TravelTalkOnline Forums Travel and Vacation Forums British Virgin Islands Stargazer trip report, 10/25/21 - 11/3/21

Stargazer Trip Report, 10/25/21-11/3/21
It was fantastic kicking off the new sailing season in the BVI. Our “just purchased” Leopard 45 had a great phase-out through The Moorings and is now in Captain Compass’s fleet in brand new condition. Between the very slow post-Irma sailing and the Covid closing of the BVI, Stargazer for all practical purposes is a brand new catamaran.
Prior to heading to the BVI we purchased BinaxNowCOVID-19 home tests with the Navica app. To try it out and get familiar with the test, we used it as the Covid test to get into St Thomas and the BVI. The test only takes about 20 minutes total and you get an email with results within 30 minutes. We used this test to travel back to the USVI from BVI. Much easier than trying to schedule and wait at a clinic in the BVI for the test. This is the second time in 9 weeks I traveled to the BVI. Both times Delta never asked if we filed out the USVI portal for St Thomas. Nine weeks ago I didn’t do the portal and it was no big deal. The US National Guard (who do the check in) just have you file out a paper version of the online portal. Total time at the airport was about 5 minutes. Using the portal, about the same amount of time. At the ferry, they do want to see your covid test results, proof of insurance and Covid vaccine card. When we arrived at the ferry dock in Road Town, all that was necessary was paying $50 and getting tested. Total time under 30 minutes (15 minutes was the wait time on the test). After that, we were free to move about as we wanted
Day 1, 10/25: We had Kevin pick us up at the airport in St Thomas and take us to the ferry. It’s always great to see Kevin. You can always count on him. One of my crew members arrived with me in Sea Cow Bay. We got there around 6pm. When we purchased the ferry tickets, they were still only providing a 4:30 ferry to Road Town (they had just added a 2:30 ferry which we could have taken had we known). Nice to know they have started increasing the number of ferries with anticipation of pent-up interest. We have always used George to pick us up at Road Town and take us the Sea Cow Bay. Be glad to share his info if anyone wants it. Once there, we did some unpacking, ate, talked to Brent about how his fleet is all in great shape and getting bookings for both this season and next and finally went to bed after a long travel day.
Day 2, 10/26: Spent the morning getting re-familiar with the Leopard 45. Our provisions arrived from Rightway by 11 AM. We raised the sails (which is really wonderful using the electric winches with all the rigging coming back to the helm and headed towards Norman Island. Once there, did some snorkeling, enjoyed a few beers and finally finished the day with dinner at Willy T’s. The food was great. There were 19 boats on moorings that night.
Day 3, 10/27: After a leisure breakfast, we headed over to Trellis Bay to pick up my wife and the rest of our crew. With lots of time on our hands, did some swimming to stay cool along with downing a few beers. Around 6:30 I picked up everyone at the dock and headed back to the boat. To properly christen our new boat we opened Champaign and enjoyed appetizers on the “front terrace” of Stargazer. For dinner that night we grilled salmon. There were a total of 3 boats mooring plus about 6 “resident” boats. Looking over to Marina Key I could see 3 boats spending the night there.
Day 4, 10/28: Another beautiful day of sun and not a drop of rain. It is so nice to enjoy a cup of coffee on the “front terrace”, watching the sun come up. Something I enjoyed every morning. We cooked scrambled eggs for breakfast before leaving Trellis. Had a wonderful sailing day with winds at around 8 knots giving us a smooth and slow sail to North Sound. A few weeks before we headed down, I emailed Saba Rock to confirm they were open and the Director of Food and Services booked reservations for dinner for us for the 28th. I was at Saba Rock many times before Irma and all I can saw about the “NEW” Saba Rock is WOW!!!!!!! They have done an incredible job of rebuilding. Two bars, (one on the first floor and a very large bar upstairs. Our food was more than delicious. Since lobster season didn’t start til 11/1, I had the best grouper ever tasted. They also have a retail store and hotel rooms. The day we were there, at least 6 rooms had been rented. For both lunch and dinner there were water taxis bringing in people for meals. Currently they have about a dozen mooring balls. Six are boatyballs, the rest are first come-first serve and you pay at either the dock or the retail store. Mooring fees are the same as everywhere else, $30. HOWEVER, that INCLUDES up to 250 gallons of water and a bag of ice. (something the “old Leverick Bay” use to do but no more. Saba Rock is now my preferred North Sound place to stay. It does put Leverick Bay to shame. The Bitterend looks as though it coming along but slowly. My understandings is first to open will be a restaurant, retail store and water toys. Once it’s up, the North Sound will have plenty of choices as to where to grap a mooring ball and eat.
