BVIs - Spinnakers and Snorkleing

We left North sound with the Super yacht regatta in full swing, we had been lucky enough to see the boats the previous day when we were heading back from our dive and they were really impressive, they didn’t fail to impress the next day and seeing the J-boats with full sail is amazing.

Wow look at them go

They look so beautiful

Race on!

No racing for us and a leisurely sail along the coast whilst watching the racing, we headed to Mountain Point/Long Bay which is only 6 miles away, by the time we were about to anchor our friends on Persephone were speeding along with spinnaker flying.  Nigel is a very keen racer and was desperate for the opportunity to use his spinnaker.

Persephone under spinnaker

We had a lovely lunch stop, shame we didn’t take our camera snorkelling as this was some of the best coral we have seen, it was like an underwater garden, amazing.  Next stop for the night was Savannah bay, we crept in behind the reef and anchored along miles of sandy beach with a handful of other boats, no hotels/bars just beach.

Lovely beach

We were up early for a visit to “The Baths” these are the big tourist attraction on Virgin Gorda, this is a lovely beach surrounded by huge granite boulders, as it is part of the national park you not able to anchor and must take a buoy of which there are a limited number so you must arrive early.    By 8.15am we were in the water snorkelling and this time we took the camera.  There were lots and lots of fish, the water was beautifully clear and swimming in between the rocks was fantastic.

One of the many blue tangs

Amanda saying hello to the Blue tangs

The amazing granite bolders

Houndfish coming for a closer look

Stingray going about its business

Amanda swimming through the deep crevice

On our return to the boat we actually had a look at our fish guide so we could provide an indication on the volume of different fish that you actually see – Foureye Butterflyfish, Spotfin Butterflyfish, Sergent Major, Blue Tangs, Ballyhoo, Silver Porgy, Jolthead Porgy, French Grunt, Bluestripe Grunt, Yellow Snapper, Dusky Damselfish, Cocoa Damselfish, Yellowtail Damselfish, Blue Chromis, Rainbow Parrotfish, Queen Parrotfish, Bluehead Wrasse, Yellowhead Wrasse, Slippery Dick, Squirrel fish, Goby, Trumpet fish, Yellowgoat fish, Smoothtruckfish, Southern stringray, Sand Dollar, Bearded fishworm – Yep lots!

As we were warming up with a cup of tea at 10am the anchorage started to fill up, we had luckily only seen one other snorkeler in over an hour in the water.  So we decided to head off, next stop Cooper Island, Hollovers Bay although this ended up being a quick stop as too rolly, so we had move to Manchioneel Bay which was not ideal as had to pay for a buoy for the night L