A speck of white sand and low bush a few hundred metres off the east tip of Little Jost Van Dyke, with Green Cay just to the north. Nobody lives on it and nothing is sold on it: there is no dock, no road and no ferry. Boats anchor off on the sand and you swim or wade ashore — so the sea on the day decides whether you go.
Skip today Thunderstorms in the forecast · Sargassum offshore. If you go, the least bad stretch left is 3 pm–6 pm.
| Day | The call | Why | Best time | Cruise guests here | Sea at the beach | Rain |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Today | Skip today | Thunderstorms in the forecast · Sargassum offshore | 3 pm–6 pm | — | Gentle · 1.8 ft | Thunder |
| Tomorrow | Think twice | Thunderstorms in the forecast · Sargassum offshore | 11 am–2 pm | — | Calm · 0.5 ft | Thunder |
| Sun, Nov 8 | Think twice | Sargassum offshore · Choppy — N swell into the bay | 8 am–11 am | — | Some chop · 2.1 ft | 53% |
| Mon, Nov 9 | Skip today | Rough — 3.0 ft NNE swell, shore break · Sargassum offshore | 8 am–11 am | — | Some chop · 2.6 ft | 29% |
| Tue, Nov 10 | Skip today | Rough — 2.9 ft NNE swell, shore break · Sargassum offshore | 2 pm–5 pm | — | Some chop · 2.8 ft | 37% |
The call is the same one our beach report makes, refreshed every half hour: the swell reaching the islet (Open-Meteo's marine forecast off Jost Van Dyke), NOAA's sargassum satellite and the rain forecast. Our model treats Sandy Spit as open to every direction — a bare sand islet with no bay to shelter in — so a swell the bigger beaches shrug off can make the swim in a no. It is a model, not a report from the water: the captain looking at the sea has the last word. The bars under each call are the hours from 8 am to 5 pm. Today's beach report
What the BVI asks at the border, the anchorages and moorings round Jost Van Dyke, today's sea and weather reads, the live cameras nearest the islet and the island it belongs to — each one opens the full page.
Sandy Spit from OpenStreetMap: the islet in the middle, Green Cay across the shallow bar to the north and the east end of Little Jost Van Dyke to the west, with the anchorage between them. Sandy Cay, the national park, is about a mile south. Tap a pin for its section.
Sandy Spit has no dock, no road and no ferry. You come by boat: a day charter from St. John, St. Thomas or Tortola, a water taxi, or your own boat. There are no moorings at the islet; boats anchor on the sand bottom off its west side, between the spit and Little Jost Van Dyke, and you swim or wade the last stretch to the beach.
Coming from the U.S. Virgin Islands you are crossing a border. Every boat entering the BVI clears customs and immigration at a port of entry on arrival — for Sandy Spit usually Great Harbour on Jost Van Dyke or West End on Tortola — and everyone aboard shows a passport, U.S. citizens included. A charter captain handles the stop and the boat's BVI charges; ask what the price includes. In a straight line the islet is about 10 miles from Cruz Bay on St. John and 4½ from West End on Tortola (OpenStreetMap).
St. John → Jost Van Dyke by private boat · St. Thomas → Jost Van Dyke by private boat · BVI entry fees · Day-sail routes · The Jost Van Dyke guide
By private boat: Sandy Spit by day charter on BoatCharterBid, with what captains bid to go there.
Sandy Spit itself is free — Crown land with no gate and no one to pay. What a visitor from St. Thomas or St. John pays is the British Virgin Islands' charges at the border, where the boat clears in. From Tortola or anywhere else in the BVI none of it applies: the trip is domestic.
| Sandy Spit | Free |
| BVI environmental and tourism levy, on arrival | $10 |
| BVI departure tax, leaving by ferry | $20 |
| The same, for BVI residents | $15 |
The levy and the departure tax are the UK government's figures. A day charter or water taxi from the USVI also pays BVI charges for the boat, through the captain: ask what the price includes before you book.
| Great Harbour, Jost Van Dyke | 8:30 am – 4:30 pm daily |
| West End, Tortola (customs & immigration) | 8:00 am – 9:00 pm daily |
The BVI Tourist Board's hours, as listed in October 2026. West End's port itself keeps shorter hours (8:30 am to 4:30 pm Monday to Thursday, to 6 pm Friday to Sunday). Clearing outside the hours has to be arranged in advance and costs extra.
Checked October 29, 2026 against the UK government's BVI entry requirements and the BVI Tourist Board's sea ports of entry. Fees and hours change: the officers at the port of entry and your captain have the last word.
Very little, which is the point: sand, a patch of bush in the middle, the shallows and the reef round the edge. There is no business of any kind on the islet.
About a quarter of an acre in the 2009 Environmental Profile of Jost Van Dyke, and barely 2 m above the sea: beach round about three-quarters of the edge, 20 to 45 m of sand from the bush to the low-water mark, and coconut palm, seagrape and sea purslane in the middle. Hurricane Irma took its trees in September 2017; how much has grown back since, we could not confirm — the photos on this page are from before the storm.