Day 5 and 6, 10/29 & 10/30: With winds from 4 to 9 knots, we had a very relaxing sail to Anegada. Once there, we went ashore to reserve a jeep for the next day. Spent the afternoon doing my version of “being at the end of your rope”. Using a fifty foot line with an innertube tied to it, we all grabbed an innertube and enjoyed beer while floating in the most beautiful place on earth. That night we had grilled duck breasts with berry sauce on board. This was Friday and there were 6 boats on mooring balls that night. Next day (Saturday) we headed over to Cow Wreck for drinks and snorkeling. After that we ate lunch at a great little place called Flash of Beauty. It’s out of the way, but nice and with a self serve bar. They still had enough lobster from last season to make a wonderful lobster salad. Next we headed over to the Big Bamboo for more drinks and snorkeling. That evening we had dinner at Anegada Reef Hotel. Should have known better since lobster season was still 2 days away, but they said they had lobster so we ordered it. My guess is it was frozen because it was all mushy, not up to their usual standards. Since Anegada Reef has Wi-Fi, we all did our Covid tests for USVI while enjoying cocktails waiting for dinner. There is now a five day window to do this test regardless if you’re flying or taking the ferry from the BVI, so this was the perfect place and time to do the test. Must say it was an interesting way to do the test. That night there were 20 boats on mooring balls.
Day 7, Oct 31: Met Sherwin at 6:30 AM to go fishing. Always nice to see Sherwin, bad news was after 4 hours, only had a few bites and didn’t land anything. After lunch on Stargazer we set sail for Cane Garden Bay. Got there around 3/3:30 pm. Had a total of 17 boats that night. A large power-cat next to us had quite the Halloween party. Ended up with a least eight dingys tied to the back with at least 40 people on board including “The Skipper”, Gilligan, Mary Ann and many more. The cat was starting to look very top heavy.
Day 8, Nov 1: Did an easy motor over to Great Harbor and used our new dingy to motor to White Bay. Had the traditional Pain Killers at Soggy Dollar and had a very good lunch at Hendo’s Hideout. You can never go wrong with their food. As we ate lunch, we saw a fisherman delivering freshly caught lobster to the restaurants. When we returned to Great Harbor, we ran across the boat with the fresh lobsters and bought 3 lobsters from them for the wholesale cost of $30. Cooked them on the grill,,,, what a great, sweet tasting meal for dinner and lunch. That night there were 12 boats on mooring balls.
Day 9, Nov. 2: On our way back to Captain’s Compass at Sea Cow Bay, we stopped at the West End just to check it out. Still working on the downstairs bar at Pussers, other than that everything is pretty much open. Considering I have never thought of this being a place to spend the night , I found it odd the there are now a few boatyballs there. Just seemed out of place to me. After lunch it was time to head back to Sea Cow Bay and get ready to take the 7:30 AM ferry on the 3rd. back to St Thomas and then home. Since we love to use Kevin and he is no longer with the taxi group at the ferry, we had him meet us at the ferry, put out luggage in his van and headed uptown to eat and kill time until our flight. When we are ready, Kevin picked us up and got us to the airport as well as getting us a porter. Great service!
Want to just add that although I have enjoyed all our BVI sailing adventures, the Leopard 45 has made this my best experience sailing. Easy to sail, air conditioned, lots of glass that opens up the entire boat lots of room and storage and even a captain’s bunk if needed. It’s a great and wonderful catamaran to experience the BVI in. Captain’s Compass has Stargazer plus her twin sister ship, Smile Maker along with his “classic fleet”. We are extremely happy being in his fleet and glad to share our boat.

Sounds like a great trip.

