Guadeloupe

Monday 20th January
At 1800 we lifted the anchor for our sail to Îles des Saintes. The journey was about 75 nm and rather than arrive at a new place when the sun had gone down we decided to night sail and arrive as the sun rose.
We had a good sail across to Dominica and then slowed down in the lee of the island. We were not in a rush and sailed slowly or motored slowly up the west side of the island. Once out of the shadow of the island the wind picked up again and Mirabella picked up speed. We were racing along at over 7 knots and even reduced the sails as we did not want to arrive in the dark. We arrived off Îles Des Saintes just as the sun rose.

The Saintes

Wednesday 22nd January
When we arrived at Boug Des Saintes we originally picked up a buoy. Always keen to keep the costs down we moved to Tete Rouge to anchor.

Thursday 23rd January
The plan for the day was to hire electric bikes and explore the island but we were just a bit late and all the bikes had just gone. So instead we walked across the island, spent a bit of time on the beach and then came back and walked up to the castle.

Friday 24th January
Sailed to St Louis on Marie Galante

Saturday 25th

Our next stop was Petite Terre, where we had planned to meet RaLa, another boat. Although not far, we wanted to get there around 10, so set off just before the sun rose. The entrance was over a shallow spit and we entered carefully, later in the day the waves started to break over the spit and it was harder for boats to leave without timing it carefully.

RaLa at Petite Terre

Iguana on Petit Terre 

Petite Terre was supposed to be a good place for snorkelling, so we were disappointed to see very little in the water during our morning swim. This changed in the afternoon when we swam with turtles and had fish well over a metre long under our boat plus some yellow tail tuna. It was a shame we were in a national park or the fishing lines would have been out.

Sunday 26th
The plan for the day was to Sail to  La Désirade, but it was too shallow for Rala to get in, so we motored to Sainte Francois.

Tuesday 28th
We said good bye to RaLa and Headed to  Petite Harve where we stopped for lunch and made some water. After lunch we headed to Îlet Au Gosier.

Îlet Du Gosier 

Thursday 30th
To Pointe-à-Pitre for fuel.
Sailed to Basse Terre, anchored south of Marina Sud Ancrage.

Friday 31st
Sailed to Pigeon Island.
This was the best place for snorkelling so far, lots of colourful fish and turtles. Sue was not keen when approached by large barracuda and raced back to the boat!

Saturday 1st February
Our next stop, Deshaies was where they film some of ‘Death in Paradise’. A great place to watch the pelicans dive.
We also did a river walk/scramble through the rain forest.