A little about "The Baths" in Virgin Gorda

I think that I had mentioned the Baths yesterday when we walked to Coco Mayas.

"The Baths" are considered by many to be a geologic wonder and are located on the southern end of the island. They are one of the BVI's major tourist destinations. Here, the beach shows evidence of the island's volcanic origins, as huge granite and/or diorite boulders lie in piles on the beach, forming scenic grottoes that are open to the sea. They truly are awe-inspiring boulders! You can wade through the sheltered sea pools and enjoy the water in them on the beach edge. This area is just north of the Virgin Gorda Yacht Harbor (where we hauled out). I think we can probably do an early morning walk there once Steph gets here. If it’s too far we’ll have to flag down a ride. I’ve been told to walk it early – not at the noon time since it gets too hot. Some of the massive granite boulders are as large as 40 feet in diameter. With the white sand beaches and secret rock pools, it truly is a lovely area that inspires you theorize about the origin of these giant ocean sentinels.

Ready for a little geology? It’s said by the park service that: “The cavernous surroundings are a result of the molten rock seeping up into the existing volcanic rock layers; because the molten rock did not reach the surface it cooled slowly and formed the hard crystalline granite layer. Further shrinkage and cracking formed blocks, which were exposed when the softer volcanic rock above eroded away. Weathering rounded the corners of the boulders to what they are today. These massive boulders are also found at Fallen and Broken Jerusalem.” Strong ocean swells can occur in the winter months, preventing use of the mooring buoys and access to the beach from the sea. Swimming is also discouraged during these periods, due to the strong currents. That being said – it sounds like it’s better to head there by shore so we’ll do the Baths by foot from the marina. I’ve been told they’re between a mile and two miles from Spanish Town so we’ll give it a shot.

In the island's North Sound is the high-end Bitter End Yacht Club, a five-star resort. I’m also hoping to make it there this trip too. It’s been a long time since we’ve been there and I’d like to see what changes have been made. Last time we were there was with Laura and Greg – many moons ago. I love the thought that this time we are here with our own boat. It really is something I’ve wanted to do. I guess it’s what you could call one of my bucket list items (just being in the Virgins in my own boat). I do need to make sure that we moor over at Cinnamon Bay though – our old campground area where we used to bring the kids when they were smaller! I love the thought of being able to look ashore at the spot where I used to stand looking at Capt’n Bob’s boat from the beach. It’ll be a sort of completion of by-gone years.

It’s been kind of a non-eventful day, except for all the bees that like to come and drink the water from the puddles on our boat. They seem to like Aurora, our boat and the boat on the other side of us. We’ve been doing miscellaneous work around the boat. I’m still cleaning up pieces of things that Mr. Rat managed to get into. I went through some of the storage areas in the galley and the clean up is slow but continuous. I have to add a couple of splicing jobs to my “to do list” before the boat gets launched. One of our davit lines is hanging together by threads. It’s been nice to be able to get online today. I’ve managed to post my journal up to yesterday.

We have an official launch date now: Dec. 19th at 9:30am. We have to get used to listening to the weather and keeping track again. So after talking to Desney in the boat yard and the marina to make sure we have a slip, I got the radio, radar and chart plotters hooked up and tested. It looks like they’re all in working order. Yay!

Time to head over to Azaya’s for sun downers. It’s been raining out on and off for the last couple of hours. The heady winds have died off now so it might be a good time to make a run for the marina now.

Wow I can’t believe the difference in weather. We really are somewhat sheltered behind the building in the boatyard. When we got to Azaya the winds were still strong. At our boat – none comes aboard. We met a couple from Sweden that were looking at Azaya. They’d bought a de-masted custom boat in the boatyard and were working on it. They were getting ideas from Mary/Axel on the setup of Azaya. Gordon and Anna (their names) have 2 year old twins and are currently setting up the boat to take it back to Sweden. They’re an interesting couple - full of life to take on this project with 2 year old twins. Wow. The little boys are adorable little white haired bundles of energy! I couldn’t imagine taking on a boat project of this magnitude with 2 year olds.