Nit pick - this is not true "There is now a five day window to do this test regardless if you’re flying or taking the ferry from the BVI"

It is still within three days of travel if flying, within five days of travel if by water (ferry or water taxi). Sometimes they miss it but better to not risk it.

Did you have a surveyor supervises the Moorings overhual? It sounds like it went well but do you have any tips on the process?

Yes we had our own surveyor working for us. Moorings worked with our surveyor very well. Even when they pulled her out of the water. Our surveyor inspected everything and they took care of all our concerns. They took care of everything our surveyor and insurance company wanted. I would never do this without my own surveyor. The key is having a surveyor you can trust and depend on. Moorings was wonderful in working with us to insure when we took possession everything was addressed. It was a long process but worked out great for us.

Sorry about the wrong info regarding flying. This is something that needs to be checked before going as this can change quickly. 9 weeks again to ferry out, the test had to be within 48 hours of arriving in St Thomas. Last week, it was 5 days. To play safe we took the test 4 days out.

Yes, it changed in mid-August (the 13th, I think) when both the BVI and USVI were seeing spikes in the case numbers. It was rolled back by Governor Bryan on October 4th. Now it's back to 5 days prior if by sea, 3 days prior if by air. Good point to keep an eye on these things!

Bitter end will open mid December. Had a great tour of the facilities last week.

Second comment on Saba rock....very impressive.

Bob

Hey Jagmansr - Nice trip report. You mentioned using Kevin to get from STT to the ferry. Does that work out better than the normal taxi [censored] show? Do you have contact info for him. I'm assuming you line him up in advance. What does he typically charge?

Kevin's # is 340-643-0025. Just text him your flight info a few days before your arrival. He charges $10/person.

Another nice thing about Kevin is if you are running just a tad late for the ferry, he has actually called and had them hold the ferry for you. You can't go wrong with Kevin.

Just curious...when you fished with Sherwin in Anegada did you have to get a fishing license ahead of time or does he deal with all of that? One of our friends who is coming is a fly fisherman and wants to fish. We typically do fish when we are there and get the licenses way ahead of time to fish off the boat but our boat hasn't been licensed yet and it looks like it isn't going to be prior to use getting there.

How was the dinghy ride from Great Harbour to White Bay? Our crew would like to moor in Great Harbour to go to Foxy's but want to visit White Bay and Soggy Dollar and Hendo's.

Excellent and timely trip report.

"At the ferry, they do want to see your covid test results, proof of insurance and Covid vaccine card."

What does proof of insurance look like? We will fly to EIS from SJU/IAH the first week in December. Chartering Sing Winds with BVI Yacht Charters.

Sherwin handled everything. All we needed to do was set the day and time and number of people.

We have always done the dinghy ride from Great Harbor (however sometimes my wife likes to walk over for the exercise). A couple of times it was a little choppy but never bad. Last week the water was smooth and calm, making for a very pleasant ride. We have a 12 foot dingy with 15 horsepower so it's a nice and short ride that only takes 10 minutes if that. Just make sure you have plenty of rope to secure your dingy. Last week we found a couple lose dinghies that needed pulled back up into the sand. White Bay has a record of the most boat accidents so we won't take our boat in. Plus some charter companies red-line White Bay.

Thanks for the info! I’ve also heard people taxi from great harbor.

Two members of our group in July taxied from Little Harbour to White Bay. I believe it was $60 round trip for the two of them and was a great way for them to spend the day at White Bay and then come back to the quiet and great lobster at Abe's.

Also seems like a great way to drink all the painkillers the captain wants and not have to worry about picking up a mooring ball or driving the dinghy! haha!

True that.

I'm a very big fan of spending the night in Little Harbour as opposed to the other options. There are 3 great places to eat and the quiet of the evening reminds me of The Bight in our first visits during the 80s.

we prefer Little Harbour or Diamond Cay area or East end of White Bay (weather permitting) over Great Harbour. JVD. We walked from White bay to Great Harbour one day in June but I wouldn't do that walk at night if lots of traffic (e.g. Full Moon Party) Dinghy depends on weather and how many you have in dinghy...

Great to hear the condition of the vessel!!...we are chartering with Brent next year on Sea Palm...another phase out from Moorings and are truly looking forward to our adventure!!