Virgin Gorda, British Virgin Islands

My last stop in the Caribean was to Virgin Gorda in the British Virgin Islands to visit Linzi another friend from University. The photo´s above were taken my first day on the island when we went to Devils Bay and The Baths with Linzi´s daughter Kyla and her friends Angeleah and Anghill.

Virgin Gorda is also a small island but is quite long in legnth and here we were over at Bitter End - you have to take a boat to this resort which is one of the main spots for tourists and private yachts.

The beach near Linzi´s house though not as pretty as some of the others on the island was fine for just chilling out and reading a book.

Chom Poo Moo liked this beach at Savannah Bay.

Sunset from Linzi´s porch.

The Mocko Jumbies who perform at Leverick Bay - they dance about with more rythm on their stilts than I do on my legs (though I suppose that wouldn´t be too hard!!).

Kyla and Noah took me to Spring Bay which is one of their favourite beaches on the island.

Linzi took me to her favourite beach on the island - Trunk End - it was Kyla~´s first visit as well as well as their is a little scramble over the rocks to get here - the advantage being that very few other people come here.

Trunk End estate - some very nice villa´s overlook the beach but as they are secluded by trees you don´t see them when you are on the beach.

It does rain in paradise sometimes as well - Kyla on her way to school.

Marlon - Linzi´s hubby is a musician and we went to see him play one night which was good fun.

Linzi & Kyla enjoying some time in the water.

Having spent my diving budget for the next few months in Saba & Anguilla I stuck to snorkelling in Virgin Gorda but I don´t think I could have seen much more even if I had gone diving. If you are able to see the outline of the flat fish in this photo he would just shimmy along the sand at some speed sometimes - hard to spot!

As you are not deep down when snorkelling you can really see the colours of the fish especially when the sun comes out.

I spotted this turtle feeding on the rocks and then followed him as he swam up really close and I followed him for a good ten minutes until I realised I was swimming out to see!! He came up to the top and surfaced for air - I had never seen a turtle do that before - this was my best turtle experience to date.

Kyla took me to show me her school St Mary´s where her mum also teaches. Kyla is in pre-school as she is only 31/2 though it is easy to forget that sometimes as she seems much older.

When Kyla and Linzi headed off to school most days I headed to the beach where my intention had been to get through the pile of books I´ve been carrying about with me - I did manage a couple but I was too easily distracted by the snorkelling...

A big barracuda - these guys just swim right up alongside you.

Quite a variety of corals and plants in a relatively short area.

Trumpet fish.

Yellow Tailed Damsel Fish - I love these little guys but they move so fast that most of the photo´s I took of them are blurry this is about the only clear one I have!

Squirrel Fish - no idea how they got their name!

These Rainbow Parrotfish were not only really colourful but they were huge some of them must have been at least one metre long.

Lots of other brightly coloured fish whose names I don´t know as I forgot to bring my fish identification card to the internet shop (and some aren´t even on that!!).

Sometimes you would just look around and there would be a school of fish just swimming right towards you - they didn´t seem to be bothered by people.

There were also schools of these tiny silver fish - think sometimes there was literally millions of them just swimming around you and surprisingly enough swimming really shallow and close into the shore!

I think that is some kind of egg which had been laid in the corals.

One of the soldier crabs that live under Linzi´s house.

The Pelicans were also pretty impressive - big wing spans and amazing to watch them fish.

Linzi, Kyla and Noah make pancakes for breakfast.

The 400 year old Coppermine on the point of Virgin Gorda.

My last afternoon on Virgin Gorda was the annual WaterWorld fund raiser for the local Rescue services - lots of games etc.

Kyla tries out her sea legs on a mini catamaran.

This is the frozen T Shirt competition - entrants buy a T´Hirt which is twisted and tied soaked then frozen - they then race to see who can get it on first......took a long time and a lot of effort to loosen those things off. Had never seen that game before.

Kyla and I try out some new costumes.

Strange place for an old red telephone box at the ferry dock! where I said my goodbye´s to Linzi & Kyla.

As my flight was at 7am on Tortola (the main island of BVI) I had to spend my last night there - this is the sunset at Trellis Bay - the advantage was I was staying less than 5 minutes walk from the airport - first time I have ever walked to an airport!!

My last view of the British Virgin Islands as I fly out to Guyana.

There was a few stops on the way in Barbados and Trinidad - think this was Barbados - then I say goodbye to the beautiful blue waters of the Caribean :-(

Well my trip to Virgin Gorda was as good as the rest of my Caribean experience though it did start with a bit of a dilemma. I hadn´t realised that I needed to show a booking for an onward flight before I would get through immigration control on my arrival - poor Linzi realised the morning I was flying in and of course couldn´t get hold of me as I lost my mobile in Florida - she spent the afternoon running about trying to reserve me a ticket and had been told by immigration she would have to come meet me - then her boat broke down between the islands. Meantime I had arrived and had been put in a side room without a clue other than Linzi was coming to meet me - when they finally spoke to me (they had several flights arrive at one time) and as Linzi was stuck in the middle of the sea they tried to get me to buy a return ticket all the way back to the UK - well as you can imagine that was not on the agenda so using my powers of persuasion they eventually allowed me to buy a ticket onto Guyana (the only country I could fly directly to in South America) with an assurance that I would make sure I met the immigration requirements there before departure!! Off all the places I have been to can you believe that the only one I have had any problems getting into is a British Territory!!! Anyway I just felt bad as Linzi had all the stress!!

Other than that minor hiccup my travels continue to go well - as you can see I have caught up with friends, partied and continued to get excited with all the wildlife and underwater life when I have been diving and snorkelling (hope your not too bored with all the photo´s!).

I am now in South America but I will update you with how that is going next time as I really need to get this published before this internet cafe closes (everytime I find an internet cafe that works they seem to be closing hence the reason this has taken me forever and is so long!!).

Here you have a heatwave at home so hope your all enjoying that and remember slap on that sunblock :-)

luv

Jack xxx