Wednesday, April 22, 2015

Brought to You by the Colour Blue

No matter how long we cruise down here, I never cease to be amazed by the colour of the water - azur, cerulean, teal, turquoise, sapphire, ultramarine ... BLUE!

Today, we made our way from Trellis Bay up to North Sound under an almost cloudless sky, and as a first for us we anchored off Saba Rock.  We usually head for Leverick Bay on the other side of the sound but decided to give this end a shot.  Not that we haven't been here many times, we've just chosen not to anchor over here and now I'm really not sure why.

 ... a study in blue

One of The Dog islands halfway between Tortola and Virgin Gorda.

Mosquito Rock - part of the reef that guards the entrance to North Sound.

Incredible changes in colour mark the various depths of the water and tells us somewhat what lies beneath.

Making our way through the channel in the reef, these guys sure were in a rush.

Relax guys, there are lots of mooring balls, and we don't want one anyway.

Looking back at the reef - blue is good, brown is bad.

Blue all around us.

Dropped our anchor and this is our view - all shades in one eyeful.

And a short swim to shore through beautiful blue-green waters.

Before we left Trellis we heard stories of two vessels come amuk - the first was Sunday morning when we watched the rescue helicoptor on the north shore of Tortola.  If you remember I commented on the swell and hence our move to Trellis Bay.  A small sport boat got caught in the massive surf in Josiah's Bay and was washed up on the beach, luckily with no loss of life.  The second was a fire that completely destroyed a vessel in Christmas Cove.  We are now checking our fire extinguishers, evacuation plan and ditch bag - just one more time to make sure we're prepared.

See how low the helicopter is right behind the sailboat.

On a happier note, this little guy was our company on the boat behind us the other night.  His crew had left for the evening so he was doing his rounds before settling down for the night.