For a sailor, few things in life live up to chartering the British Virgin Islands.
by Neil Rabinowitz
It was the time of my life. I was 24, part of a crew
delivering a 73-foot race boat named Ballyhoo from England to the Caribbean. She was spectacular: sleek, fast and loaded with gourmet provisions and an incredible on-deck stereo system.
Whenever I could, I’d take the helm and send everyone below, preferring the thrill of being alone on deck. With the Trade Winds at my back, I’d trim the sheet, accelerate from crest to crest, surf the face and rocket under full sails from sunny afternoons into tranquil, star-studded evenings as Steely Dan sound tracked our phosphorescent trail across the Atlantic. I was young enough to believe it was all about the journey — until one morning when we spotted an odd greenish reflection on the underbelly of a cloudbank. Then came a hint of drifting plant life in the water. Then a land bird circled and we caught the faint, sweet fragrance of blossoms. Finally, just like in whaling days, came the shout from the foredeck: Virgins! Virgins Ahead!
It’s been years since that glorious crossing. Married now with two school-age boys, I live on an island in the Pacific Northwest, where we wake to the roar of sea lions and the cranky yodel of roosters as day breaks over the snow-capped Cascades. It’s a good life, if a bit gray and mournful for five months of the year. So when a magazine calls offering Virgins again, I’m not going to lie and say my heart doesn’t skip a beat.
The offer this time involved a 55-foot custom catamaran called The Shellette, with a fully stocked galley, an amiable South African skipper I knew from previous trips, an impressive arsenal of windsurf and snorkel gear, one hull for the boys and one for Beth and me. All we’d have to do was bring our bathing suits. . . and my memories.
There are some advantages that come with age. Although the British Virgin Islands are reasonably accessible from East Coast business for commercial travelers, usually involving a transfer in Miami, St. Thomas or Puerto Rico, the Islands are a really easy hop if you have your own plane. With anything from a King Air to a G54, it’s just a 1,500-mile straight shot southeast from New York out to the tip of the chain arching up from Venezuela, where the Atlantic rushes through the Anegada Passage.
We touch down at Beef Island, the mountain-ringed international strip adjacent to Tortola. Just across the tarmac, I recognize Richard Branson’s Falcon 50. Sir Richard owns Nekkar Island, a nearby coral-reefed compound that he rents out with hot- and cold-running staff, beach toys and the ultimate in privacy for tens of thousands of dollars a day — when he isn’t keeping it to himself. Luckily, I’ve never indulged much in the luxury private-island fantasy. Not when there are dozens of even more private ones to explore.
A driver in a Jeep picks us up and speeds over the bridge onto Tortola and along narrow coastal roads into Road Town. About 10,000 locals call the BVI home, a colorful mix of descendants of slaves, plantation owners and pirates, American, British and other Commonwealth expatriates; it seems as though we pass every one
on the way to the boat, honking our way through the market throng swarming mango, papaya and seafood stalls.
Around a bend, the largest charter fleet on the planet awaits, a hundred yachts bobbing at the docks like thoroughbreds shifting at the gate. When we spot ours, a little shout goes up among the crew. She’s even bigger than in her picture, a nimble, giant cat built with flair on a beach in South Africa and sailed by her skipper to the BVI.
The first charter captain to recognize the islands’ charms was Christopher Columbus. He sailed 17 top galleons borrowed from Queen Isabella and happened upon the islands on the way to what
he hoped was China, naming them for St. Ursula and her 11,000 virgin martyrs (historical records indicate that figure was closer to 11, but who’s counting?). The English, French, Dutch and Danish followed, and island life eventually passed from colonial tribal warfare and piracy to slavery and sugarcane production before the slaves were freed in the mid-1800s. By 1893, only two white men, the deputy governor and a physician, remained. The Danish sold the western half of the island chain for $25 million in 1917 to the United States so the Americans could protect the approach to the Panama Canal. The British held on to the other half, and to this day, the British Virgins retain far more of their pastoral hillsides, uninhabited anchorages, original Calypso beat and allure to sailors the world over.
It doesn’t take long after we hit the dock before we’re effortlessly reaching across Sir Francis Drake Channel toward Norman Island; our sails trimmed, each of us stakes out a cozy niche to spot dolphins and flying fish breaking off the bow. As soon as the anchor thuds down in a cloud of golden sand, Beth, our sons and I are in the water snorkeling among massive schools of fish flitting in and out of caves.
The next day, we sail northeast past Peter Island, the private outpost owned by Amway founder Richard DeVos, past the sunken Royal Mail Steamer The Rhone, pausing to watch the divers skitter in and out of the wreck. The wind picks up, the weather hull lifts and the splash cools us down as we close in on the Baths and Fallen Jerusalem at Virgin Gorda’s southwest tip. This spot is a favorite in any BVI logbook: a three-mile pile of immense granite boulders, fringed with white-sand coves and crystal-blue pools in between.
Conditions are so perfect we ignore the usual caution about not anchoring at the Baths and take turns keeping an eye out
for the slightest hint of a squall that could send us smashing against the rocks. As the tropical night unfolds, the boys dangle their toes in the water, watching minnows and starfish, then ultimately lie down in the blackness of the trampoline to trace constellations overhead. Beth and I go for a moonlight swim before a thick row of palms rustling across the beach and the looming moon shadow of towering rocks.
At first light the next morning, we’re alone in complete stillness and waters so clear we can read the lettering on the anchor 60 feet below. The boat bobs peacefully on its leash and the smell of fresh bread wafts up from the skipper’s oven below. To the horizon, we see only clear water, green hills and the rising sun casting boulders into shadow.
We press north as the Trade Winds ease us on a sleigh ride to Anegada, the low-lying tip in the chain. Perched on the edge of the Atlantic and Caribbean plates, Anegada’s highest point is only 28 feet. We snorkel the day away in the horseshoe-shaped reef with a bouillabaisse of marine life until we come across a flock of pink flamingos choreographed in flight above a nearby salt pond.
We spend the rest of the week sailing every waterway in the islands, visiting the Bitter End Yacht Club of North Sound and running under intoxicating moonlight through Drake’s Pass. We pop a spinnaker and speed downwind, practically leaping off the crests. After getting social with other boats at anchor at Jost Van Dyke, we seek the solitude of the cruising life again and escape to Green Cay, where we stroll the white-sand beaches. All is silent but for the hiss of breakers and the rustling of palms as the boys play buccaneer and plunder gold. By the time we
pull into Road Town Harbor again, most hearts are heavy — not mine. With charters this easy, I realize all those exotic dreams of voyaging pleasures are not lost in the past but lie just below the surface of our daily lives.
The following can rent you anything from 25-foot daysailors for less than $1,000 to a 250-foot Feadship, costing upwards of $100,000 with a captain or without (known as “bare-boating”).
The Moorings: 888-952-8420; moorings.com
Sunsail USA: 888-350-3568; sunsail.com
BVI Yacht Charters: 888-615-4006; bviyachtcharters.com
TMM Yacht Charters: 800-633-0155; sailtmm.com