"A Paradise for Sailors & Divers " a British Virgin Islands Travel Page by catalysta

East of Puerto Rico in the Sir Francis Drake Channel lies a cluster of over 50 islands "flung like jewels upon the sea". Harbours with legendary beach bars like those at Cane Garden Bay and Anegada alternate with secret sheltered coves that can only be accessed by boat. Fabulous wreck dives and pristine coral reefs lie waiting under shifting shades of Caribbean blue.

These are the British Virgin Islands, mythic paradise for sailors & divers alike. Descendants of freedmen have mingled with East Indian migrants and UK wanderers, creating the kind of atmosphere most of us fantasize & seek when we head to the Caribbean Sea. A little rum & reggae, a bit of West Antilles yellow pepper sauce or mango chutney on a fish pate, a hammock slung between two obliging palm trees, and the sound of the waves breaking against the reef as you slip into the dream...

It's underneath you whenever you are on the water, the history of Western discovery of the Caribbean Islands & the Americas and the subsequent colonization by many different European countries.

From bits and pieces rumored to be from one of Columbus' ships (like the anchor found offshore from St. Croix), to victims of legendary pirates like Blackbeard and the hopes of Spanish gold still unfound, to cruise ships from the 1800's gone down in unanticipated hurricanes, to all manner of ships and small boats sunk on the treacherous reefs, to more recent small airplanes left to collect a veneer of coral and a few new inhabitants, it's all there awaiting your visit to this magical nether kingdom with a tank of oxygen strapped to your back.

The real way to visit the BVI's is by boat, preferably cruising on a nice big catamaran so you can access all the shallowest coves as well as the deep water harbours. I didn't have that opportunity yet (this was sort of a recon trip to convince some friends to cruise with me in the future), so I opted to spend my time mostly on Virgin Gorda. For more details on the specific islands I visited, please see pages for Virgin Gorda, Beef Island, and Tortola.