance of the Sea

: Arriving at TT2 from Village Cay Marina

: Snorkeling at the Indians

: Lunch after snorkel and before Willy T

: Watching a “rum tasting” video

: At the Willy T

: Our guests get some sun

: Back toward the cruise ship

: As seen from the cruise ship (TS)

: Piloting out to The Indians (TS)

: Relaxing on the foredeck (TS)

: The Indians, as seen from our mooring (TS)

: Dinghying to Willy T’s (TS)

: At Willy T’s (TS)

Chuck’s nephew Erik and Erik’s wife Cindy flew in to Charlotte Amalie on Feb 28. While anchored in the Bay awaiting their arrival, we saw an interesting sight. Two helicopters circled the Bay and then one of them hovered over the dock at the Coast Guard Station. It was difficult to see what was happening, but later examination of my telephoto pictures revealed that a superstructure suitable for mounting navigation aids was being tied to the helicopter. When that was secured, the helicopter flew off, presumably to deposit the structure on some hazardous rocky outcrop.

We had a grand time with Erik and Cindy. We snorkeled at Waterlemon and Christmas Cove, and after checking in to the BVIs in order to pick up an injector pump for our generator, visited the Bight area of Norman Island, where we snorkeled the Caves and the Indians, and of course we stopped in at Willy T’s in order that Erik and Cindy could experience that particular bit of tourist-madness.

While in Francis Bay, Barb took our guests on a walk to the Annaberg Ruins, where they were fortunate to arrive during an expo day. On Friday night we again partook of the gluttonous meal at Maho Resort, and afterwards watched in fascination as a guest glass blower created a gnarled tree complete with green foliage. On another day we all joined Hunter and Devi (Arctic Tern) and their guests Craig and Sharon on a hike over the Johnny Horn trail from Waterlemon to Coral Bay and back. While in Coral Bay we had breakfast at the Donkey Diner, and then walked down to the little grocery store “Love City Mini Market”, which “has everything”.

Erik and Cindy: great guests, welcome anytime.

Post Script: On the day after Erik and Cindy’s departure, Mar 8, Barb took some amazing photos while dinghy-ing in to do some laundry. See the last two photos in the album, below, of a daring rider on a “St Thomas JetRider”. Barb later found literature which described the setup. A 33 ft hose from the small boat to the two barrels on the jetpack unit. Water is pumped at over 1,000 gallons per minute.

PPS: Today, Mar 20, I am updating the photo gallery, below, to include three photos taken by Erik while he was with us. I just got them through email a few days ago — hence the delay in their inclusion.