Virgin Gorda: Day II

Up once again with the dawn.  It's odd to me that it's only on vacation that I voluntarily rise so early in the morning. Most mornings at home I have to drag myself out of bed by 8:00 simply to get to work on time, then rush out the door without so much as a sip of coffee. But here in the Caribbean it seems to be easy.  Partly it's because at this latitude there's very little dawn or twilight time: it goes from dark to full sunlight in a matter of minutes and vice versa at the end of the day. Partly it's because my bed directly faces east on Virgin Gorda.  However, I like to think that there's something deep in my blood that pulses to the rhythm of the island. That first quiet, early hour is a precious thing.

DH catching some early morning rays

My mom, dozing in the morning sun

Before long, though, all of us are awake and puttering around.  DH prepares breakfast once again; it's positively decadent. This time he regales us with cheese omelets, bacon, toast, juice, and coffee. We rush to clean up and pack our beach bags & cooler, for today we head to Spring Bay, which is absolutely my favorite beach on the island.  It's Saturday, so we know that the Baths will be crowded with daytrippers and the boating folks (or at least as crowded as it can be in October), and I remember from experience that Spring Bay tends to gather more of a local crowd.

Spring Bay: note the picnic tables off to the left

You reach Spring Bay as if you're heading toward the Baths, but the turnoff is on the right before you get to the more famous destination. There's a parking lot immediately off the road, but don't stop there; continue down the dirt path to the second carpark, which is much closer to the beach. You'll still have a bit of a hike to reach the beach, but it's only onerous if you're also trying to cart beach chairs and a cooler. In other words, exactly what we were doing.  There are a few picnic tables down on the sand, but for us it was worth the hassle of toting things in because of the sparse shade. We wanted to set up under the sea grapes and snag what little shade was available.

The walk down is carved amongst the boulders for which the southern part of the island is famous, and a well-worn path weaves among them, with a few stairs cobbled together where the way is steep or where tree roots might give way to stumbling. But it only takes a few minutes' time to get there, and is it ever worth the walk. The moment you break out into the open from the path, this is what you see:

Note the hoards of people

In other words, in front of us stood the most inviting rocky grotto of a swimming hole as can possibly be imagined.  After settling our chairs & cooler in a choice spot of sand, we walked around a few minutes to make photos before Melanie and I got ready for our first snorkel of the day. As it turns out, that first snorkel was the best one on the trip, and I once more rued not replacing my underwater digital camera.

I had last snorkeled at Spring Bay back in 2007 with one of my granddaughters, who is an intrepid snorkel fiend and I was looking forward to getting back there amongst those sun-dappled boulders again. Melanie, as it turns out, had never snorkeled in water that deep (maybe 20 feet? I'm not a good judge) and thus was a little uncomfortable. She also had *tons* of frustration with her flippers. But here's what you do to get out to those waters beyond the boulders: walk south along Spring Bay beach until you're in front of a couple of beachfront villas and there's a sandy place to enter the water. At about waist-deep you have to start swimming to avoid the rocky bottom and sea urchins, but it's plenty deep enough to swim out.

There were a few of the tiny jellyfish (I don't know what they were, but they were transparent and about 2-2.5 inches across) in the water, but not a ton of them, and one small-to-medium sized moon jelly washed up on the shore where we entered the water, and these made Melanie a little nervous, too.  We were both wearing snorkel shirts so I felt fine about it and I think Melanie basically just followed my lead, and as it turned out, neither of us got stung.

We didn't see anything large, like a sting ray, barracuda, shark, tarpon, or even a turtle, but lots of smaller fish life.  Maybe it's the way the sun filters through the rocks there, but things seemed healthier (or at least more colorful) there than other places on the island in terms of coral and sea fans. Since I couldn't take any pictures this time, here is a photo from the same location, two years ago, when I was snorkeling Spring Bay. I'd guess the water clarity was *slightly* better at the time the photo was made.

Spring Bay snorkeling

I estimate that we'd swum about half a mile by the time we got back to land again. Negotiating the way *back* to the beach can sometimes be tricky, too.  We came back up on a sandy part but then had to pick and crouch our way through some fairly dense underbrush to get back to a place where we could walk upright on the sand. By the time we toweled off and reapplied some sunscreen, a local family had set up next to us and their young boys started the boulder jumping that is so much fun to watch (I even did it once myself, evidence of which you can see here). I asked their mom if it would be okay to post some photographs and she agreed.