Photo: Cayeldo, CC BY-SA 3.0No bar, no toilets, no fresh water, no bins and no shade beyond the bush. Bring water, sunscreen and a hat from the boat, and take every scrap back with you — whatever is left on an islet this size stays there.
Photo: giggel, CC BY 3.0There is no dock and no mooring. Boats anchor on the sand off the islet's west side, in the pale water between it and Little Jost Van Dyke, and the dinghy or a swim brings you in. The Profile found seagrass round the spit, and a bottom where the yachts anchor that probably held more seagrass once: drop the hook on clear sand, never on grass or coral.
The rocky islet just north of the spit: about 15 acres and 30 m (98 ft) high, Crown land like Sandy Spit. An underwater bar of stones joins the two. Brown pelicans roost on Green Cay's rocky south coast, and the 2009 Profile found goats grazing its slopes. OpenStreetMap maps a small beach on its south-west side, facing the spit.
Photo: giggel, CC BY 3.0The water east of Green Cay and Sandy Spit — 15.5 ha, about 38 acres — was declared a fisheries protected area under the BVI's Fisheries Regulations in 2003, managed by the Conservation and Fisheries Department. Leave the speargun and the fishing line on the boat and take nothing from the reef.
Photo: Cayeldo, CC BY-SA 3.0The arrival is the experience: off the back of the boat, over the sand and the shallows to a beach with nothing on it but sand and bush. Calm mornings are best, before the day boats come in; on a swell day leave it for another time.
It takes a few minutes. Keep to the sand: the bush in the middle is the islet's only cover, and sea turtles have nested on its beach. Look across to Green Cay, the open sea beyond it and Jost Van Dyke's hills to the west.
Photo: giggel, CC BY 3.0Reef and rock fringe the islet, a bar of stones runs across to Green Cay, and toward Jost Van Dyke there is seagrass, where turtles are sometimes seen. Stay off the coral, keep away from where the breakers run on the exposed side, and watch for dinghies on the anchorage side.
Photo: David Broad, CC BY 3.0The bigger, greener cay to the south, owned for four decades by Laurance S. Rockefeller, who kept it open to the public and cut its walking trail, then given by his estate to the BVI National Parks Trust in May 2008. Its moorings are the Trust's, for day use.
Photo: giggel, CC BY 3.0Lunch is on Jost Van Dyke: White Bay and the Soggy Dollar on the south-west coast, Foxy's and the waterfront in Great Harbour, where the boats from the USVI clear in. The classic day sail strings them together with the spit.
Nothing is sold on Sandy Spit. Bring water and lunch on the boat — ask your charter what it carries — and take everything back with you.
The nearest bars are on Jost Van Dyke, a short sail west: White Bay's beach bars and the Great Harbour waterfront. Several of the island's bars close for a few weeks between August and October; our closures list says who.
Warm all year, with a steady easterly trade wind and short tropical showers rather than all-day rain; the forecast below has this week's numbers. December to April is the dry season and the busy sailing season. June to November is hurricane season — Irma, in September 2017, stripped the islet's trees.
Sandy Spit is a flat sand islet with no bay round it, so it takes whatever the sea is doing. Green Cay breaks some of the swell from the north, but the anchorage is a day stop only, and on a day of big trade-wind seas or a winter north swell the boat rolls and the swim to the sand gets rough. The call at the top of this page reads the swell every half hour.
| Day | Sky | High / low | Rain | Wind | Seas offshore |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Today | Thunderstorms | 84° / 79°F | 96% | SW 18 mph, gusts 24 | 3.2 ft |
| Tomorrow | Thunderstorms | 83° / 80°F | 85% | WSW 20 mph, gusts 27 | 3.7 ft |
| Sun, Nov 8 | Drizzle | 84° / 82°F | 63% | W 12 mph | 3.3 ft |
| Mon, Nov 9 | Clear | 83° / 82°F | 32% | NNW 8 mph | 2.6 ft |
| Tue, Nov 10 | Drizzle | 83° / 81°F | 45% | NE 14 mph | 2.1 ft |
| Wed, Nov 11 | Overcast | 84° / 83°F | 22% | E 14 mph | 2.3 ft |
| Thu, Nov 12 | Drizzle | 85° / 82°F | 25% | ESE 12 mph | 2.9 ft |
Open-Meteo forecast for Jost Van Dyke, refreshed every half hour. The seas are offshore; how much of it reaches the sand is the call above. BVI weather & sailing week · North swell season
Daily-mean sea-surface temperature off Jost Van Dyke, averaged 2021–2024 (Open-Meteo marine reanalysis): warmest in Sep (86.3°F), coolest in Feb (79.6°F).
No — there is no live camera on Sandy Spit or anywhere that looks at it. The nearest cameras are at White Bay on Jost Van Dyke, about 3½ miles west: the Soggy Dollar's and Pink House Villas'. They show the weather and the sea on the island's south side, not the islet itself.
