Day 52
OCTOBER 21, 2019
ROAD TOWN, TORTOLA, BRITISH VIRGIN ISLANDS
That's the Viking Sun docked in Road Town today.
Having visited the BVI in April 2018, Karen and I are curious to see what re-construction has taken place during the intervening period. You might recall that 2017 was the deadliest and most destructive hurricane season on record and Hurricane Irma was the worst. However, two weeks later Hurricane Maria blasted the island.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2017_Atlantic_hurricane_season
Here are a few photos that we took last year (many boat graveyards abound):
Before our adventure began in 2018 we (Terry & Nancy Fauteux, Jim & Bonnie Hume and the Di Tomassos), had preconceived ideas of wondrous yachting in cobalt-blue waters and favourable winds. Paradise. What we found instead was devastation beyond our worst expectations. The destruction was so widespread that one third of Tortola's inhabitants were both homeless and jobless - so they had left the island. And Tortola was six months without electricity - wow! Despite these early concerns, we sailed our catamaran throughout the islands and had a memorable, if somewhat diminished, holiday.
This afternoon we took an extensive tour of Tortola by open air bus on extremely narrow and steep roads. To our surprise and delight most houses, schools, services and businesses have been repaired and are back in operation. What a remarkable recovery! These folks are resilient!
Later we stopped at the very popular Cane Garden Beach for a rum punch. It was chock-a-block filled with busses from the Viking Sun, which was the only ship (and a small one at that) in port today. If two or (shudder) three ships are in port on the same day, this beach would be chaos and mayhem combined.
Our room steward Muhammad is Indonesian. He introduced us (Karen, really) to his favourite food dish called "rendang" and it sounded delicious. On Google we found various recipes for Malaysian and Indonesian rendang; the difference has to do with the seasonings. Once the ship gets to that part of the world we plan to taste as many versions of rendang as possible and hopefully add to our repertoire of kitchen fare at home.
https://www.google.com/search?q=indonesian+beef+rendang+slow+cooker&oq=indonesian+&aqs=chrome.0.69i59j69i57j0l4.7286j0j8&sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8
ROAD TOWN, TORTOLA, BRITISH VIRGIN ISLANDS
That's the Viking Sun docked in Road Town today.
Having visited the BVI in April 2018, Karen and I are curious to see what re-construction has taken place during the intervening period. You might recall that 2017 was the deadliest and most destructive hurricane season on record and Hurricane Irma was the worst. However, two weeks later Hurricane Maria blasted the island.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2017_Atlantic_hurricane_season
Here are a few photos that we took last year (many boat graveyards abound):
Before our adventure began in 2018 we (Terry & Nancy Fauteux, Jim & Bonnie Hume and the Di Tomassos), had preconceived ideas of wondrous yachting in cobalt-blue waters and favourable winds. Paradise. What we found instead was devastation beyond our worst expectations. The destruction was so widespread that one third of Tortola's inhabitants were both homeless and jobless - so they had left the island. And Tortola was six months without electricity - wow! Despite these early concerns, we sailed our catamaran throughout the islands and had a memorable, if somewhat diminished, holiday.
This afternoon we took an extensive tour of Tortola by open air bus on extremely narrow and steep roads. To our surprise and delight most houses, schools, services and businesses have been repaired and are back in operation. What a remarkable recovery! These folks are resilient!
Later we stopped at the very popular Cane Garden Beach for a rum punch. It was chock-a-block filled with busses from the Viking Sun, which was the only ship (and a small one at that) in port today. If two or (shudder) three ships are in port on the same day, this beach would be chaos and mayhem combined.
Our room steward Muhammad is Indonesian. He introduced us (Karen, really) to his favourite food dish called "rendang" and it sounded delicious. On Google we found various recipes for Malaysian and Indonesian rendang; the difference has to do with the seasonings. Once the ship gets to that part of the world we plan to taste as many versions of rendang as possible and hopefully add to our repertoire of kitchen fare at home.
https://www.google.com/search?q=indonesian+beef+rendang+slow+cooker&oq=indonesian+&aqs=chrome.0.69i59j69i57j0l4.7286j0j8&sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8
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