We left Deshaies not long after first light and enjoyed a sail of several parts down the Guadeloupe coast and across to the Saintes. The butterfly-shaped island of Guadeloupe has several big extinct volcanoes along its length, which create gusting and swirling winds. One minute you are in 10 kts with sails flogging, and the next minute it’s 25 kts and you’re on your side – so lots of reefing and un-reefing to keep us busy. As we rounded the south of the island and hit the open channel we ran into a 35 kts squall, so lots more activity before it settled into a fine upwind sail over to Isles des Saintes. We are now comfortably tied to one of the many mooring balls in the bay, surrounded by a ring of green, mountainous islands.

We have been in here before and are so happy to come back. It is just a really lovely place to visit. Cutsey little town with nice walks, waterside bars and restaurants, lots of day trippers on buggies or electric bikes but the tourism is relatively low-key. The French do this well. K particularly likes the local specialities: accra, which are cod fritters served with creole sauce, and tourments d’amour, which are a sort of exotic bakewell tart.

Today we climbed the hill to Fort Napoleon for a look around and the usual history lesson on the struggles between the English and the French (not the Scots, I may say). Today’s photo is of the village and bay from the fort (can you see Barracuda?). Then we walked on over to a palm fringed beach on the NW side of the island for some quiet time, before wandering back over the island to the village for provisions and home. We could happily spend more time here, but tomorrow we will head to another of our favourites: Dominica.

230 nm to Grenada.