The Bight at Norman Island

Our last full day on the boat – and a great way to start with a beautiful sunrise followed by a big breakfast of eggs and fried potatoes. Unfortunately, we had run low on drinking water and John was too timid to try the coffee made with water from our tanks. So he substituted with a good old Coca Cola to get his blood pumping.

Being our last full day, we hopped wanted to take advantage of another morning snorkel and headed back to east shore of The Bight. This time we just swam over from our boat rather than taking the dingy. Again we were not disappointed! Lots of fish, tarpon, a couple stingrays and even a lobster!

As usual the boys stayed in the water longer than I could (yes, it truly sucks to not have enough body fat to keep me warm for more than 30 mins even in Caribbean waters!)  As I swam back to the boat, I heard a loud rumble and turned to see a large tourist boat passing nearby. Again – very glad I was wearing my new mask with a vibrant orange snorkel!

When the boys arrived back to the boat, they were really excited (OK, as excited as these 2 guys can get) about seeing the stingrays and all the tarpon. After a quick snack we had a stunning display of expert piloting as a Leopard 45 sailed into the mooring field under sail. When we saw this guy coming we had flashbacks to other videos we saw of credit card captains coming into anchorages under sail and pin-balling off of surrounding boats. This guy seemed to know what he was doing though so we grabbed the camera and watched intently. We think he would have made his target if it wasn’t from some inconsiderate fellow boater that hurried past him from behind and caused him to change his plan. He finally had to give up once he got too close to us and started his engines.

We headed to shore for another hike – this time up along the west ridge of Norman Island…or so we thought. The path climbed for a while along the edge of the bay and was promising to lead us to the ridge. However it soon veered downward and ended up in a refuse area after only a 15 min walk. Bummer! We thought it would be a good idea to lift our spirits with a few refreshments back at The Bight.

 

On our way back, I decided to scramble up over the cactus and brush to what appeared to be a rough path. It eventually did lead me to the ridge, where I had terrific views of Tortola to the west. Unfortunately I didn’t take a camera so missed any good photo ops. John tried to get a picture of me scrambling up the steep hill. The spec of my white hat is barely visible in the upper centre of the photo.

 

It was a really warm day so the refreshments tasted all the better. We arrived back to the boat in time to receive our water delivery from the ever popular Deliverance. John would get to enjoy fresh coffee on his last morning. We were amazed at how much garbage Deliverance fit on the bow of their boat! This picture shows it at about half of its capacity.

As we lounged on the back deck, Jeff noticed a very crowded dingy which had stalled not far from our boat. It appeared to be heading to shore but experienced some engine trouble en route. Jeff & John to the rescue! They towed the dingy to shore so the thirsty, and very grateful passengers could enjoy happy hour at The Bight.

As we turned on the generator for dinner prep, we didn’t hear the rumble of it starting as expected. The guys investigated and discovered the water strainer didn’t appear to have any water. After a couple conversations of trouble shooting with our charter base, an engineer was dispatched. An hour and half later it was dusk, when we received another call to advise that the engineer could no longer make the trip and unfortunately we were required to stay put since it was now too late to reach Road Marina before dark. Bummer! Our last night would be spent without a generator which meant no air conditioning.

We were thankful for the Christmas winds which provided a bit of cooling for the cabins.

Jost Van Dyke to Norman Island
Norman Island to Tortola

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