Mineshaft Sunset

When we went to Virgin Gorda on Monday, we had dinner at the Mineshaft restaurant and caught a lovely sunset. The proliferation of outdoor dining, while problematic on the occasional rainy day, does make sunset-watching much easier.

Monarchy

You know you live in a former British colony when ...

an official holiday is announced especially for the Royal Wedding.

That's right. Even though we've just finished up a round of Easter holidays - Good Friday, Easter Monday - this Friday we have a one-time-only official holiday so that folks can get up at 4:00 in the morning and watch William Windsor marry Kate Middleton and not have to worry about making it to work on time.

I suppose it's to be expected in any place that celebrates the Queen's birthday annually.

Virgin Gorda Chickens

HB and I went to Virgin Gorda (VG) yesterday to catch the tail end of the annual Easter Festival, meant to be one of the most elaborate Festivals in the Caribbean, complete with Carnival-style parade. But more about the Festival later: the most memorable part of the evening for me was watching the chickens at the Mineshaft restaurant where we dined. Despite a beautiful sunset, tasty food, and the Festival attractions, I could not tear my attention away from these chickens.

At first, I was fascinated at the juxtaposition of chickens among the cacti that grow readily in the drier climate of VG. I suppose that chickens are allowed to make their homes in the desert as well as anywhere else, but they strike me as more plains-type animals.

As the sun finished setting, we noticed that fewer of the chickens were pecking among the cacti. Instead, they had migrated into a tree near our table and seemed to be settling down for the night. Again, this seemed a strange haunt for chickens, whose feeble wings ought to keep them somewhat more earthbound.

Nonetheless, by the time the skies were completely dark, every chicken, rooster and chick had found itself a comfortable roost for the night in the tree.

Barometer

When I got out of the shower last night, I asked HB, "Did you use my shampoo, or did we have a serious increase in atmospheric pressure?" During the shower, I had noticed that my shampoo bottle was compressed in the middle - something it had decidedly not been when I'd used it the night before - and when I opened the bottle, a fountain of shampoo splurted out.

These are symptoms typically associated with taking your shampoo on an airplane, or traveling with it from higher altitude to lower altitude, both examples of increased atmospheric pressure producing exactly this effect on sealed, flexible plastic bottles.

HB told me he definitely hadn't used my shampoo, and a quick glance at wunderground.com proved my intuition right. Pressure that had been holding steady around 29.9mmHg had a sharp increase in the course of a few hours to over 30mmHg on the night of the 23rd.

Maybe my new-found homemade barometer will come in handy during hurricane season.

Happy Easter

Happy Easter from the BVI!

While I certainly haven't seen any rabbits around, the preponderance of chicks wandering the roads behind their mothers have been a strong reminder of Easter's approach. I also haven't seen Easter candy or Easter baskets or Easter egg dye kits or any other Easter products on sale anywhere. The grocery stores, though, were packed with people buying their ingredients for a big Easter feast - important when finally breaking the Lenten fast. Apparently the focus during Easter for BVI is church and family.

Still, I kind of miss the thrill of the Easter egg hunt.

Official Holidays

Back in October, HB wrote about all the special holidays we celebrate in the BVI. However, since he hadn't actually experienced a holiday here, he wasn't able to write about what you might expect should you find yourself in the BVI on an official holiday.

The primary thing you will note about an official holiday is that pretty much everything is closed. Offices, shops, restaurants, some grocery stores. Now you may be used to stores and offices being closed on major holidays, like Christmas, but this applies to ALL official holidays. When we celebrated H. Lavity Stoutt's birthday and Commonwealth Day in March (the BVI equivalents of Martin Luther King Day and President's Day, respectively), pretty much everything was closed.

The exceptions to the closures are what you might expect. Some restaurants will be open for dinner. The restaurants and maybe one or two shops closest to the cruise ship terminal will be open if there are ships in. They will only stay open until the cruise ships leave. The large Riteway and OneMart in Pasea Estate are open shorter hours (Riteway is usually 9am-7pm).

You will also note, should you be unfortunate enough to arrive in the BVI on an official holiday, that the streets are very quiet. If, as HB and I often seem to do, you elect to take a drive on an official holiday, the only other people you will see are expats and cruise ship passengers. On the other hand, should you wish to go to the beach, you will immediately realize where the vast majority of the population has opted to spend their holiday. Brewer's Bay usually has about 10 people using its lovely sandy beaches, but on holidays, that number is more like 100.

The last thing to note about your BVI official holiday experience is in relation to Good Friday. Not only do all the above rules apply to Good Friday, but there is an additional rule in effect on this official holiday as well: alcohol may not be purchased in the territory before 6pm on Good Friday. It cannot be served at bars. It cannot be sold at grocery stores.

I feel strident sympathy for the passengers of the two cruise ships that arrived in Tortola yesterday, on Good Friday. They're on holiday, they get off in the port, and everything's closed. No shopping available to them, many of the shore excursions are not operating, as it's a holiday. They try to go to the beach and at least enjoy the sun, but the beaches are crowded. And they can't even get a drink.

Stick Shift

With our regular car in the shop after catching on fire Saturday night, we're using a loaner - a manual transmission turbo-diesel truck. After driving to work today, I understand why 98% of the cars on island have automatic transmissions, and I only had the minor obstacle of Zion Hill to traverse, not the 1000 ft climb to the house from Road Town.

As I've mentioned before, the grade here is steep, and if circumstances arise while you're going uphill that cause you to slow down, you'll need to downshift. Downshifting in an automatic is not a problem - just pop the gear lever down a notch. Downshifting with a clutch on a hill is no fun, since it's accompanied by a sensation that, should you fail to shift fast enough, gravity will win.


On the other hand, the engine braking offered in a manual transmission car sure is nice for the downhill parts of your trip.