The Natural Beauty of Sandy Spit (Green Cay) & the Sandy Cay Botanical Gardens
Written: Apr 04 '02 (Updated Apr 07 '02)
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Pros: Just like a postcard, picture perfect, great snorkeling and beaches
Cons: The only bugs we encountered in the BVI's were at the gardens
The Bottom Line: Our two destinations on Jost Van Dyke, Sandy Spit (Green Cay) and the Sandy Cay botanical gardens were well worth the visit.
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| Javelina's Full Review: Jost Van Dyke |
In mid-March 2002, I flew from JFK airport to Puerto Rico, then on to Beef Island, Tortola. After taking a wild taxi ride from the Beef Island airport to Road Town (the capital of the British Virgin Islands).
As a group of 6 family members, we had rented a catamaran with Conch Charters, (www.conchcharters.com), which is housed in Fort Burt Marina. (I recommend this company, as we loved our boat and the staff was wonderful.) One of my uncles is an experienced sailor, so there was no need to hire and kind of crew or onboard staff. My two cousins, aunt, and other uncle, as well as myself, helped sail and keep everything in general working order. Leaving from the slip in the marina on Saturday morning, we traveled from islands to island, reaching Jost van Dyke on Tuesday. Named after a Dutch pirate, Jost Van Dyke is only 4 square miles in size.
It had been a long sail from Trellis Bay, Tortola. The stretch of open water on the North side of Tortola had been recommended to us by Conch Charters as a popular place to see dolphins and possibly whales. We kept a look out while sailing, but saw dolphins when we were less expecting of it- near Little Jost Van Dyke.
My absolutely favorite part of Jost Van Dyke, and my favorite spot that is tied with The Baths:
Sandy Spit, Green Cay.
On our first night in Tortola, I bought some postcards. One of the postcards had a photograph of a tiny little island. Boats anchored around the island gave a perspective as to how small the island is, and we counted a total of about 6 palm trees in the photograph. As I passed the postcard around, I exclaimed that I wanted to go there. Soon, we had all agreed that we wanted Sandy Spit to be part of our itinerary.
Our motivation for visiting the British Virgin Islands was not the party scene or the drinking crowd, after all, you can drink and do all that at home. Therefore, we did not seek these areas in towns, and at night tried to anchor or moor further out from the shoreline and other boats. After all, we learned a lesson when in the slip at Road Town, Tortola where we had to endure loud live music all night, keeping us up late when we had to get up early the next morning for our first sail. Throughout our trip, we tried to keep the catamaran away from crowds, but here and there we were interrupted by some rowdiness.
Sandy Spit, Green Cay (pronounced “key”), is located off the North east end of Little Jost Van Dyke. We anchored the catamaran and took our dinghy to shore. The island was popular, so we were happy to find a place to moor. As I stepped into the warm water of this tiny island’s coastline, I took around me. One thought came to mind, just as it had when we arrived at The Baths:
This is the heavenly place that I imagined the British Virgin Islands to be, this is picture perfect.
We walked around the island, which only took a short amount of time. On one side of the island, there is a small, makeshift memorial for someone, marked with a tiny palm tree. The snorkeling was wonderful, with a great variety of sea life including both fish and coral. Some examples of fish include Parrotfish, Snappers, Damselfish, Tangs, Grunts and much more. The beautiful, shallow water was a wonderful experience and provided unimaginable scenery. The swimming areas are located mostly on the southwest side of the island, because of the crashing waves of the Atlantic Ocean that make swimming less desirable and potentially dangerous in other areas.
We decided to anchor further toward Jost Van Dyke for the night. Before it got dark, we did some exploring where the two islands almost meet. Pelicans sat perched on a nearby dock. On shore was a beach composed entirely of coral- small pieces that had been smoothed by the action of the waves. The water had carved out a small “cliff” about knee-height along the shoreline. A few hundred yards onto the island, there is a small shipwreck of a more modern-looking boat. I amused myself by following some young goats around the island. The goats had grazed much of the shore area, leaving short, scrub-like vegetation. Along the shore and into shallow areas of the inlet were mangrove trees. Their large, exposed roots were quite interesting and provided shelter for a variety of small marine life. We took a close look at some of the small creatures that inhabited the small, shallow pools of the channel.
