Distinct Sceneries and History of the Cooper and Salt Islands
Uncover the sheer beauty of the Cooper and Salt Islands in the British Virgin Islands. Both Caribbean havens offer unique land and water attractions for thrill-seekers and nature lovers alike. Enjoy what these two idyllic islands have to offer firsthand with Kuralu Catamaran Charters’s public and private sailing trips around the Cooper and Salt Islands.
Cooper Island - a little gem
Cooper Island is a small, unspoiled island with a protected anchorage that lies 5 miles across the Sir Francis Drake channel from Tortola. It is home to a self-sufficent resort called Cooper Island Beach Club on Manchioneel Bay in the North West corner. Their excellent restaurant is a perfect place to get a delicious lunch after your swim. Cooper Island is home to “wreck alley” an area of seabed where boats have been sunk deliberately over the last 3 decades to create dive sites and provide habitat for marine life. The best snorkeling site at Cooper is known as Cistern Point, off Little Carvel Rock. The shore adjacent features remnants of a cistern used to water local livestock and plantation land in operation around the 1800s. On the summit of the island are the remains of a fort with thick walls to resist cannonballs from pirate attacks or Spanish incursions.
Salt Island:
Home to a Famous Shipwreck
Many islands in the Virgins have salt ponds where crystal salt was collected, but no island had a larger or more productive pond than Salt Island, a small T-shaped island about five miles south of Tortola. Salt Island is named after its three salt ponds that were once important sources of salt for seasoning and preserving food for the BV islanders and passing ships. For centuries the small settlement on Salt Island thrived on the salt industry and up to 1,000 pounds of salt were harvested annually from Salt Island. Today, islanders still harvest salt, but on a much smaller scale. Harvesting salt as a tribute to the Queen is a tradition dating back to 1867. The Governor would send one pound of salt to the Monarch on their birthday and this tradition continues to this day.
No one still lives on Salt Island year-round, although some Salt Islanders who live on Tortola come back regularly and tend the smattering of houses in the bay.
Home to the Caribbean’s Most Spectacular Wreck
Salt Island’s other claim to fame is as the location of the wreck of the RMS Rhone, the 310-foot twin-masted steamer, which sank during a ferocious hurricane in 1867. There is a cemetery of Rhone shipwreck victims a few dozen yards from the settlement in Lee Bay. A wide circle of stones distinguishes the mass grave of people buried by the Salt Islanders after the storm. Considered by some to be the best wreck in the Caribbean, it now lies in three sections west of Salt Island and has beckoned underwater explorers for decades. In 1977 it was the primary filming location for the movie The Deep, starring Nick Nolte and Jacqueline Bisset.
The wreckage is divided in two halves. Lying in 65-90 feet of water, the bow is the deepest, largest, and most intact section of the Rhone. Here divers can enter the interior of the vessel and will find diverse marine life including angelfish, snappers, grunts and blue tang. The crows nest and foremast can be seen here. The midsection, lying in about 60 feet of water, is dominated by a series of support beams—all that remains of the ship’s deck. The stern, the shallowest part of the wreck, can be explored by snorkelers as well as divers. It features the ship’s large rudder and 15-foot propeller. Marine life frequently seen on and around the wreck include barracudas, stingrays, eagle rays, turtles and Reef sharks.
