The Backpacking Housewife: The Next Adventure

Ethan saw me peering ahead with eagerness.

‘We’re heading northwest towards The Dogs,’ he informed me.

‘What kind of dogs are they?’ I asked cautiously, wondering if we’d needed rabies jabs.

Ethan laughed. ‘There are no dogs. It’s a group of islands named so because sailors once thought the barking they could hear came from dogs on the islands.’

‘And, if it wasn’t dogs, what was it?’

‘Caribbean Monk Seals,’ he clarified. ‘Sadly, they’re now extinct.’

He looked gloomy for a little while as he considered this awful loss.

We soon approached a group of five small rocky islets that made up The Dog Islands.

They looked wild and rugged against the calm deep blue of the surrounding sea.

‘Now we’re truly in virgin territory!’ Ethan proclaimed.

He sounded excited as he stood proudly at the helm, inhaling deeply, as if the air around here was purer too. ‘Many years ago, the sailors who came here thought this was the very end of the world, and they imagined the horizon line that you see now was the drop off point. All these islands around here are privately owned. But some are also protected wildlife sanctuaries for creatures that can be found nowhere else in the world. See that island up ahead?’

I peer through my sunshades at the shape of an irregular mound in the distance.

‘That’s Mosquito Island. It’s where I first learned to scuba dive. My instructor, Booty Bill, was known as the last pirate in the Caribbean. He was a real character. There’s so many rumours about him finding shipwrecks and treasure around here. No one ever really knew fact from fiction. When I first came here, at eighteen years old, Booty was like a father to me.’

Ethan sighed happily as he remembered those times.

‘He sounds like an amazing man. Is he still here? I’d love to meet him.’

‘No. He retired to Florida. But now, of course, Richard owns the island.’

‘Are you talking about Richard Branson?’ I gasped.

‘Aye, in 2007, he swiped Mosquito from under my nose for just twenty million.’

Ethan shook his head as if 2007 was just yesterday and twenty million was small change.

‘But I thought Richard Branson owned Necker Island?’

‘Aye, he does. He bought Necker way back in ’79. Although, interestingly, on one very old map of the BVIs it’s shown as ‘Knicker Island’. As you might imagine, Richard, with his sense of humour, thought that was downright hilarious!’

I laughed. ‘Yes, I expect you’d have to be British to appreciate that joke.’

I’m guessing he and Richard Branson have an interesting alliance.

‘So, is that why you know this area so well? Because you lived here as a young man?’

‘Aye. I spent a whole summer down here before I started university. I love these islands. I know these waters like I know the back of my own hand. It’s long been an ambition of mine to buy a boat and an island here and make my home in the BVIs. A dream, actually’

‘But I thought Scotland was your home?’ I said in some surprise.

‘Nah. Not really. I’ve gone soft in my old age. Scotland’s too damn cold. I’d rather follow in the footsteps of my fellow Scot, Robert Louis Stephenson, and live in warmer climes.’

And, I suddenly realised, that although I do know certain things about this man – his recent history, his passion for conservation, his determination to save the planet, and how much I love him – there is still so much that I don’t know about him. His childhood in Scotland. His earlier life. How he single-handedly built up the Goldman Global Foundation. And this dream of his.

I suspect Ethan is as deep as these waters all around us and as equally intriguing.

‘And, this island we’re going to see today,’ I said. ‘Do you think this might be your dream?’

He turned from the helm to grin at me. He had such a handsome face in any regard, but when he smiled, Ethan looked movie star handsome and my heart did a little flip.

‘Lori, my love, believe me when I tell you this is a once in a lifetime opportunity. Unfortunately, this island’s not for sale or I’d be snapping it up. It’s held in an ancient trust. One hundred years ago, it was leased to someone who died with a hold over on the lease agreement, so the island was left to inheritors for the remainder of the lease despite them having no plans nor interest in the island. My guess is they forgot all about it until the lease finally expired this year. I got my lawyers straight onto securing it for the next hundred years.’

‘And that’s why no one has lived on it in all that time?’

‘Aye. It’s a rare find. The last private island with an untouched eco-system in the Virgin Islands. That’s just like finding a virgin in a brothel!’ He chuckled at his own joke.

