The West Coast of Guadeloupe
07 March 2010 | West of Guadeloupe, French West Indies
Graham
Time had come to leave The Saintes, so an earlyish departure at 7-30 am saw us heading northwest towards the southwest corner of Guadeloupe before enroute north towards Deshaies via the Cousteau Marine National Park, a place I was particularly keen to visit being a keen SCUBA diver. After a few hours sailing, the wind dropped to less than 5 knots, so we were motorsailing (sailing but with the engine on to assist). This came as no big surprise after looking at the wind direction picture, shown above, that we use for sailing. The sea started picking up and before long, there was a large following swell coming in from the southwest, quite unusual for this area. As we approached Pigeon Island where we had planned to stop for lunch and do some snorkeling, the swell was between 1.5 and 2 metres, not much for ocean sailing, but for snorkeling....? I don't think so! The anchorage was empty of dive boats as we continued on past, taking in the scenery around Jacques Cousteau's famous marine park, and heading on north towards Deshaies where we planned on stopping the night before the 50 Nm trip to Antigua. This was beginning to become a concern as the anchorage at Deshaies is open to the west, and hence the southwest, where the swell was coming from. As we arrived at about 4 pm, life did not look too rosey; the anchorage was packed, boats were at all angles and swinging very close to one another, and there was s swell coming into the bay. The wind was blowing the boats onto the shore, not good, and known as a 'lee shore' in sailing terminology and to be avoided at all costs when anchoring. You do not generally anchor near a lee shore for safety reasons. But, we either anchored here with the other 50 boats, or carried on another 50 Nm to Antigua in the dark. We stopped and let down the anchor, came to a stop, put the kettle on, and had dinner. All appeared well so far. I set the anchor alarm on the GPS receiver to ON. This tells us if we move more than a certain distance in the night and starts beeping to wake you up, telling you politely "...it may be a good idea to check your anchor...". So off to sleep until tomorrow...