Tag Archives: renting

Sharing Home(s)

Recently friends from home in France visited the Caribbean on a cruise ship and Tortola was one of the ports-of-call on their itinerary.  Graham and I had known for sometime that they were coming, as it had been a topic of conversation over dinner during our last visit to France.  I offered to give them the “local’s Island Tour” rather than their taking one of the ship-organised tours.  This invitation was accepted with alacrity.

Thus it was that Pat & Roy met me at our office at late on a week-day morning.  Things didn’t go completely as planned for a number of reasons, not least of which was the fact that I had just been released from hospital following surgery for acute appendicitis!  However, we set off heading in a clockwise direction around the island.

It is often only when you share your home with visitors that you appreciate the beauty or uniqueness of where you live.  We drove westwards relatively slowly, stopping every so often for a photo opportunity or to facilitate my explaining something.  My plan had been to go over to Frenchmans’ Cay and have a drink there before heading over to the North Shore for lunch.  However,when we pulled into the parking area we found it jam-packed with other cruise ship passengers (frequently the cause of massive irritation for us locals, unless you happen to be a taxi driver).  This necessitated a quick change of plan and we went back onto the Tortola side of Soper’s Hole and stopped at The Jolly Roger for a tourist-free cold drink instead.

Once a small thirst had been quenched we continued on our way around the island, going “off-piste” to follow the un-made road around the very western-most tip of the island.  We made another stop for a photo opportunity and, between the ooohs and aaahs of appreciation, Pat asked me “Why would you want to live in France when you’ve such beauty right here?”  I have to confess that as we looked through lush greenery over stunning blue waters dotted with yachts under sail to emerald-green islands it was a very fair question.

The view that Pat was looking at when she posed her question

As we drove on we discussed the various merits of living here in the BVI, in France or the UK.  I told Pat & Roy that we don’t dislike living here  (if we did then we’d leave).  We love living in the BVI.  The weather is a major factor, of course, but there’s way more to life here than the weather.  We neither one of us could ever return to living in the UK – while it’s where we’re from it certainly isn’t “home”.  It’s nice to visit (so that Graham can get his fish & chips fix, I can have my curry cravings satisfied and we can pick up an industrial-size pot of marmite), but sorry, it isn’t for us!  We appreciate France for the quality and pace of life – the ethos of working to live, as opposed to living to work – and the wonderful, fresh, locally grown food and excellent wine.  And then there’s the novelty, the challenges of the language and endeavouring to integrate and the culture too.

We have very different experiences of sharing Les Terraces with the people who rent it for a holiday as, more often than not, we get to share our home with people remotely – we’re here and they are in Sainte Foy La Grande exploring.  If we’re lucky they share with us the experiences that they have, whereas here showing friends around gives us a whole new appreciation of home.  And we get to enjoy the best of both worlds.  How lucky is that????

Oh, I should probably tell you want else went pear-shaped on the day ….. the lunch spot that I had chosen for us was closed (recession, or island-time issues??).  So was my fall-back position (lack of research).  We ended up sitting beach-side in Trellis Bay and the lobster salad that Pat ordered came out as a lobster sandwich instead.  Three strikes and I was clearly out!  However, I think that Pat & Roy enjoyed themselves.  I know I did, and my thanks to them for getting me out of my rut and remembering why we live here in the British Virgin Islands.  We clearly need more guests!