Iles des Saintes and Guadeloupe

A temporary break in the weather appeared, so we dropped our mooring in Dominica and headed off to the Saintes, a quick 3 1/2 hour sail north. We picked up a mooring ball in the quaint anchorage just off the only town on Terre de Haut… Bourg des Saintes. We were in France once again! Dinner out every night and lots of wine shopping on the agenda! The Saintes are another one of our favorite island groups of the Eastern Caribbean and are considered part of France. Bourg des Saintes is an adorable seaside town, sparkling clean and picturesque with red roofs, balconies, gingerbread and colorful fishing boats.

We rented bikes and spent one day exploring all of the beaches and attractions of the Saintes. Thank goodness the bikes had electric boost, or we wouldn’t have made it!

The view from on top of Fort Napoleon. Mira is a tiny speck in the anchorage.

The prettiest beach was Plage de Pompierre.

The locals go everywhere on their scooters – this was one of the more unusual passengers that we saw 🙂

Sadly, more unfavorable weather and strong northerly swells were headed in – so we were forced to cut our Saintes visit short. Our goal was to take shelter in a safe southern facing harbor within the next two days. Off we headed on a 7 hour sail to the northwest corner of Guadeloupe to Deshaies, a town that was a perfect stopping off point for our next long sail. It would be 42 nm to Falmouth Harbour which is on the southern coast of Antigua and well protected – a perfect spot to wait out the next predicted bit of bad weather.