Fish Bay Gut
Excerpted
from St. John Off The Beaten Track
The terrain of St. John is mostly mountainous. Between the mountains are valleys. When it rains, water seeks its lowest level, flows and seeps down the hillsides of the valleys, and makes its way down toward the sea.
In the Virgin Islands these rain-collecting temporary valley streams are called guts.
When it rains hard, water rushes down the guts taking with it soil and sediment that have collected during dry periods. The bottoms of the guts are left as bare rocks.
Along the edges of the guts, the plant life grows profusely due to the abundance of water available to them. These gut environments are usually tropical and jungle-like.
Some of the most accessible and beautiful guts are in the Fish Bay area. Most often hiked are the Fish Bay and Battery Guts, which come together at an elevation of about 200 feet in the Fish Bay Valley.
The gut environment is dynamic and changes considerably depending upon the amount of rainfall and the time of year.
The Fish Bay and Battery Guts, along with the Living Gut in Reef Bay and the Guinea Gut, are the only south side guts that have some degree of permanent water.
The freshwater pools contain fish whose eggs can lie dormant for years at a time when the pools dry up. They will hatch when there is sufficient rainfall to support life in the pool.
There are also freshwater crabs that will scurry for shelter when they see someone approach, and crayfish that look like little Maine lobsters. Colorful dragonflies often hover above the pools. Here the forest is alive with the buzzing of bees and the songs of birds attracted to the water in the pools.
The Fish Bay Gut is fed by the Battery Gut, which intersects about a quarter mile up from the bridge on the Fish Bay Road.
The Battery Gut is the western (left) fork and continues up alongside the Gifft Hill Valley, where it begins in the vicinity of Neptune Richard's Laundromat. On the way it passes the Pine Peace School where there is an exit trail.
About 0.1 mile up the Battery Gut from the intersection is a seventy-foot high waterfall. There are fresh water pools on the top and bottom of the cliff.
During the slave rebellion of 1733 the Free Negro Corps led by Mingo Tamarin pursued a party of rebellious slaves down the gut from Beverhoudtsberg Plantation where a battle, which was then called a batterie, was fought at the bottom of the high waterfall. The Battery Gut was named after this battle.
At the intersection of the two guts the eastern (right) branch is the Fish Bay Gut, which leads to Centerline Road running for a time alongside the old L'Esperance Road. There are several opportunities along the way to access the L'Esperance Road before climbing through the increasingly thick underbrush as you approach the upper levels of the valley and Centerline Road. The rarely traveled L'Esperance Road will provide much easier access to Centerline Road and civilization.
The Fish Bay Gut has several fresh water pools as well as a beautiful waterfall that descends much more gradually than the Battery Gut waterfall.
(If you are tempted to explore these guts remember that they are difficult and challenging hikes and should only be undertaken by those in good physical condition and who possess knowledge of rock scrambling techniques. It is extremely important to exercise the utmost caution. The rocks may be slippery and the ways out of the gut and back to civilization are limited. Do not attempt this [or any] hike alone!)