Sailing Trip Day 8: Wreck of the Rhone + Norman Island

Good morning lovelies! I'm back with more Sailing Trip recap posts this week, and I should have everything wrapped up by Wednesday. Today is all about Day 8, which was a cool day since we visited the Wreck of the Rhone off Salt Island.

Before we set off for Salt Island, we noticed this barracuda hanging out under our boat. It was pretty cool to see since I've never seen one in real life. I also got a video of him (and another one that joined him), but be warned, there's some serious camera shake (and Fred's bathroom humor) near the end.

Barracuda Under Our Boat from Lesley Anne Fenton on Vimeo.   It didn't take long for us to get to the dive site since Salt Island is right next to Cooper Island (where we were the night before). According to Kyle's dad's book on BVI Anchorages, The Queen of England used to get her salt from Salt Island. Pretty cool! And it was the Royal Mail Steamer Rhone that wrecked here in 1867 that has since become the most popular dive site in the British Virgin Islands, let alone the entire Caribbean. So to say that Kyle, Eric, Lynn, Jenny and Zach were excited to do this dive would be an understatement! This is the view of the dive site on the surface.   

And this is how it looked below (dive photos taken by Zach). 

Once the dive crew got back to the boat, we ate lunch and then headed over to Peter Island Yacht Club to top off our water tank and fill up the oxygen tanks for one more dive. The weather was overcast with scattered showers again on Day 8, so we got to see another beautiful rainbow while sailing.

And it wouldn't be a legit sailing trip without someone getting hurt, right? Thankfully our few injuries were nothing too serious. Here Kyle is wrapping up his wrist after he accidentally cut it while cleating a line to the boat.

After our detour in Peter Island, we headed to our destination for the night, The Bight at Norman Island. We had a lot of time to kill before dinner, so Christina decided to do a little fishing and she caught a needlefish!

We had dinner that night at Willy T's, a floating restaurant and bar in The Bight.

My fish and chips were not that great, but Kyle was pretty impressed with his burger (I think the thick juicy bacon on it helped). 

So ended Day 8 of our trip. Up next: Snorkeling around The Indians and The Caves on Norman Island!

Sailing Trip Day 7: The Baths at Virgin Gorda

I am so excited about today's post! Exploring around The Baths at Virgin Gorda was hands down my favorite part of the trip. I have to apologize in advance for the mammoth size of this post since I got a little carried away with the photos, but they are all really pretty, so call it even? 

We woke up to overcast skies on Day 7, and God blessed us with an early morning rainbow while we were on our way to Virgin Gorda. The rainbow was pretty low-lying, just above the water, so my camera was barely able to pick up on it. 

Zach was able to capture it better from further back (the arrow is pointing to it).

It didn't take us long to get to Virgin Gorda since it was practically straight across the Sir Francis Drake Channel from Marina Cay, so we moored up there pretty early in the morning. I know I've talked about mooring buoys in several posts now, so if you're still curious about what that involves, here's a video I got of the boys attaching our boat to a mooring buoy when we got to Virgin Gorda (Kyle on the left, Fred in the middle, and Zach on the right).

Mooring Up at Virgin Gorda from Lesley Anne Fenton on Vimeo. 

This is the view of The Baths at Virgin Gorda from our boat. Awesome, right? It looks like the boulders were placed there by humans, but they are all there naturally.

Before going ashore, we had a quick family meeting on the front of the boat where Kyle's dad went over our plans for the day, in case we were to get split up while navigating through The Baths.

 

Once we had a game plan set, Kyle and I took the kayak to shore while the rest of the group came in the dinghy. The feeling you get while exploring around The Baths is a combination of being on a natural playground and being at the Honey I Shrunk the Kids exhibit at Disney World. It is a truly unique experience! And thanks to Zach's waterproof camera, we have photos of our trek through the caves and grottoes of The Baths. So without further ado, I'll let the photos do the talking now! :)

As if we hadn't had enough adventure for the day, we came back to the boat for a quick lunch and then jumped back in the water to do some snorkeling around the front of The Baths. (All snorkeling photos taken by Zach). 

After we snorkeled our way over to Devil's Bay, Fred and Kyle's dad came to pick us up in the dinghy and took us back to the boat. From there we said goodbye to Virgin Gorda and sailed over to Manchioneel Bay off Cooper Island to spend the night. The large clusters of palm trees on the beach at Manchioneel Bay were so beautiful!  

It was our turn to help cook dinner that night and sneaky Kyle got this shot of his mom and me cooking from the porthole above the kitchen area. 

We ended the night with several games of Nerts with Jenny and Zach. I'm surprised this was our first night playing cards together! 

Up next: Diving the Wreck of the Rhone and Norman Island (aka Treasure Island)!