Part 4: Jost Van Dyke
After the distillery tour, Doug took a hike while the rest of us strolled along Cane Garden Bay's quiet (at this hour) beach, swung in the hammocks provided for our leisure, and poked some more in the gift shops. After Doug finished his walk, we headed back to the dinghy dock and returned to Space Dancer. Our destination today would be Jost Van Dyke and environs.
Our favorite spot from last year's BVI trip was Sandy Spit, a tiny little island completely encircled by a perfect beach, and marked by a lone, curved palm tree on its north side. Since then, Sandy Spit has figured in a lot of fond memories, not to mention a few magazine covers and charter brochures. This picture perfect desert island paradise would be our lunch stop, and we took off towards Jost Van Dyke. We got caught in a few rain squalls on the way over, and outran a few more, which seemed to hover over Tortola for the rest of the day while we enjoyed bright sunshine over JVD. The storms generated a stiff breeze, and our sail over was correspondingly brisk, clocking up to 7 knots according to Pete's GPS. Unfortunately, the bracing sail resulting in some feverish winching by Pete, who lost a winch handle overboard during one tack. That the handle's lock was broken was small comfort - these babies cost $60 to replace!
But, other than an occasion to heap abuse on Pete, the lost winch handle was soon forgotten, especially as we dropped anchor in the small bay formed by Sandy Spit, Green Cay and Little Jost Van Dyke. We shared the anchorage with only a handful of other charter boats and an excursion boat from St. John. Since it was nearly lunchtime, the girls threw together a lunch of chef salad, which the girls ate, and pita sandwiches, which the boys ate. While the rest of the crew cleaned up after lunch, Rick and I dinked over to Little Jost Van Dyke. The purpose of our trip was to find a beach from which we could skinny dip. Privacy was paramount, but the bottom should be sandy and not too steep. From a distance, it looked like there were three possibilities. We rejected the most western of the three as being too rocky, but the next one was just right. Snugged between two rock outcroppings, no more than 10 yards across, white sand strewn with boulders, gently sloping sandy bottom, and no current.
Once Rick and I finished our exploration, we returned to Space Dancer and retrieved the rest of the crew for a ride to Sandy Spit. I made a quick reconnoiter of the island by walking around it, and found that the island's distinctive leaning palm tree was now half-buried in the sand. I snorkeled with the others for a while, but soon tired of it; so while the others snorkeled, I just splashed and floated around.
After a while, the couple from Clementine (we now know them to be Walker and Nancy from Houston), a Moorings 405, approached us. They asked us if we were on Space Dancer, and when we told them yes, they asked whether we were having any water problems. We all kind of looked at each other and started laughing, at which time Walker and Nancy confirmed that they had chartered Space Dancer from Moorings the year before and suffered the same curious "shortages" of water. We chatted a bit longer, and then noticed a huge catamaran, Cuan Law,- looming over our slice of paradise, loaded with what looked like 50 people decked out in snorkeling gear. This signaled that our time at Sandy Spit had come to an end.
But not before heading over to the little beach Rick and I had pre-approved on Little Jost. We beached the dinghy, and then Rick drew a line in the sand with his toe. I knew what was coming and started nudging the straps of my swimsuit down. "Last one in the water naked is a rotten egg." Rick and I shrugged out of our suits in no time, Doug and Jodi were close behind, and Sue and Pete brought up the rear (partly because Pete couldn't figure out what to do with his hat: should it stay or should it go?). The warm water felt silky on our naked bods and I was definitely glad to have shed my inhibitions and clothes.
By now, it was time to start heading for somewhere to spend the night. Having never been to Foxy's, but wanting to go, we started for Great Harbour on Jost Van Dyke. Great Harbour is a large, protected anchorage with a sandy shore and several bars and restaurants, as well as customs and immigration, but without moorings. By the time we got there, it was pretty crowded with the Sunsail flotilla as well as other sailboats. We scoped out a likely spot, but just as we were positioning ourselves to drop anchor, a crewed Moorings boat named Zoe zoomed in and stole our spot. We moved over to a less favorable spot, and attempted twice more to anchor, with some dubious advice provided by Zoe's "friendly skipper," but could never get comfortable in this anchorage which would undoubtedly get even more crowded as the day wore on.
