How to get to Virgin Gorda from St. Thomas

Ferry from St. Thomas to Virgin Gorda: two boats a week

By boat, and the day of the week decides which one. Inter Island Boat Services runs the one ferry from St. Thomas to Virgin Gorda that works as a day trip: Thursdays, leaving Red Hook at 7:30 am and Cruz Bay on St. John at 8 am, back from Virgin Gorda at 3 pm, a 90-minute crossing by the operator's figure as of October 22, 2026. It lands at Spanish Town, the island's port of entry, and the Baths are ten minutes up the road from the jetty.

Speedy's is the other ferry, and it runs the wrong way for a day out: its Saturday boat leaves Charlotte Amalie at 4 pm and leaves Virgin Gorda at 8:30 am, a boat for a weekend or a week, home on a later Saturday morning or through Tortola. It pauses each autumn; check with Speedy's before you plan on it.

The operators' own pages and the BVI Ports Authority's November 2026 calendar, read October 22, 2026.

St. Thomas to Virgin Gorda ferry schedule and fares

Inter Island lists every Virgin Gorda fare as a pair, the lower one for booking a day ahead.

Fares from Inter Island Boat Services' Virgin Gorda trip page, checked October 22, 2026: two adults and two children come to $660 booked a day ahead. The page names no fee on top. On its Jost Van Dyke route the same operator adds $30 a person for customs and immigration, which is what the British Virgin Islands charge a visitor by sea, a $10 levy in and a $20 departure tax out, so plan on about $120 more for the four of you and ask when you book.

Speedy's charges $60 one way and $110 round trip for an adult, $50 and $80 for a child of 5 to 11, on its rates page as of October 22, 2026, with no fee line of its own.

The tradeoff: one boat each way on each route, and the Thursday boat's 3 pm sailing is the only ride home that day. Miss it and the night is on Virgin Gorda, or on Tortola by way of Speedy's.

Getting to the Red Hook and Charlotte Amalie docks

The day boats, the Thursday ferry and the charters, leave from Red Hook on the East End; Speedy's Saturday boat leaves from the Charlotte Amalie waterfront. Inter Island asks for check-in 45 minutes before departure and Speedy's closes it 30 minutes before, so be at the Urman V. Fredericks Marine Terminal, where the St. John ferry also leaves, by 6:45 am on a Thursday.

Driving routes we measured on September 16 and October 9, 2026. The Charlotte Amalie terminal, for Speedy's, is 12 minutes from the airport, 12 from Havensight and 9 from Crown Bay by the same measurements. A taxi from the airport is $23 for one rider to Red Hook, or $17 each for two or more, and $11 or $9 to Charlotte Amalie, on the Virgin Islands Taxicab Commission's tariff in force since October 2022. A 6:45 am check-in from a villa near the airport means leaving before 6:05.

Through Tortola, and why it usually means a night

On the five other days the public route is two ferries, and the timetables are honest about what that buys. The St. Thomas to Tortola ferry leaves Charlotte Amalie for Road Town at 9 am on the BVI Ports Authority's November 2026 calendar, 50 minutes across, and Speedy's leaves Road Town for Spanish Town at 10:40 am Monday to Saturday and 12:10 pm on weekdays, $30 one way. That is Spanish Town by late morning on a good connection.

The way back is the problem. The last boats to St. Thomas leave Tortola at 3:15 pm from Road Town and 4 pm from West End, 32 minutes away by road, and Speedy's leaves Spanish Town for Road Town at 12:45 pm on weekdays and 3:30 pm Monday to Saturday. Only the 12:45 pm connects, and it leaves about an hour at the Baths; the 3:30 pm lands after the St. Thomas boats have gone. So a Tortola routing is really a night away, on Virgin Gorda or in Road Town before the morning ferry home. The BVI ferry page has every Speedy's sailing, and getting to the British Virgin Islands the fees at the border.

Day sails from Red Hook to the Baths

A charter is how most St. Thomas visitors see the Baths in a day: it goes any day the boat sails and has you back at Red Hook for dinner. Three operators publish a Baths day on their own pages as of October 22, 2026:

Stormy Pirates' price covers the guided walk and entry at the Baths, the open bar and snacks aboard, and it does not recommend the day for children under three. With customs and the gratuity it comes to about $420 a person before lunch, by our arithmetic, more than twice the ferry, for the Baths early in the day, White Bay in the afternoon and a boat that waits for you. For a private boat with its own hours, the St. Thomas charter directory lists who runs to the BVI and what fuel and customs add.

At the Baths: the taxi, the fee and the ladders

Taxis meet the boats at the Spanish Town jetty, and the ride south through The Valley to the National Parks Trust's lot at the top of the trail is 10 minutes by our measurement, the sand 4 minutes below on foot. Fares follow the government's taxi tariff, last revised in December 2022, so ask for the tariff fare and agree a pickup time before you walk down.

The Greater Baths Day Pass is $3 an adult and $2 a child, a few cents more online, per the National Parks Trust of the Virgin Islands as of October 22, 2026, and covers Devil's Bay, Stoney Bay and Spring Bay the same day; the park keeps 8:30 am to 4:30 pm. The trail between the boulders is the point of the place, and the Trust is plain about it: expect to crawl, climb ladders and wade, with steps and rope rails to hold. The dry scrub path from the lot to Devil's Bay is 10 minutes by our measurement, 15 by the Trust's. In a winter swell the Trust closes the moorings and discourages swimming, so a January day may be for the pools and the rocks rather than the snorkel.

On the Thursday boat the arithmetic is kind: ashore around 9:30 am by our reckoning, up the road by about ten, and back at the jetty by 2:15 pm for check-in, roughly four hours at the Baths. Top of the Baths, the restaurant beside the lot, does lunch, so the day needs no second taxi.

Passports and BVI customs at Spanish Town

Bring a passport. Virgin Gorda is in the British Virgin Islands, and the boat lands you at a border. Since March 2025 the Government of the Virgin Islands has required every visitor to hold a passport book, or a US passport card for a US traveler, for the whole stay, and its notice sets no child apart; the driver's license that gets you onto St. John gets nobody onto Virgin Gorda. The BVI Tourist Board asks you to fill in the Immigration and Customs online form before you arrive, which opens 72 hours ahead, and to show its receipt on a phone or on paper.

Spanish Town is a port of entry, and its Customs and Immigration office keeps Monday to Sunday, 8:30 am to 7 pm, on the BVI Tourist Board's list as of October 22, 2026, hours that cover both boats. Each visitor pays the BVI's $10 levy on arrival and a $20 departure tax by sea, the $30 the fares leave out.

Coming home, U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) takes the same book or card from a US citizen arriving by sea, and lets a US child under 16 through on a birth certificate; the BVI's rule is the stricter one, and it binds on the way in.

Planning a Virgin Gorda day trip from St. Thomas

Pick the day first, then the boat: a Thursday for the ferry and about four hours at the boulders, any other day for a charter at about twice the price and a fuller day with White Bay in it, a Saturday with Speedy's for the weekend. Cruise passengers check the return against the ship's all-aboard, since Inter Island does not publish when the Thursday boat is back at Red Hook and Stormy Pirates' 4:30 pm is later than many ships allow. The Baths are worth arranging the week around. Book the Thursday boat a day ahead, and be at Red Hook by 6:45 am.