‘So, what you’re actually talking about is another research facility!’ I remarked a little sourly. I couldn’t help it. I loved his enthusiasm. But how could an abandoned island possibly be our permeant home? How could we possibly thrive, never mind survive, out here on a small rock? I imagined the two of us sitting on a deserted island beach together, sun scorched and dehydrated, with nothing more than one bottle of rum between us – like those poor abandoned pirates – and fighting over one gun with one bullet in it with which to end our awful misery.

As we made our approach, to what I could easily understand being thought the very edge of the old world, Ethan’s untouched virgin island rose dreamily from the sea and it was breath-taking to behold. At first glimpse, I see white crested waves crashing into rocky inlets and small sandy coves. But then I spotted a small heart-shaped cove with a tiny curved beach and with swaying palm trees and a labyrinth of boulders forming natural pools and seawater-flooded grottoes. I hear the call of seabirds, egrets, herons, pelicans, frigates, and drag my eyes upward over sheer rugged cliffs to see undulating hills covered in misty jungle, as Ethan steered us straight into the heart-shaped cove, where the shallow waters were teeming with colourful fish.

He puts down the anchor onto a sandy bed. ‘The boat will be safe here. This is the only safe way to approach the island because the lagoon on the other side is protected by a coral reef.’

Then carefully he pulls out an old battered map from a folder he’s brought along, and we stand together on the gently swaying deck to study it carefully. It’s deeply creased and faded with age. It looks exactly like a treasure map with its star shaped compass drawing and little illustrations showing landmarks. In excitement, I spot an outcrop marked ‘Treasure Point’ at the most northerly aspect.

Treasure Point: so called by ye freebooters from the gold and silver supposed to be bury’d thereabouts after the Wreck of a Spanish Galleon.

‘Oh, it’s a real treasure map!’ I gasp. ‘But who are the freebooters?’

Ethan looked amused as he passed me a bottle of cold drinking water from the cooler.

‘I’m guessing any treasure buried here would have been lifted a long time ago by my mate, Booty Bill. Freebooters, hence booty, was a name for pirates in the old days.’

My eyes flitted across the rest of the map. I see the island is long and shaped like a figure eight, or a symbol of infinity, with two distinct volcanic ranges and a narrow middle area.

‘Oh, look, there’s a house here!’ I shake my finger in excitement at an illustration of a dwelling. I immediately imagine us living there overlooking the beach and the lagoon.

‘I wouldn’t get your hopes up too much. I doubt it’s still here. Not after all this time.’

Ethan tapped a finger at the top of the document where it said: Map of Waterfall Cay by Thomas Jeffreys, Surveyor and Geographer to The King. The Virgin Islands, 1775.

‘This island is called Waterfall Cay? How beautiful. But surely it will still have a waterfall?’

My imagination conjured up a romantic scene in which Ethan and I were swimming naked below a tropical waterfall with rainbow coloured mists all around us. Ethan, who might have been imagining the same thing, slung an arm around me and pulled me closer to kiss me slowly on the lips. As we touched, our skin was hot and damp through the light cotton of our shirts.

His lips tasted of sea spray but in a nice way. More mythical merman than dirty pirate.

When he spoke, his voice was low and sexy. ‘Shall we go exploring to find out?’

We left the boat in the little bay and we slipped into thigh-high warm clear waters with soft sand underfoot and waded ashore. Once ashore, we made our way east through the steamy interior and then began a climb through steep and rugged jungle terrain. We stepped carefully along what appeared to be remnants of an ancient trail of flat rocks that must have been laid down and trodden smooth by many feet so many years before us. Pirates, castaways, sailors, explorers, wanderlusters—who knew?

We leapt across narrow rushing streams that cut through our path and in all the places where the path had collapsed. Ethan, being a gentleman, held my hand and guided me as we traipsed along muddy banks and through the deep forest foliage.

We quickened our pace once we heard the thundering sound of a waterfall ahead.

Then we fought our way through a curtain of hanging vines, to emerge breathless and dirty and sweaty, and to find that we were standing inside an open-air grotto filled with cool misty air in which countless shiny reflective green butterflies fluttered in streams of filtered sunshine.

