Get To Know The Sailing Vessel Maple Cookie

She was simply known as The Cookie. With elegant lines, a spacious salon, state-of-the-art navigation, and four large bedrooms–the Maples Cookie cut through the waters of the British Virgin Islands with style and grace. As for her passengers, well that’s another story. Style and grace we are not, more like rum loving pirates on a floating magic carpet.

That magic carpet was the Maples Cookie and she was home away from home for the nine of us on board. We booked her through Virgin Island Sailing, chartered her with Horizon Charters, and picked her up in Nanny Cay, Tortola. She is 44 feet long, over twenty four feet wide,  boasts 4 double cabins, 4 heads and showers, two single berths forward and is a Fountaine Pajot Helia catamaran. That’s what the Cookie is, but that’s not what she was. She was much more than boat, she was dancing on the deck to Kenny Chesney, she was floating on paddleboards with cold beers, she was morning breakfast and good jokes, she was creator of island stories and new friendships. Boats are much more than fiberglass and motors, they are platforms for some of the best memories you’ll ever have.

With Captain Mike at the helm we bounced around the BVI with smiles on our faces and rum drinks in our hand. Along with our other boat, Fly-Bye, we hit Norman Island, Virgin Gorda, Anegada, and Jost Van Dyke. To say the BVI are beautiful is a vast understatement. You just can’t put into words the visual display that  feeds into your eyes. All that beauty, and all those experiences happened because The Cookie took us there.

The above is one of my favorite photos of the Cookie. Taken on Jost.

I love all boats. Big ones, small ones, fast ones, old ones–it doesn’t matter, they are all special. But sailing is different. There’s a special feeling you get when the sails go up and the motors go silent. You feel the wind grab the canvas and the boat begins to move through the water just like explorers and their tall-ships did hundreds of years ago. It’s romantic.

I think about The Cookie still. She is down there, sitting in the blue waters of the BVI right now. There is a new cast of characters sitting on the aft deck. I wonder what they are doing, I wonder what flags they have flying. They are no doubt laughing and telling stories. They are dancing on the Willy-T, they are climbing the rocks at The Baths, they are falling off scooters on the sandy Anegada roads, they are drinking Passion Confusion rum drinks with Sweet-P at the B-Line, they are eating lobster quesadillas at One Love Beach Bar, they are sitting on the deck under a billion stars as The Cookie sways back and forth in the calm waters of a BVI bay. They are creating their own magical memories.

She is more than just a boat, she is a memory maker. A sexy one at that.  Cookie I miss you.

If you haven’t been sailing through the BVI yet you must. If you have, go again…and take me.

This story was made possible by Virgin Island Sailing, a company that makes VI sailing charters easy.

Cheers,
RumShopRyan