Royal Visit to BVI: Day 1

On the first day of HRH The Duke of Gloucester’s official visit to the BVI, His Royal Highness carried a number of public engagements around Tortola: he was greeted by an RVIPF Guard of Honour Ceremony at the House of Assembly, given a tour of significant buildings along Main Street and visited the BVI Watersports Centre to meet members of the BVI Special Olympic sailing team and christen new additions to the Sailability fleet. Today, Colin and Alison Bramble from Sailability guestblog about the day’s events:

The BVI Watersports Centre is honoured to be a part of HRH The Duke of Gloucester’s visit.  We took the opportunity to highlight some of the activities of the current Sailability BVI sailors and their instructors, friends, fellow crews and competitors, before presenting the Special Olympics BVI Sailing Team to HRH.

We welcomed the Duke at our HQ in Sea Cows Bay, before swiftly handing him a lifejacket and invited him aboard ‘Dory’ our brand new safety boat – one of five new additions to the fleet.  He was driven from the dock to the ‘working area’ in the bay, where young sailors with special needs were training under the guidance of Royal Yachting Association Assistant Instructors and experienced helms – all local, secondary school students themselves.

After ten minutes afloat, HRH was driven back to the dock where he had a moment to meet students from Eslyn Henly Richez Learning Centre and BVI Technical and Vocational Institute.   The Duke then took part in the christening ceremony of four, very special, small training dinghies called Ladybug, Lovebug, Beachbug and Snugasabug!