It was getting warm, so I coaxed everybody into the water to cool off and to take some photos. For this I did use my old waterproof camera since I didn't plan to immerse it:

DH, Melanie, Mom

Mom & DH, looking towards shore

Melanie

Just another shot of Spring Bay

After that, Melanie and I took another snorkel; Mom was going to join us, but her mask kept leaking water and we didn't have a spare one with us. We basically repeated the same path again, but this time Melanie felt much more confident in the water--I think she also might have left her pesky fins behind this time.  I rarely use them myself, and almost never for a shore snorkel, though I do have a nifty pair of short, split flippers that have come in handy once or twice.

By now, it's well past 1:00, and though we'd brought water and Ting with us in the cooler, it was time to think about lunch.  We packed up and I demonstrated to everybody just how easy it is to change into a dry bathing suit underneath a large sarong. Not to venture too far into TMI territory, but it gets difficult for me to sit around for very long in a wet bathing suit bottom, so in this case, necessity was the mother of invention.

The sign at Mad Dog

We hiked back up the path to the parking lot (after I exhorted everybody to drink more water so that I wouldn't have to carry it back up) and drove straight to Mad Dog, which became the go-to place on this trip.  We split the nachos and the Cubano sandwich special, plus a couple of rounds of Bushwhackers for everybody except DH, who ordered a banana daiquiri instead. We sat around our "usual" table, enjoying the breeze and the shade and the chickens.  Ms Lillia took great care of us, and as we chatted with her, we discovered that she hails from Grenada, which is one of our favorite islands--and the one we've most visited besides Anguilla.

Lillia in action, making our bushwhackers

DH and Lillia

After we had cooled down sufficiently, we headed home. DH was making dinner that night and he needed time to get his spaghetti sauce's flavors to meld on the stovetop before serving.  Which freed up Mom, Melanie, and me to use the pool and take a nap before dinner.

I neglected to take pictures of the meal, but we had yummy garlic bread, green salad, and a super spaghetti. We didn't find out until later that DH had to improvise on the sauce a little bit.  What he had taken for olive oil in the cupboard turned out to be balsamic vinegar instead, so he used bacon fat to saute the garlic and other ingredients.  No wonder it tasted so good!

We dined relatively early, so after cleaning up, we watched another movie.  We'd brought along a handful of them in case the weather turned difficult, but the villa came well-stocked with books, games, and DVDs, so we were all set.  Rum poured over cookies & cream ice cream turned out to be a pretty good dessert and we all went to bed very sassified indeed, ready to embark on tomorrow's adventure.

Euphoria Villa, seen from above

Flora and Fauna of Virgin Gorda

Virgin Gorda is a small island in terms of both size and population (8 square miles, fewer than 4,000 people), but like most tropical destinations, it has a diverse selection of flora and fauna. Here's a tiny sampling of what we delighted in last week. Alas, my underwater digital camera is no longer seaworthy and I didn't replace it before our trip, so these are all land based. In no particular order...

You got your beach (and boardwalk) fowl:

Running goats & climbing goats:

Wilbur and his friends:

I just love this one!

Which means this one must be Charlotte:

At home we call this an orange garden spider. Don't know what it's called on VG.

The mighty pelican (don't you always think of Ogden Nash?):

And a tiny crab--look closely:

Here are some flower shots by day:

I think this was a flamboyant.

Oleander

Firecrackers

One evening near twilight I went outside and randomly shot some flowers on a micro setting with flash.   I was surprised by what the results were:

Tiny bougainvillea blooming out of the rocks

Blue Wreath 

Ixora

This hibiscus just might be my favorite shot

We also saw frigates, hummingbirds, grackles, and bananaquits flying around the villa but weren't able to snap photos of them all. And there were dozens, if not hundreds of flowers that I didn't shoot, including the wonderfully fragrant jasmine blooming outside our door at Euphoria that laced the air with its delicate perfume. Melanie shot lots of lizards and a few skinks but I somehow came up empty-handed where those are concerned. 

One of things I love best about this island is the lack of demarcation between indoor and outdoor, between humans and animals--it's just all there in a wild jumble for the [picture] taking. 

P. S. Happy birthday, sweetheart!  I scheduled this post at 10:15 on 10/15 in your honor.

Virgin Gorda 2012: Travel Day + Day I

Sunrise seen from the airplane

Our trip got off to an inauspicious start at the Fairfield Inn next to the airport.  We frequently nab a Park-Sleep-Fly package at an airport hotel because for trips of a week or longer, it costs less than parking at the airport for the time we're away.  I'd requested a room on the ground floor, only to find out upon check-in that the only room available in the fully-booked place was on the top floor. Oh yeah, AND the elevator was out of order. Granted, the top floor was only the third floor, but I'm a Marriott rewards member AND both of my traveling companions were in their seventies, so I wasn't exactly thrilled with the ways things were shaping up.