Giving up on Great Harbour, we motored over to Little Harbour, which is smaller and deeper, but features moorings. The harbour was almost empty, and we chose a mooring in the field near Harris' Place and Sidney's Peace and Love, and went ashore. We went to Harris' to pay for our mooring and, despite the fact that tonight was not lobster night, make reservations for dinner. We met Jeffrey, the (female) bartender, who informed us that tonight was barbecue night. In island fashion, not only did Jeffrey take our reservation, she took our dinner orders and let us choose our table.
With those formalities behind us, we got down to the serious business of bushwhackers and painkillers, to which Jeffrey's blender did justice. We swapped stories, and Jeffrey told us how she ended up working 4 days a week on Jost Van Dyke, taking the ferry over from Tortola every few days and living on the island during her shifts. I deduced from her stories that she was close to 50, but with her close-cropped hair, striking good looks and trim figure, she looked nowhere near old enough to have a grown daughter. We meandered over to Sidney's, which was fairly bereft of activity. However, unlike Harris', whose gift shop had burned down, Sidney's had a large assortment of really great looking shirts, hats, etc. Rick found himself an orange baseball cap, and I a yellow t-shirt. The saleslady talked me into buying a much larger shirt than I really wanted. We spied Sidney, whose acquaintance we made very briefly last year, then headed back to Space Dancer.
I mixed up a batch of sangria, doing the best I could with beaujolais, sugar packets, fruit and juices. It passed the test, and we drank it down with mixed nuts as we cleaned up and dressed for dinner a bit later. In the meantime, Zoe's crew must have decided that Great Harbour was not the place to be, so they cruised into Little Harbour and onto a mooring for the night.
Shortly before 7:30, we headed back to Harris'. By this time, it was dark and the Christmas lights on the roof and supports were aglow. We settled at our waterside table, dug our feet into the sand floor, and got comfortable. We had the attention of the entire staff: Jeffrey, another lady, and Mrs. Harris, who was the chef. Of course, we were the only ones in the restaurant at this hour, and only one or two other tablefuls would arrive the rest of the night. Somewhere between the bread and carrot soup (mmm!) and the main barbecue event, the sky opened up and Rick and Pete made a dinghy run for the boat to close the hatches, but no sooner had they come back did the rain stop. Typical!
Dinner was wonderful. We all had barbecue, but while the rest of us had the combo plate (pork and chicken), Doug and Pete went for the all-you-can-eat, and I'm not sure how they managed to eat as much as they did. The meat was spicy, moist and fall-off-the-bones tender, and the staff of Harris' made sure every desire was sated, right down to the coconut and pineapple pie we had for dessert. Afterwards, Jeffrey promised us that tomorrow morning she would open the bathrooms up for us to take showers, and make us coffee, before she caught the ferry back to Tortola.
By 9:30, we were full and tired, and so headed back to Space Dancer for a good night's rest, interrupted only by the inevitable Hatch Drill.
Wednesday morning, we rose about 6:30 am, and Sue, Pete, Doug, and I went ashore to shower. Sure enough, Jeffrey had arranged to open the doors for us. The water pressure wasn't too strong, and the water wasn't too warm, but it sure felt good to have a shower on land without worrying about emptying the tanks. When I finished, Jeffrey met us with fresh coffee, and we chatted some more as Doug went for a hike. Jeffrey told us the eye-opening (if its true) story of how Sidney's son killed Harris with a spear gun to the heart about 3 years ago, but only got a one-year sentence. Yikes!
A bit later, Rick came for me in the dinghy, and we got rid of some trash then went over to Abe's for some provisions. The doors were locked, but we poked around a bit and soon someone came to open up for us. We got some ice, bread, tomatoes and onions, and then returned to Space Dancer. At about this time, Doug was finishing his walk, and we had a breakfast of hard-boiled eggs and bacon.
