BVI Day-6 ; Wednesday April 1 (Snorkeling at Treasure Point Caves & Pirates Bight Restaurant)

Wednesday April 1st, we had initially planned to go to Anegada Island and tour the island in some “Moke Vehicles” (a lot safer than Scooters !!!)

But after our ride on Sunday from Jost Van Dyke to the Dog Islands & Scrub Island, we re-evaluated the plan.

As you may recall, the ride on Sunday from Jost VanDyke to Scrub was a very bumpy with 4ft waves.

The water was bumpy because we were in an area of the BVI with no land protection from the north.
In March, every day, the BVI winds are 15-20 kts out of the NE.

Similarly, the long 40 mile ride to Anegada, would have been in open water & would have made for a long 5-6 hour ride one-way.

We would have spent 12 hours of driving for 6 hours of time on the island of Anegada.

So our revised plan for the day was – To go back to the Treasure Point Caves @ Norman Island & do some snorkeling.

You may recall that the Treasure Point Caves are on Norman Island, very close to Willy T’s two story floating Boat Bar. On our first day, we had so much fun at Willy T’s, we ran out of time for The Caves.

The Treasure Point Caves are advertsied as one of the bext snorkeling locations in the BVI.
Even a guy that I spoke with at Oil Nut Bay had recommended the Treasure Point Caves.

Google = Treasure Point Caves on Norman Island in the British Virgin Islands (BVI) are a top-rated snorkeling attraction consisting of three to four water-level sea caves at the base of a cliff. Famed for inspiring Robert Louis Stevenson’s Treasure Island, these dark, accessible caverns feature vibrant coral, sponges, and diverse marine life, often with a nurse shark inside.

The ride from Oil Nut Bay to The Caves was not 40 miles, but it was still a decent 25 mile ride.

But the difference between going to Anegada vs Norman Island, was that the 25 mile ride to Norman Island, was a calm ride due to the protection from The Dogs, Scrub & Tortola blocking the wind from the NorthEast.

Captain Cook took over the driving duties for the day.

Rich & Anita are also Big Boaters in Michigan & have a 34 foot Sea Ray Sundancer in Lake St Clair @ MacRay Marina.

It was a beautifully calm ride.
Dave & Ginger were on the lookout for Pirates !

We arrived at The Caves about 11:30am.
We hooked up to a FCFS Boaty Ball, had some “safe-arrival drinks” and started some initial snorkeling.

While I was in the water doing some initial snorkeling, some guys came over to our boat in a diving boat and told us that we had to move to another Boaty Ball.

Evidently, they were a “mooring ball dive inspection team” & the ball that we were on needed some repairs.

So we fired up the engines, unhooked from Boaty Ball #1 & moved to Boaty Ball #2 (which had been blessed by the dive crew).

Before departing Boaty Ball #1, I did go down and look at the mooring.
The only difference that I saw between Ball #1 & Ball #2, was that the steel base cap of Ball #1 appeared to be 4″ above the sandy bottom floor. In Ball #2, the steel base cap was completely under the sand.

It was a hassle moving the boat, but better than floating away at night.

I have seen several internet postings about moorings breaking loose in the BVI, esp the FCFS balls.

Our mooring for daytime snorkeling, was also our mooring for the night, so better to be safe than sorry.

OK, back to snorkeling at the Treasure Point Caves.
Anita was showing us the way !

LETS GO SNORKELING !!!

It was really cool inside The Caves, but no big fish, no sharks – I was disapointed.

The best fish sightings were actually outside of the caves around the rocks approaching the caves.

It was really difficult to take the videos.
My phone was in a waterproof case.
The case affects the pressure sensitivity.
I had to start the video above water, then take the phone below water.
And – I can’t see to read the video icon buttons without my progressive glasses on (gettin old sucks).

The Hinmans seemed to adapt to the snorkeling quite well.

They are Boaters too – they have a nice Malibu Sky boat that Dave uses to go drink beer at the Lake Orion Sand Bar.

We were all a little disappointed that we didn’t see any big fish, but Rich did get some video of a large Sea Turtle & a small Sting Ray.
The turtle was about 1.5ft long. Great job Captain Cook !

It was now about 5pm.
Snorkeling was over for the day.
Back to the boat to freshen up before dinner.
It was a clam beautiful early evening.

For dinner we took a very fun, high energy dinghy ride, about 1.5 miles to the Pirates Bight Restaurant.

It was a fun filled ride.
Everyone was already in a Great Mood, but Rich got the team Amped Up !
We arrived at The Pirates Bight.
The Pirates Bight Restaurant was yet another, Beautiful Waterfront Restaurant.

Trivia-What is a Bight (Pirates Bight) ? = A bight is a geographical term for a long, gentle, and shallow curve or bend in a coastline, creating a broad, open bay.

We captured some of our prettiest photos here as the sun was setting & nightfall arrived.

After dinner, we took the dinghy back to the boat.

It was a very dark 1.5 mile long ride back to the boat – it was calm and the ride was GREAT.

We took it slow & had on our blinking headlamps, one headlamp on Rich at the bow pointing forward & one headlamp on my head pointing to the stern.

The graphic below shows our ride around Treasure Point, from the restaurant in The Bight Bay, to our boat in Privateer Bay. It was a very dark 1.5 mile ride.

Sorry – no photos or video of the dark ride back.

As we turned the corner around the Treasure Point, it was even more dark away from the lights of the restaurant – but once again, the disco lights running on the boat helped a lot. We could see our Disco Boat a quarter mile away (thanks Ashley) !!!

The week was coming to an end – tomorrow back to Tortola for one last day of fun.

Hope that you enjoyed the snorkeling today.
We were slightly disapointed that we didn’t see more large fish, or even some nurse sharks, but we all enjoyed the snorkeling and all agreed that if we do the BVI again, that there would be a lot more snorkeling involved.

Tomorrow Day-7= It’s back to Tortola for one more day of island fun.

Mike/Ashley, Rich/Anita, Dave/Ginger