Sunday 10 April 2016

Guadeloupe - Les Saintes to Deshaies

Hi everyone,
Today we had a pretty good sail from Les Saintes off the south side of Guadeloupe to Deshaies on the NW side of the main island of Guadeloupe.  The 34nm passage took a little over 6 hours of which we had to motor for 2 hours due to lack of wind.  Here are the usual plots...

Zen Again Track
Zen Again Speed Over Ground
We had a great sail across the channel between Les Saintes and the main island, with a NW current helping us along.  Once in the lee of the main island the wind was very variable.  Brief rain showers came over with wind ahead of them and nothing behind them.  Towards the northern end of the main island we had 1 knot of current running against us.

The island's leeward side is quite scenic with lots of green hills and a number of settlements from villages to small towns.  The rain showers love to pour rain over the island, often leaving little to fall on those sailing to leeward.

Guadeloupe's leeward shore
We motored through one large calm area, sailed again for a while and then motored into Deshaies.  It seems a pretty little town and is at the head of a quite well protected bay.  The wind funnels through but the swell seems to stay away.  There are some moorings here but most of the 40 or so yachts here this afternoon are anchored.  We are anchored in 10m over sand at 16 18.36N 061 47.91W.

View of Deshaies from Zen Again at anchor
We don't expect to go ashore here.  We'll spend the afternoon aboard taking it easy and watching more big yachts coming in to anchor.  We're certainly a pocket cruiser amongst this lot!  Some very pretty boats here.

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