The elevator still wasn't working in the morning when we caught the 4:30 a.m. shuttle and grumbled our way to the airport, but things were about to pick up.  As I mentioned in the previous post, we broke our usual travel habits on this trip by flying first/business class--something we've not paid to do since our honeymoon trip nearly ten years ago. American Airlines must have had a glitch in their booking system that day, as the overall costs were only about $50 per person more than the cheap seats. We don't exactly have a surfeit of cash when it comes to travel--we'd much rather taking a longer vacation in a casual spot than a shorter vacation in a luxurious one--so this might be the only instance in our traveling history when we've had our cake and eaten it, too.

We had two easy travel legs, with a connection in Miami, an airport I rather like but only when not having to clear immigration & customs (in which case it's an utter nightmare). We arrived in St. Thomas around 2:00, took a short taxi to the ferry dock in Charlotte Amalie, and spent a couple of very pleasant hours upstairs at the Petite Pump House before our 5:00 departure on Speedy's for non-stop service into Spanish Town.

Mom at Petite Pump Room

View of some ruins from Petite Pump Room

We enjoyed the views and the breeze and even made photos of the floatplanes taking off & landing right next to us. First rum punch of the trip (alas--they make their punches way too sweet for me in the VI), plus some conch fritters (calling them mediocre would be too high a compliment), and some surprisingly good wings, plus a couple of Presidentes to wash everything down.

Waiting room for the ferry

Sunset viewed from the ferry

The ferry ride was extremely smooth and fun as we passed along the north shore of Tortola, spying St. John, Jost Van Dyke, Guana Island (where we honeymooned), Camanoe, and Scrub, which looks much different from the last time I passed through this area. The sun set well before our arrival on Virgin Gorda, passing through immigration & customs was easy-breezey, and our friend Melanie greeted us upon exiting the building.  Her travel day had taken her BDL-MIA-SJU-EIS, and then the North Sound Express to Spanish town and she'd arrived on the island about 15 minutes ahead of us. Leverick Bay had arranged for Chudney, a terrific fellow, to pick us up at the ferry dock, so after we retrieved our luggage we piled into his open-air jitney and we headed off into the darkness.

Leaving St. Thomas in our dust wake

My husband and I had visited Virgin Gorda before, not to mention other mountainous Caribbean islands, but my mom and Mel felt like they'd gotten themselves onto Mr. Toad's Wild Ride: holding on for dear life and praying not to fall off the back of the truck on those steep inclines. Still, all of us were grateful when, 30 minutes later, we pulled up to Euphoria Villa. A woman from Leverick was there to greet us, but she was so clearly tired and desperate to leave that she only gave us the most cursory introduction to the villa. If I hadn't asked where certain light switches were, or where the grill was, or where the keys were, or whether we should lock our doors, or whether there was any protocol about the a/c, we'd have had no information at all. Bone tired and barely able to keep our eyes open after 16 hours straight of travel, we bade each other good night and scurried into our respective bedrooms.

Sunrise over the North Sound

While I would never choose a long day of travel if I had my druthers, there is one incredible reward to arriving on an island after dark, and that's waking up at dawn and seeing its beauty for the first time. Our master bedroom faced due east, and though we had the jalousie louvered windows all shut for the a/c to run, the doors out to the pool are done in frosted privacy glass, so I was always awake shortly after the sunrise. I love the gentleness of that early morning sunshine--it's the only time of day I take the sun directly.

The beautiful early light on our villa & pool

Around 9:00, DH began breakfast preparations. I'd asked Leverick Bay to provision a few items in the villa for our first night and morning, including cheese & crackers, gin, tonic, Ting, fruit, bread, eggs, bacon, juice, milk, & coffee. Yes, the prices are already a little higher than at home, and there is a 20% surcharge added on top of that, but the convenience can't be beat.  I didn't want to provision at Bucks after arriving on Virgin Gorda that first night in case our ferry was running late, so I was happy to pay a little extra to have all of that waiting for us.