It was breath-takingly beautiful.

Inside this grotto, there was also a large round emerald green pool of water, surrounded by many other smaller round emerald pools, separated and interspersed at differing levels by giant granite boulders. Some of these giant boulders were shiny volcanic black. They were round and flat and smooth from centuries of rising and declining water levels washing over them. Others were white, limestone or marble, and also flat and smooth.

Ethan took my hand again as we leapt from one to another, like we were playing a game of giant checkers, to reach the deep main emerald pool beneath the tall and writhing and thundering white-water stream that fed it from high above.

In the smaller pools, the water was as still and smooth and reflective as a mirror. I peered down at my reflection. I’d like to say that what I saw was the face of a gypsy wanderer. Someone with the heart of an adventurer and the spirit of a mermaid. But what I actually saw was a middle-aged woman with a happy face, sparkling bright eyes, and long and messy and dirty wild hair. I decided I liked what I saw. This was Lori, the world explorer.

Not Lorraine, the ex-housewife from London.

Lori was a happier and more fun person than the anxious always unsure version of herself.

And then suddenly the mirror became a window into what lay beneath. Large translucent fish suddenly appeared as if by magic. They’d been completely invisible until the sharp rays of filtered sunlight revealed them. ‘Look—’ I called out to Ethan.

He was suddenly beside me and when our eyes met, my thoughts of love were clearly reflected in his eyes too. Our lips crashed together. Our breath quickened between our hasty kisses as we tugged and pulled at each other’s clothing. Not that there was much in the way of our bare skin. I dipped my fingers into the waistband of his shorts, flipping open the button fastening with one hand and boldly pulling down his zipper with the other and soon they were discarded, flicked away onto a nearby rock. In response, with a practiced dexterity, he lifted my vest top over my head and pulled down my shorts in one swift move. My bikini soon went the same way. Then we were together as one, turning and twirling, in the cool emerald pool.

At one with nature and with each other in what appeared to be a paradise.

Happily, after making love, we lay back in the wonderfully cool rippling water, listening to the rhythmic background of the cascading falls and gazing up at the small patch of blue sky that could be seen high above the walls of tall verdant vines that reflected in the pools of water.

It looked unreal. It was like being wrapped up in swirling northern lights. Like in a dream.

‘This place is magical. This island is incredible. Look at all these butterflies!’ I gasped.

I lifted a hand out of the water, sending tiny droplets of rainbow glazed water into the air.

I splayed my fingers wide apart under the wings of a hovering and shimmering and glimmering green butterfly. To my astonishment it settled itself down onto the tip of my thumb.

‘Oh look. It’s tame. I’ve never seen anything quite like this!’

‘Many years ago, this island was a butterfly sanctuary.’ Ethan told me, as he also lay back relaxing in the water. ‘One of my heroes, Alfred Russel Wallace, who was a 19th Century Scottish biologist and explorer and a direct descendent of William Wallace, discovered a unique species of giant butterfly right here on this little island.’

‘Do you mean William Wallace of Braveheart fame?’

‘Yes, that’s right. Alfred reported that the butterflies here were as large as dinner plates. At that time, the Victorians were keen collectors of tropical butterflies and so The Green Morpho butterfly of Waterfall Cay soon became highly sought after and so incredibly valuable that it was prized above all others. Eventually, Wallace came back to this island to find that his special discovery, one of the largest butterflies in the known world, had been almost wiped out. That’s when he established the sanctuary. To try and protect and save them. But, over the years, the island continued to attract butterfly poachers and so The Green Morpho is now sadly extinct.’

‘And that’s what led to its extinction? People collecting them?’

I couldn’t take my eyes of this tiny butterfly as it settled onto my hand, undulating slowly, showing off how it could magically change its wings from green to gold in an instant.

‘And these little fellows, although very pretty, aren’t so rare.’ Ethan told me knowledgably.

‘But maybe this island could be a protected sanctuary for butterflies again?’ I suggested.

‘Perhaps. Only, to apply for the protected status from the government, we’d need to find an indigenous species here or at the very least an endangered one.’

‘Indigenous? That means a native species?’

