BVIs

The British Virgin Islands are by far the most popular cruising grounds in the Caribbean. I went in expecting to have a lot of fun, but to be underwhelmed by the "touristy" destination. But it turns out that there's a reason for its popularity. There's something that's a lot of fun on every island, and they're all just a 2 or 3 hour sail away.

The highlight of the trip, of course, was welcoming our first on board visitors. Many good times were had.

We ticked all of the must stop places:

Bitter End Yacht Club -- beautifully rebuilt and landscaped since the hurricane several years back.

Anagada, where all of the boats packed into a mooring field, leaving us a nice anchorage at Pomato Point. Sid's was some of the best food on the whole trip.

We hit Foxy's and stayed out late dancing to the DJ. We spent a day on the beautiful beach in front of the Soggy Dollar Bar, where they invented the painkiller.

I always come back from the islands with the notion that I'm going to make painkillers at home, and I always forget about it.

Willy T's was more fun than I remember. It's an old barge, styled as a pirate ship, where people definitely never jump off the upper deck into the beautiful water below. And they especially never ever jump off the upper deck naked, even though there's a t-shirt to celebrate such an achievement.

We visited The Baths, a natural formation of rock that makes cool wading pools and is one of the places that one really must visit.

There were only two drawbacks. First was the maddening crowds of charter boats. We mostly counter-programmed our visits to be away from the weekend to weekend charter itinerary, but it's still a master class in which vessel should stand on and which should give way. And they do love to drop an anchor right on top of where you're swinging!

The other drawback was that we went down a head (boat toilet). Someone flushed something that was neither toilet paper nor excrement, and the pump that grinds it to a liquid and discharges it couldn't handle the load. In the previous Velvet Elvis, this would have been a disaster, but fortunately, we now have a 2nd head to use for backup.

Again, all of the fun is documented over in the photos, but here are a few to whet your appetite.

Friends in town

Anagada

Jost Van Dyke

The Baths