Day 21: West End

Today I went to the other real "town" on Tortola: West End. I debated ferry vs taxi, but since the ferry didnt offer a price to just West End, and the cabbie came down on his fare, I decided to just go for it.

I booked a cheap room at the Jolly Roger Inn, and saved $10 by forgoing AC and a private bath. After checking in I replaced all the unnecessary things in my pack with climbing gear and set off on the day's adveture. The goal was to visit Smuggler's Cove, as the locals call it, or Lower Belmont Bay, as Google unimaginatively puts it.

So I set off on the road that I thought ran around the island, out to the westernmost point and up to cover... but the road disappeared. No problem, I continued on among the boulders, liking the plan more and more as I had to walk less and scramble - even climb - across the shore. This ended the same way over-water traversals always end: with a wet boot. But I didn't roll my ankle (it tried) jumping/sliding off the rock face, into a oncoming wave, so I feel its a fair trade.

I climbed/hiked back up the beach to a private dock, which I followed up the cliffs
to a driveway, which was about 20' horizontally and at least triple that vertically down to the opposite coast. I hiked out the driveway, over some terrible roads, and eventually made it to Smuggler's Cove, only to find beach-chair sellers and other people on what was supposed to be my private beach. So I set off for Gun Point, the rocky promontory on the west edge of the bay, figuring I should at least have that to myself.

I did. I ate lunch in a large cleft overlooking the cove, checking to make sure the ground beneath was dry and thus out of any splash-zone, and then set off to examine the point itself. I clambered out onto a corner to watch the waves crash, but neglected to doublecheck that I was standing on dry rocks. A large wave later, in less dry shorts, I set off up the rock to get a more comfortable view.


From the higher vantage point I saw a dry seat-shaped area that would make a perfect spot to read and watch the waves clash against the rocks. I set up an anchor and rappelled down. Fun, but even more fun was when I swung over a bit to rappel out over the crashing waves. I sat down and read until ADHD got the better of me, and then I set off to check out the cave at sea-level that was shooting water 20' into the air with every wave.

Luckily, the rocks were in layers, upthrust from the earth, and arrainged so that there were plentiful handholds, bomber jugs we'd call them in the climbing world. Unluckily, not all of them could be trusted. So each handhold, foothold had to be tested, and when found lacking, the rock tossed into the sea. And at 30' up over crashing waves, chucking a rock the size of a dictionary into the waves is enough to give a tinge of vertigo. I crossed over a rift, clipped out from my line, and set off over the wave-shooter, before carefully downclimbing.

You couldn't see any clearer from over here. But you could hear better, as there were two vents the size of letter-boxes that wend their way down to the same chamber that was geysering water out into the ocean. It sounded exactly as if a Gargantuan Walrus was snorting. If you ever go to BVI you really must go check it out.

I climbed even more cautiously back, and then set off to shortcut over the island back to West End. Here you can see it on a map:Map. One can draw two main conclusions from this map.
1) My gps doesn't work out here. As evidenced by my "short cut" back.
2) I'm terrible at hating hiking. 120M = almost 400 ft elevation change.

On my way back down into West End, I saw a boat somewhat beached and the wheels started turning...

I changed, rested, read, and then went to dinner on the water: a pizza burger and a bottle of Carib Beer. Carib is like a cheap Corona. Not bad, really. a pizza burger is a hamburger patty on garlic bread with cheese and sauce on top. Worth trying, not bad, but not what I was expecting... not that I expected anything. It was more a WTFMATE-lets-try-it than a "that sounds good" decision.

After dinner I set out to add another island to my creative total, for islands that pretend to be Islands. But I grabbed my bag just in case. And then, before I even got to the pseudo-island, there was a missing section of fence into the shipyard. Just asking for it AND a hole that big means no dogs. Yessss. So I screwed up my nerves and went for it.

Now I know why there are so many tales about ghost ships. Because empty boats at night are creepy as #%^&. They tilt unnaturally, the wind makes howling noises as it whips through whats left of the rigging... I took a couple pictures, manually adjusting it to look more realistically gloomy. Documentation done, there was nothing left to delay, so I forced myself to venture into the cabin to be able to say that I urbexed a boat. Once inside it felt more natural (well, less unnatural), but there was still no way I was going below decks with just a LED flashlight. Maybe if I had a maglight. And a machete.

Mission accomplished, I bailed back down the ladder lashed to the side of the boat and finished my trek to Frenchman's Cay. Today was a productive day.