TravelTalkOnline Forums Travel and Vacation Forums British Virgin Islands LIO KAI 4/23 - Dry cruising and other observations

I thought I would put a few thoughts in here, as always: reading entirely optional! TLDR warning.

Last fall, ahead of our November trip, I developed a temporary neurological condition that made it inadvisable to drink alcohol. Though that is since resolved, it ended up extending into a voluntary indefinite pause on any drinking.

So I went into the November trip with some trepidation. There is so much emphasis on the beach bars, painkillers, sundowners, etc... what if the BVI without alcohol just wouldn't be (as) fun?

On our 9th "dry" week in the BVI I'm happy to report that neither of us feels this way. The islands are just as beautiful and I won't say I don't miss the cocktails and cold beers, but there are some payoffs and there is increased focus on other activities ( diving, photography ). If I have a clumsy fall, screw something up or say something I regret, at least I can be sure that alcohol was not a factor.

We're not remotely full time cruisers, but we sail enough that I have from time to time questioned the sustainablity of living the party lifestyle 3-4 weeks at a time several times a year. (No judgement!)

Hope this doesn't offend anyone or come across as off-topic or inappropriately personal, just felt compelled to share this with my TTOL friends - perhaps in case someone else finds themselves in a similar situation.

Will add more traditional trip notes soon.

EZ - thanks for sharing. We enjoyed a quiet relatively alcohol free two weeks just returning yesterday. I had been ill recently and alcohol wasn’t recommended. Or, quite honestly, missed. Serene nights on anchor and several days around St. John and away from the BVI Pub Crawl. It was actually more enjoyable than our previous trips (and even then we aren’t “big” drinkers). We will probably continue on this road - health is everything.

it's all about the beauty of the islands, their people, and who your with and what's really inside you. Nice share- thanks

MrEZGoin,

The BVI has so much to offer. Alcohol should not be the focus. Over indulgence can easily decrease the enjoyment.

We live in the USVIs and cruise south in the summer. If you live every day like your on vacation you will not last long. We see the casualties every year.

Cheers, RickG

Sorry we missed each other, really want to got to St. John again sometime, but hoping for a day when it can be done without standing in line or filling out a paper form.

Wise words. Our few months a year have always been kind of an in-between thing. We have never been what anyone would consider heavy drinkers, but even so a few drinks per day can add up when that's how the boat is provisioned.

True. It has never been the focus for us, but eliminating it entirely is still a bit of an adjustment.

My wife and I have been open water certified about 10 years, but our dedication to scuba has been a little off and on, partly due to the overhead involved as compared to skin diving.

Inspired by some on this forum, we rented tanks and gear for the first time and have done our first dives on our own.

I'm not a pilot, but I imagine that soloing the first time feels a little like this - a huge leap in responsibility! No divemaster, crew left on the boat, O2, etc. Accordingly, we are confining ourselves to the simplest of dives, preferably places we already know well. So far we dived Sandy Ledges, Diamond Reef, and at the Indians twice.

The biggest challenges so far have been navigation and communication. I'm well familiar with compass navigation on land, but underwater between maintaining depth, monitoring air and trying to keep a compass course has me feeling like I'm frantically juggling my instruments the entire time.

Adapting communication is also a challenge because the dynamics are different. It's so tempting to ask questions like: do you want to go around one more time or go back? These are difficult to communicate. The threshhold for wanting to communicate a minor difficulty or discomfort is also lower. We need to work on our underwater vocabulary.

Diving on our own has also given us a heightened appreciation for the comparative ease of guided dives, so we have done a bunch of those too: several 2-tank dives with SCD, a 1 tank dive with Sunchaser and we have another 2-tank outing to the Invisibles planned for tomorrow.

This trip has really re-ignited our enthusiasm for diving, and we hope to return with our own gear next time and rent only the tanks.

Have a great time at the Invisibles - it is one of our favorite dive sites - and tell Ben and Kay Melanie says hello - we love them. We are advanced divers (I was once on track for dive master). Have my own equipment but lugging it down just doesn’t make sense to me - especially when Sunchaser has great gear and gets us to many places I wouldn’t dive on my own. The dive equipment goes with me on dive dedicated vacations - we only dive occasionally in the BVI - but can see how those diving many times per trip may want to travel with a dive bag. Enjoy the diving and your solo flights.
🙂

Thanks very much! Will be sure to pass on your greetings. Understand about the dive gear... I was thinking of storing it here but then if we did a dive trip elswhere it would be unavailable.