‘That’s right. Like the Green Morpho.’ Ethan leaned forward to kiss my bare shoulder.

As if offended at not being deemed special enough, the little butterfly fluttered away.

‘There’s only one problem. ‘I adore butterflies, but I really can’t abide caterpillars.’

Ethan laughed in surprise. ‘Why ever not? I mean, it’s not like they can hurt you.’

‘Because I think I had a traumatic experience involving caterpillars when I was a little girl,’ I confessed. If I closed my eyes, I could recall a misty memory of myself as a child, standing at a big leafy shrub in the garden. ‘I was picking caterpillars off a plant and collecting them into a plastic bucket. I have no idea why.’

Back then, like today, there’s hot sunshine on the top of my head and the earthy scent of damp soil and vegetation all around me. I remember the simple childish pleasure I felt at collecting dozens – if not hundreds – of tiny new creepy crawly friends.

‘I suppose it was some kind of a childhood game.’ I continued. ‘Except, I’m still not entirely sure if it was something that really happened to me, or if it was just a horrible nightmare. When I heard my mother calling me, I left my bucket of caterpillars on a workbench inside our garden shed for safekeeping.’ I paused and shuddered at the thought of retelling it.

‘So how is that traumatic?’ Ethan scoffed, not seeing anything offensive in my story at all.

‘Because, when I returned to the shed to play with my caterpillar friends, I remember the wooden door slamming behind me and finding my bucket almost empty, except for just a few green caterpillars and some leaves. I can remember looking around to see only one or two caterpillars crawling along the bucket rim and wondering where they’d all gone?’

‘That doesn’t sound anywhere near as bad as the time I found my ant farm unexpectedly empty.’ Ethan interrupted me to say. ‘Except it wasn’t kept in a shed. It was in my bedroom!’

He laughed at the memory. I ignored him to continue with my own story of icky trauma.

‘I then suddenly realised that there were hundreds of caterpillars covering the walls and the glass windows. They were also crawling on the wooden beams and ceiling. When they started to drop onto me, I began to scream. They didn’t look cute to me anymore. They didn’t look like tiny friendly toys that wriggled. They looked like tiny bloated chomping hairy monsters and I screamed and screamed. I remember feeling the pitter patter of them falling onto my head and getting caught up in my hair and sticking to my dress and my bare arms. I remember trying to flee. Only to find the door handle and my escape route covered in caterpillars. I was trapped. They all looked like tiny wriggly scary snakes. Yuck!’

I shuddered again and pulled a face to show my revulsion to both snakes and caterpillars.

Ethan laughed and discreetly pinched my bottom ‘Oh, look, there’s a snake in the water!’

But I wasn’t falling for it and so we had a splash fight until we were suddenly aware of the time and how the whole morning had somehow escaped us. We reluctantly left the waterfall grotto and made our way back through the rainforest towards our boat, where Ethan said that included in our charter was a cooler with fresh drinking water and a packed picnic lunch of sandwiches and fruit. He was always so thoughtful and thorough about everything.

Although, being Ethan, of course, he would call it being prepared.

Once back on board, after our packed lunch, to get our bearings, we cast our eyes over the ancient map once again. I traced my finger along the line that formed this side of the island.

‘Okay, so this is the bay where we’re at anchor just now. And here is headland and the lagoon and the long stretch of beach that’s protected by this coral reef.’

‘Yes. That’s right. And that’s where I want to build our house.’ Ethan declared.

I dragged my eyes up from the map to look at his handsome face and wondered how I’d ever thought to doubt him over these past few weeks. He had been listening and sympathising with all my concerns. He had understood me when I’d tried to explain how I loved my life with him but couldn’t help but to feel anxiety over being separated from my family. He’d said then that he’d find us somewhere for us to call home and he’d been true to his word. All this, despite my reservations that Ethan Goldman could no more settle down somewhere, than a butterfly could choose to land on my hand. Happily, I’d been proved wrong on both counts.

‘I want to build us a big beautiful traditional style Caribbean house. Using only natural materials and with features that will provide us with a zero-carbon footprint.’ His eyes sparkled as he told me his plans. ‘We’ll use solar panels to generate our own electricity. We’ll dig a well and tap into the fresh water source here for our drinking water. We’ll finally have somewhere to call home. A perfect place to take time out and a base to return to between our travels. Where we can invite your family over to spend their holidays and where we can both grow old together. How does that sound to you, Lori?’

