Touring the Island of Tortola, BVI

My First Day in the British Virgin Islands

Late this summer my boyfriend and I visited Tortola of the British Virgin Islands on a last minute cruise we booked on Norwegian Getaway.  Since we booked the cruise two days before it left, we didn't have a lot of time to research things to do in the ports of call.  With most of the more interesting shore excursions fully booked on Tortola, we wound up winging it when we stepped off the ship onto this small mountainous island.  It would turn out to be one of the better Caribbean shore excursions I did this year.

Enjoying the view at one of the stops on my island tour of Tortola.

A big reason I think Tortola was fun to visit was due to how well organized their information center in the port was.  There were plenty of helpful staff armed with maps to give cruise passengers a run down of their options.  The first option was meandering around the downtown visiting the cluster of small museums.  Option two was hopping on an island tour with one hour beach break for $20.  Option three was grabbing an $8 taxi ride to the beach each way per person.  We decided on option two and loaded in to our pirate-themed taxi.  All of the taxis are similarly built and painted with motifs to match the driver's personality and tastes.

One of the taxis offering island tours.  Each is uniquely decorated to match the personality of its owner and driver.

The island tours do not all take the same route, with each taxi owner working independently, they can go wherever they chose, with their tour style varying as well.  I am not sure how typical our tour was, but I was very pleased with Barry our driver.  Armed with a strong botanical knowledge of the island we made as many stops to look at beautiful vistas as to stop and smell herbs and taste fruits typical of the island.  

The British Virgin Islands as viewed form Tortola, the national park of the baths can be seen on Virgin Gorda in the far right.

Enjoying a variety of lime that our taxi driver Barry picked off a tree for us to taste.  It had the consistency, peel, and pit similar to a lychee.

Enjoying my soursop smoothie along with the view in the mountains of Tortola.

I was also pleased to find that one of our stops deposited us at a snack stand serving smoothies made out of the famous caner fighting soursop.  I wrote about the soursop fruit and its disease fighting properties widely known throughout equatorial Central and South America in the post about Costa Rica.  Since my trip to Tortola was a little short of a year later, it seemed the appropriate time for another dose of the longevity-ensuring fruit, and I treated myself to a serving.  

A wall of murals chronicling life on and the history of the British Virgin Islands.

One of the more interesting attractions we saw on the island tour was a wall of murals on the far side of the island from the cruise port.  This rather long and extensive collection of murals displays motifs of life on the Virgin Islands.  Scenes include social gatherings as well as work and school.  Painted by an array of local artists, this stretch of local murals allows visitors a glimpse of the culture of these islands, which may not be available with other shore side activities.

A festival of dancing is portrayed in this mural on the island.

This mural depicts processing of sugar cane stalks in the BVI.

A mostly outdoor school is depicted in this mural.

The last stop on our island tour was a one hour beach break.  It seems all of the taxis go the the same beach, which while I thought at first would be over crowded, had some quieter stretches on the edges.  We were only allotted an hour for our beaches stop, because our cruise ship was leaving port at 2 PM.  I don't know if a later departure time would ensure a longer stay at the beach.  I am sure someone really longing for some play time in the waveless water could leave the tour at this juncture and catch a taxi back later.  

The beach taxis from the cruise ship bring passengers to.

Enjoying the beautiful beach of Tortola.

While the water did look inviting and I had a bathing suit on under my clothes, the lack of a towel and one hour limit made me seek out another option that was a little drier, the Callwood Distillery.  The Callwood Distillery I had glimpsed briefly online in descriptions of things to do on Tortola.  I wasn't all that interested since it looked small and probably did not have much of a tour.  Since we only had one hour to kill though a small visit was all we could do anyways. 

The very old and still active Callwood Distillery on Tortola.

The distillery is located in the beach area, off the road on the drive in.  It took us five minutes to walk there from where our taxi dropped us off at the beach.  I was pleased to find on our arrival that unlike many so called "distilleries" in the Caribbean which only age and don't actually distill rum.  The Callwood Distillery does and has been doing so continuously for the last four hundred years.

The Callwood Distillery is the longest continually running rum distillery in the Caribbean.

Signs inside the Callwood Distillery announcing the rules of photography and tasting.

As excited as I was, I was also apprehensive about drinking anything that came out of such and old and run down looking shack.  My adventurous side got the better of me however and we soon were standing at the bar shelling out two dollars for two flights of rum.  The rum was okay, nothing spectacular, but reasonably priced with most bottles in the $10-$12 range.  We bought a bottle which also granted us the right to take photos of the distillery as the sign inside explains.  The distillery visit was a nice last attraction to finish off our island tour of Tortola.

The still drains its to-be rum alcohol into a container behind the bar inside the distillery.

Tortola is one of the rare destinations that I am adding to my must-visit-again list of ports in the Caribbean.  While I enjoyed the tour it did not satisfy all of the things I want to do in the British Virgin Islands.  On Virgin Gorda, another island is the national park of The Baths.  This formation of boulders lying in shallow waters makes for a unique snorkeling opportunity.  Unfortunately the only way to get to The Baths is through the cruse ships shore excursions, and the shore excursion was completely full when I inquired about it on board.  I'll just have to revisit the British Virgin Islands.