DH preparing breakfast in his lava-lava

We ate our meal at the outdoor table under the alcove, but that was the last time we dined outdoors. The flies soon drove us to distraction. There were some portable fans indoors that we considered moving outside for future dining, but we ended up just eating inside for the rest of our meals. With surrounded on three sides by sliding glass & screen doors, it was no hardship eating at the dining room table in total comfort.

The pretty little outdoor alcove with table

While we were lingering over one last cup of coffee, Chudney pulled up with our rental car around 10:00 am. We offered him a beverage and he joined us over some conversation.   He hails from Handsome Bay, and if everybody who lives there looks like Chudney, then it's a well-named place, indeed! He gave us a small island map and showed us all of the places we could buy groceries before heading on his way.

I'd randomly selected a 4-door, AWD vehicle from the Leverick website that turned out to be much smaller on the inside than it looked! It was a lavender-colored Daihatsu and it had a hard time making it up some of the hills.  In retrospect, we probably should have traded in for a larger, more powerful vehicle and paid the difference, but we made do. There were times when the pedal was to the metal and  the poor thing could only slowly chug up the hill at about 15-20 km/hour. The floorboard design was poor, as when I had anything other than flipflops on my feet, the gas and break pedals were so close together that it was hard to have my foot on just one of the pedals.

One of the views of the island

We didn't plan to do much that day, other than drive around a bit so that mom and Mel could get their bearings and do our main grocery shopping, and basically just rest from the day before. So around 11:00 we piled into the car and drove into town, and I think the drive was one long exclamation from my mom and Melanie (helped along every now & again by DH and me) over how beautiful the views were. That's one of many things that I think Virgin Gorda has all over Tortola: at almost every point from almost every road, there are stunning views. Well, that, plus the fact that the roads are actually wide enough to accommodate two cars abreast at one time. Don't get me started on the fear factors behind driving to Brewers Bay on Tortola!

Because we were feeling rather parched, it seemed like the most reasonable of ideas to continue on to Mad Dog before doing our shopping.  I'm not sure how it's possible that I've never been there before, but it's true.  It's the kind of place that's easy to fall in love with: casual setting, utterly unpretentious, with good drinks and a good-humored staff and chickens to entertain you while you're waiting for your food. Whatever you do, do not ring the bell in the ceiling unless you want to buy a round of drinks for everybody!

DH and Melanie inside Mad Dog

Mom outside at Mad Dog, enjoying her first (but not last!) Bushwhacker

We ordered a round of their signature Bushwhackers, which are so decadent that it's easy to forget that they can also pack a wallop: it's a frozen drink made with rum, cream of coconut, Kahlua, amaretto, Irish creme, and occasionally with a hint of chocolate.  Let's just say that they go down with tolerable ease.

The dart board in "our" corner at Mad Dog

After reviving ourselves sufficiently to go on, we drove back to Buck's to buy our groceries, including food for dinner a few nights during our stay. Once home, we enjoyed the pool all afternoon until it was time to go to Hog Heaven for an early dinner--early because we wanted to enjoy the famous views
before sunset and because we hadn't really eaten since breakfast that morning.

See what I mean about views from the road?

Hog Heaven is on the road to Nail Bay and it's another casual island eatery, but it has the very best views on the island. The menu is simple and not extensive; I wouldn't recommend going there if you're a vegetarian. We decided to try the pork platter (me), the fried chicken (DH), and the grilled chicken (Mom and Melanie), with each platter accompanied by your choice of two sides. I personally thought the plantains and coleslaw were very good, and while the pork itself was really terrific, the cheap Kraft bbq sauce slathered all over it completely masked the flavor of the meat. As we Southerners say, to us BBQ is a noun but to the rest of the world, it's merely a verb.  Too bad, as the pork at Hog Heaven truly could have been excellent BBQ in noun form. DH enjoyed his chicken, as did Mom and Melanie their ribs, and the latter especially enjoyed the signature drink called Blondie. I myself chose a Presidente as being the better accompaniment to our meal.

DH at Hog Heaven

All in all it was a moderately priced dinner out and we'd had a great time. It was definitely chilly out on the balcony, especially after the sun set, and the folks with me were glad to have a light wrap, despite being skeptical of the need for one when we left the villa. There were no sunset views, strictly speaking, which was a surprise to me. We would have eaten dessert, but they don't serve anything sweet. Also, Hog Heaven is strictly cash-only, so please plan accordingly. Our bill came to about $80 and we couldn't tell if a service charge had already been added, so we asked: the answer was yes, 15%. We added a bit more and went home for a nightcap and a dip in the pool.

Once last lovely view before concluding this post