The Lettsom family of Little Jost Van Dyke own Green Cay and Sandy Cay and grow cotton on them; Sandy Spit, almost all beach, is never farmed. There is no sign that anyone ever lived on any of the three.
Green Cay and Sandy Spit are first proposed as protected areas.
The two privately owned islets are offered for sale through a German private-island broker — $1.7 million for about 15 acres, MercoPress reports. Foxy Callwood leads a fundraising drive through the Jost Van Dykes Preservation Society, and the BVI Government says it will buy them.
The Fisheries Regulations declare 15.5 ha east of Green Cay and Sandy Spit a fisheries protected area — one of fourteen in the territory.
The Government completes its purchase of Green Cay and Sandy Spit, which become Crown land.
The estate of Laurance S. Rockefeller gives Sandy Cay, a mile to the south, to the BVI National Parks Trust. The BVI's protected-areas plan, approved that year, proposes one protected area for Sandy Cay, Green Cay and Sandy Spit together.
Irma takes all of Sandy Spit's trees, News of St. John reports.
Two St. John residents, Monica Knaggs and Connor Masterson, go over and plant rooted coconut palms in the shape of a heart, with soil given free by St. John Hardware.
Sources: Environmental Profile of Jost Van Dyke, 2009 · SAIL, August 2003 · MercoPress, August 2003 · News of St. John, November 2017
From St. John or St. Thomas you are crossing into the British Virgin Islands: everyone shows a passport where the boat clears in, U.S. citizens included, and again at U.S. customs on the way home.
The BVI's online embarkation card is required of every traveller; do it on your phone up to 72 hours before you go.
A bare sand islet has no lee. Check the call at the top of this page and the swell before you book, and let the captain decide on the day.
Bring a hat and a shirt: the bush in the middle is the only shade, and there is no awning or umbrella to rent.
No bins and no one to clear up: every can, bottle and wrapper goes back on the boat.
Sea turtles have nested on Sandy Spit's beach. Keep clear of any marked nest, and do not dig at the bush line.
Skip today todayJost Van DykeWhite BayThunderstorms in the forecast · Sargassum offshore
Skip today todayJost Van DykeGreat HarbourThunderstorms in the forecast · Sargassum offshoreJost Van DykeLittle HarbourSheltered · Quiet
The island guideJost Van DykeHow to get to Jost Van Dyke, what the taxis cost, White Bay and the Soggy Dollar, Foxy's in Great Harbour, the Bubbly Pool and Sandy Spit — with today's weather and the next boat.Only by boat: a day charter from St. John, St. Thomas or Tortola, a water taxi, or your own boat. There is no dock, no ferry and no moorings — boats anchor on the sand off the islet and you swim or wade ashore. From the U.S. Virgin Islands the boat first clears BVI customs and immigration, usually at Great Harbour on Jost Van Dyke or West End on Tortola.
Yes. Sandy Spit is in the British Virgin Islands, so everyone arriving from the U.S. Virgin Islands — U.S. citizens and children included — needs a passport and the BVI's online ED card, and the boat clears in at a port of entry before anyone goes ashore. You clear U.S. customs again on the way back.
The islet is free: it is Crown land with no gate. From the USVI the BVI charges visitors a $10 environmental and tourism levy on arrival, and the boat pays its own BVI charges through the captain. The price of the boat itself is the charter operator's: ask what it includes.
No. There is no bar, no toilets, no fresh water, no bins and no shade beyond the bush in the middle. Bring water and food on the boat and take everything back with you.
Tiny — about a quarter of an acre (0.1 ha) in the 2009 Environmental Profile of Jost Van Dyke, and barely 2 m (6 ft) above the sea. You can walk round it in a few minutes. Its shape changes with the storms, and Hurricane Irma took its trees in 2017.
The BVI Government. Sandy Spit and Green Cay were privately owned and up for sale in 2003; the Government completed its purchase of both in 2005, and the 2009 Environmental Profile records them as Crown land. The water to the east of them has been a fisheries protected area since 2003.
Irma, on September 6, 2017, took all of the islet's trees, News of St. John reported. Two months later two St. John residents planted rooted coconut palms there to start it growing again. How much has come back since, we could not confirm.
There is reef and rock round the edges and along the bar to Green Cay, and seagrass toward Jost Van Dyke. Snorkel on a calm day, stay off the coral and away from breaking water, and do not fish: the water east of the islet is a fisheries protected area.
It is a day stop. There are no moorings and no shelter from the sea round a flat islet; sailors anchor on the sand for a swim and move to Great Harbour or Little Harbour on Jost Van Dyke for the night.
They are two islets about a mile apart. Sandy Spit is the tiny sand islet next to Green Cay; Sandy Cay, to the south, is bigger, green and hilly, with a walking trail, and has been a BVI National Parks Trust park since the Rockefeller estate gave it in 2008.
No. No live camera looks at the islet. The nearest are at White Bay on Jost Van Dyke, about 3½ miles west — the Soggy Dollar's and Pink House Villas' — on our Jost Van Dyke webcams page.