This part of Jost Van Dyke, the shoreline area that most closely meets Little Jost Van Dyke was marked by beautiful waters, although unsuitable for snorkeling because of sea grasses. The grasses are tangled, murkier environments that harbor a variety of small, stinging creatures, so snorkeling is not recommended.
The next day, we picked up our anchor and moved southward to the southeast end of Jost Van Dyke, known as Sandy Cay (again pronounced “key”), only reachable by boat. Here was another highlight of the trip: the Sandy Cay Botanical Gardens. This is another fairly small island, although nowhere as small as Sandy Spit.
Once we pulled up our dinghy on Sandy Cay, there was plenty of open beach and snorkeling areas as well as trails. We decided to hit the trails before going snorkeling, as it is nice to go in the water after working up a sweat. The trails on the island head in several directions, forming many paths, but the island is small and not challenging to navigate. Uninhabited by people, Sandy Cay provides an insight into the natural environment of the British Virgin Islands.
As I started walking on the path into the botanical gardens, I heard a scuffling in the leaves on the side of the trail. I followed the sound of the noise and came upon a giant land hermit crab! I was amazed to see this critter, much like the ones you see in pet shops. We continued up the trail, which offered various types of vegetation from cacti to flowering plants to trees. At the peak of the island, we looked down to the other side of the coast to see waves crashing on large rocks. Coming back down the trail, we discovered another land hermit crab, plenty of small lizards, and some snake tracks.
This was the only island that we visited in the British Virgin Islands where we were pestered by some insects. These tiny, biting bugs left us with some itchy bites, and were so tiny that it was hard to catch the “black dots” before they caused harm. I don’t know if there is some insect repellent for these critters, but I sure wish I had had some.
At this point, we threw on our snorkeling gear. The cool water was nicely refreshing, and again the area was host to a variety of marine life. Again, the swimming and beach areas on this island are located mostly on the southwest side, due to the currents and waves coming in from the Atlantic Ocean.
Nearing the end of exploration, myself and another family member decided to snorkel back to the catamaran, just a few minute swim from shore. The bottom was not too far, and the clarity of the water is amazing. I made sure to look above the surface of the water on a regular basis to avoid getting run over by a dinghy or boat, as well as to best navigate. As I reached the boat, I saw a barracuda lurking between the two hulls of the catamaran! We knew that fish liked to graze on the algae and plants growing on the bottom of the boat, so our guess is that the barracuda was attracted by the school of fish- in fact, I saw it eat a fish! This was definitely the highlight of the day, especially when the rest of the family appeared in the dinghy and were able to see the rather unfazed barracuda.
This was our last stop on Jost Van Dyke, although it was recommended to us to go to the ”Soggy Dollar Bar”, which got it’s name from a past of sailors swimming to shore and paying with soggy money. (http://www.sandcastle-bvi.com/soggy.html)
Although our itinerary included only a few stops on Jost Van Dyke, I was very satisfied with having been to both Sandy Spit and the Botanical Gardens.
If you go to the British Virgin Islands and have the choice of various locations throughout the islands, my top choices, overall, include the two Jost Van Dyke just mentioned, as well The Baths, Marina Cay, Soper’s Hole and Cane Garden Bay. Therefore, the locations and attractions on Jost Van Dyke that we visited were comparable to other areas of the British Virgin Islands.
Once we left Jost Van Dyke, we headed out and onwards to Cane Garden Bay, back on Tortola. With a limited schedule, we could only spend a certain amount of time in each place, but I felt that our time on Jost Van Dyke was well worth the sail.
Useful links:
http://www.b-v-i.com/JostVanDyke/
http://www.britishvirginislands.com
http://www.ultimatebvi.com
http://www.bviguide.com
http://www.conchcharters.com
http://www.sandcastle-bvi.com/soggy.html
If you are interested, I have other reviews on the British Virgin Islands, so feel free to check them out as well! Thanks for reading!
Recommended:
Yes
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