Are We Becoming Island Snobs?

A few days ago, we went into Spanish Town in Virgin Gorda to apply for an extension to stay in the British Virgin Islands for another sixty days. We both dressed smart-ish…as smart as our current shipwreck hairstyles and “don’t own an iron” looks could get us anyway. Ken passed. I did not. My shorts weren’t long enough to cover my apparently rather comely knees, and I was not allowed in the building. I waited outside like an abandoned dog, covering my sexy knees, until Ken produced the appropriate passport stamps which allow us to stay here another 60 days. Unbelievably we have already been here 30 days, long enough to develop opinions. Strong ones. Lists, even. We now have our top 5 beaches, our top 5 restaurants, and a sense of superiority that I don’t love—but also don’t hate enough to correct. We are, it turns out, picky paradise hunters and BVI braggers. Yelp, but saltier and meaner.

I’m writing this from the deck, and I am also topless. What is the point of getting away from it all if “it all” doesn’t also include your clothes? I arrived at this skin bearing opportunity because it’s the first time in a while that we are truly alone, both on the boat and in the bay. We’re anchored at Savannah Bay—on Virgin Gorda -beautiful, and not a soul in sight—apart from the bloke I’ve just spotted in a house on the hill who has trained his binoculars on me. I briefly considered covering myself up, but decide that maybe my gorgeous knees aren’t the only body parts that still have it. “I‘m still stalker material” I think. I am pathetically proud of this.

Elsa flew home four days ago from Tortola, and the boat now feels cavernous. This is impressive, given that it is not large. Her stage 5 clinger hugs and the lack of piles of clothes lying around leave a tangible absence, but thank goodness technology means I can track her every move despite her being in London. Getting her to the airport on Tortola required a full on military like procedure. First, we moved into a slip at Nanny Cay Marina, which is less a marina and more a small township—restaurants, hotels, condos, a supermarket, and a car rental desk in a trailer that radiated low expectations.

I rented the smallest car in existence, painted a cheerful turquoise that suggested confidence and pep. We loaded it with Elsa’s suitcase the size of a refrigerator named Gigantina and set off armed with GPS and the realization I hadn’t been behind a steering wheel in 3 months. What could possibly go wrong? In fact things were going rather well until I dutifully followed the sign for the airport in Road Town, at which point the road launched itself vertically. A sign appeared: Mount Boulu. …Mount?!! To reach the airport, you apparently must navigate hairpin turns, sheer drops, and roaming livestock.

I am not good on mountain roads—this is inherited trauma from childhood drives with my father, emboldened by Rioja, piloting his Jaguar down from our annual pilgrimage to a Spanish mountain town called Guadalest, near Alicante. I remember one truly terrifying hairpin turn when I suggested to my Dad that he go a little slower. I clearly inherit my belligerence (and love of wine) from my Father, because he declared that he was driving perfectly safely, but for demonstration purposes only, would show me what unsafe driving down a mountain felt like...Needless to say, I am now a horrible mountain journey passenger. But at least this time I wasn’t in a big old Jaguar, and I was behind the steering wheel. My chirpy toy car buzzed bravely toward the precipices while Elsa calmly coached me through it. “Breathe, Mum. You can do this.” She is, after all, my first non-pilot passenger—the guinea pig I used when I got my pilot’s license. Miraculously, just like the pilot’s license, I did do it. And then, just like that, she was flying back across the world for 82 days, according to my countdown app, which I check obsessively like a BVI cruiser trying to book a mooring ball on the app. (IYKYK)

Before Elsa left, we did some tourist duty, including the Baths-the land of giant potatoes I mentioned in my last ramble. What I failed to mention in that post is that the following morning, anchored in Big Trunk Bay, we discovered our precious sea kayak had been stolen during the night.

When something is stolen from me, my first instinct is not theft but a self analysis. When my F-350 dually truck was stolen from my farm driveway in Wellington, I assumed I’d parked it somewhere else and began searching for it like a confused squirrel - peering under bushes and behind trees. The kayak was no different. We scanned the coastline, dinghied into town, ferreted through boatyards and beaches, and posted in local groups—where we learned a local mantra from keyboard warriors: Lock it, lift it, or lose it. A lesson delivered with the warmth of a slap. Now we’re trying to buy a new kayak in the BVI, which is impossible. They are everywhere but none are for sale. Teasing me from every well equipped charter boat. And shipping one would cost more than renting one for the whole 60 days. We are now openly offering to pay for someone’s flight if they bring us a kayak as a modest hostess gift. Surely a smart packer could squeeze one in? (We need a double seater for the dog, color; confident turquoise”).

We moved on from Savannah Bay. The nudity was enjoyable; the rocking and rolling was not giving Elvis vibes. Waves, we learned, can arrive from different directions—wind here, distant storms elsewhere—leading to moving about the boat like a belly dancer on a trampoline. Ken can draw you a graph or give a lecture. Its much more fun watching me walk like a belly dancer on a trampoline.

Next stop was Cooper Island, now officially our least favorite island. The upside is that it has a rum bar which opens suspiciously close to breakfast, catering to red-faced, rum enthusiasts in loud T shirts holding louder conversations as the day progresses. There’s a decent restaurant, but much of the island is roped off, limiting dog walks. On the beach, while admiring the sea shells along the shoreline, I encountered an unusual kind of ocean dweller; an eight-inch toilet fish merrily bobbing by. This is not a species so much as a warning sign. It occurred to me that many boats in busy mooring fields have very optimistic plumbing. We will no longer be mooring in busy mooring fields. We will no longer be snorkelling in busy mooring fields. And we will not be returning to what I now call Pooper Island.

We fled to Scrub Island, which, despite its name, is extremely polished and almost certainly owned by a billionaire with a soft spot for mountain living. No UFOs (Undesirable Floating Objects) here! The resort is on multiple levels to accommodate the steep topography, and there are homes you can rent dotted around the island with names like, Rock House, and Cliffy Heights….you get the picture. The main draw for us though was the strong resort Wi-Fi, accessed at the boat thanks to Ken’s recent boat installation now known as the Wi-Fi Sucker. Due to my insatiable appetite for data, and the expense of Starlink he had to get creative or risk a marital fall out akin to the War of the Roses. It siphons resort internet so we don’t use our costly Starlink data. All we need is a WiFi password to commence the sucking. This has led to a new ritual where I burst into a resort reception declaring an emergency, brandishing my cell phone, and demanding the WiFi password. I then retreat triumphantly and hand my booty to my blameless husband like contraband.

Scrub also has spectacular hikes—up thigh burning ridges to views over Beef Island and the Sir Francis Drake Channel. It’s surreal. I don’t know how you get used to seeing this every day. Possibly you don’t. Possibly you just become unbearable.

The wind has picked up now—the Easterlies. Great for sailing and wing foiling, which has been sulking unused for a week. We are now heading back toward North Sound, perhaps near Bitter End Yacht Club where we can get those ever so patient and young water sports instructors to give us another humiliating lesson in wing flopping as is currently the more appropriate name. But basically we are aiming for anywhere with stealable Wi-Fi, calmish seas, and—most importantly—no toilet fish.

If this makes us island snobs, so be it. Paradise is competitive.

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