We did have a very nice dive outing with Sunchaser. Really appreciating their enthusiasm and professionalism. Even though it isn't exactly in their interest, they were encouraging on our unguided diving efforts and gave much helpful advice.

They were able to give us some input on diving the Kodiak Queen, which we did today and it was fantastic. Great visibility, no worries about navigation and lots of sea life. The huge angelfish were particulary impressive, and extremely approachable. My wife opined that this was the best dive of the trip! We're probably going to end the diving on that high note as tomorrow is our last full day.

We are seeing some haze from the dust today, but the weather has been amazing the whole time we were here.

P.S. MiDiver - I passed on your greetings and of course they remember you well!

Thanks EZ - we were just out with them two weeks ago. They, and Living the Dream Divers, Grand Cayman (got married on one of their dive boats and were at 100’ 20 minutes later- lol), are at the top of our preferred dove ops. Mike Ball on the great barrier reef too. Did they tell you how they screwed the BEYC balls into the bottom? Great story. Enjoy your remaining time!

Well another fantastic 3 weeks comes to an end... it's early morning at the Mariner Inn and we hope to catch the ferry in 2 hours to start our long trek home to the PNW.

I've always found it a bit difficult to post photos here directly, but as I wrote I've been getting back into photography and on the off chance that anyone would like to see some of the wannabe artsy and sunset photos from this trip I'm posting a link to a shared Lightroom album (hope that's ok).

April LIO KAI Lightroom Album

We are already looking forward to returning and continuing our "diving as a married couple" efforts. Maybe eventually we'll reach the point where the dive post-mortem doesn't take longer than the dive :-)

Awesome picture collection. Thank you.

These are simply wonderful photos! Thank you for sharing!

Beautiful! You have a great eye for details and composition.

I don't recognize photo #61?

Karen

Thanks everyone!

Not sure I see the numbering... Is that the wide angle shot of the mooring field at setting point?

Incredible photos! Thank you for sharing!

Great pictures!!!
#61 is the new Bitter End.

Those are fabulous! You have a great eye. Thank you for taking the time to link them. You've re-inspired me.
I love #3 .....that belongs on a wall.
What are you shooting with?

Thanks so much! I recently switched to Sony and my first mirrorless. I'm blown away by how good these cameras are now, and combined with modern editing software it's a whole new world and I have been having a blast rediscovering and relearning photography.

I'm using an A7IV full frame camera. Most pictures are shot with the Sony 90mm 2.8 G macro lens or the 24mm 1.4 GM. Also brought a 14mm 1.8 GM, but still figuring that one out. Thought I might be doing some night photography, but never felt up to leaving the boat for shore at night, even if I was awake. We've seen some cool astronomical events in the islands over the years, but shooting from the boat just won't work of course.

Really great pictures. Love the close up pics with the insects. Incredible detail.

Thanks! It took a lot of tries to get a bee in focus. Lizard too. The leaf hopper I didn't even know what I was shooting until edit. Tried to shoot the big carpenter bees at BEYC and on Anegada, but never got a really successful shot. Next time!

I have been thinking about trading my Pentax for a mirrorless and you may have just convinced me. Thanks for the info

Great photos. Thank you for sharing.

Happy to give you my take on the market, been doing a lot of research. PM me?

Amazing photos - thank you so much for sharing!

Ahhh, thank you!

I'll just add my voice to the chorus and say that's a helluva nice set of photos. Thanks for sharing!

Dan

Thanks everyone for the kind words! As punishment I'll add the (just edited) photos from our last day and walking around old town before our flight:

LIO KAI last day photos

We felt pretty silly having mostly whiled away extra time in the Little Pump Room when there was so much to see with just a little walking.

we just did 2 weeks on VG. I stopped drinking last May. found some N/A beers. Coco Maya had great mocktails. so did Hendos - it was tougher than other vacations/events this past year, but do-able