‘I think it sounds perfect,’ I told him with tears of happiness blurring my vision.

We gathered up our things to find the beach where he wanted to build our house.

Then Ethan opened the cooler again, to haul out a bottle of chilled champagne.

He waved it at me momentarily before stuffing it into his small backpack.

‘When we find exactly the spot to build our house, Lori, then we’ll open this to celebrate!’

I laughed and clapped my hands in excitement and approval at this wonderful idea.

We waded from the boat and back onto the little sandy beach in the heart-shaped bay from where we made our way into the steamy jungle once more. This time, we ventured in a westerly direction, into what looked like a beautiful and exotic tropical garden with giant vegetation and flowers everywhere and with butterflies and hummingbirds and other colourful birds in the trees. We stepped carefully over twisted roots and through feather-like grasses and wound our way through wild sugar cane and tall bamboo and trees with long hanging tendrils. We craned our necks to look up at the tallest of palm trees, laden with coconuts, and with their fronds waving back and to in the warm humid breeze. I saw bananas growing in great clumps, hanging down on storks, weighted down by the hefty purple cones of the banana flower.

There were breadfruits the size of footballs. Mangos and starfruits ripe and tantalisingly ready to eat. The tropical flowers that I recognised looked like those grown in heated botanical gardens back home. Others looked so vibrantly colourful and oversized and waxy that they looked completely unreal. With every step, I started to realise this island had an awful lot going for it. Ethan kept stopping along the route to take photos on his phone of the flora and fauna.

‘This island might look like a total escape from the outside world but as far as locations go it’s in the middle of the tropical suburbs,’ he told me. ‘It has protected waters. Consistent trade winds. Line of sight neighbours and it’s just a short boat ride from Tortola and its regional airport and the international airports on St. Thomas, Antigua, and San Juan.’

I started to get it. I began to understand.

Excitement fizzed up inside me like the effervescent bubbles in our soon to be popped champagne bottle. I could now see how this island was a middle ground for us between remote and accessible, public and private, and a perfect place for us to call home. It ticked all the boxes. It really was that perfect compromise that I’d been looking for and longing to find.

Suddenly, we reached a place where lush vegetation stopped and beach began, and we stepped out of the shaded surrounding jungle with its cool dampness underfoot into hot sunshine and hot powder fine white sand. I laughed and pointed out a discarded beer bottle in the sand. ‘I’m starting to doubt your claim no one has been on this island for a hundred years!’

‘Maybe there’s a message in it?’ Ethan suggested, with a mischievous twinkle in his eye.

I checked, just be sure, but only found a small hermit crab. Then an iguana crossed our path – a big one – looking like a fearsome prehistoric creature and I jumped back in surprise. Ethan reassuringly grabbed my hand, and then we both ran with our bare feet burning across the hot sand towards the water’s edge, where he pulled me into the clear and shallow waters of the calm blue lagoon and into his arms once more.

He kissed me long and hard until I was breathless and dizzy with desire for him. His big hands gently held my face then moved down my neck and my body and then holding me closely, he said to me in what was almost a whisper. ‘Lori, my darling, I know I’ve been acting a bit crazy lately. But, to be honest, I’ve been ridiculously nervous about coming out here with you today.’

‘Nervous? No way. The Ethan I know doesn’t do nervous!’ I protested, laughing.

I’ve seen Ethan keep his cool in the scariest of situations. Like the time he’d managed to keep his sensibilities about him when, in the middle of a vast ocean, everyone else was freaking out at the ships generator failing on us while we were engulfed in three hundred and sixty degrees of thick soupy sea fog, and all the noise and vibrations we’d all become used to had become an eerie and deafening silence. He’d proved unshakable.

‘Well, okay. Then I’ve been ridiculously excited,’ he relinquished with a grin.

‘Well, now I understand. This place is beautiful. And, like you said, it’s a rare find.’

He gazed deeply into my eyes, making my heart melt and butterflies flutter in my stomach.