Pigeon Island Guadeloupe

Leaving Îles des Saintes

To give us time at Pigeon Island, we left Îles des Saintes at 0600hrs on Tuesday 27 March and headed north up the western side of Guadeloupe.

Between the islands we caught a rather large Spanish Mackerel which I thought that we were going to keep. However, once Nicky had done a quick check on areas that might have ciguatera we decided to throw it back alive rather than risk poisoning anyone.

La Soufriere, Basse Terre

Little Tunny

The west side of Guadeloupe, Basse Terre, has an active volcano, La Soufriere, of which we had good views as we tracked north. A little further on we caught a small tunny. They can grow to be up to 1.2metres long, so we decided that this small one would be safe to eat for dinner.

Pigeon Island

Half way up the western side of Guadeloupe is Pigeon Island and the Cousteau underwater park. The early start meant that we had had little to no wind for the 24-mile passage so, having motored the whole way, by 1015hrs we had found a suitable anchorage in the bay opposite the island and were ready to explore the marine park.

The waters around the island are a no-anchoring zone and while there are day-use moorings close off Pigeon Island they are not designed for boats the size of BV, hence our choice of anchorage. Unfortunately, that left us with a ½ mile dinghy ride across to the underwater park which was something of a concern once again. But, by taking it slowly (again!) we got across and secured the dinghy to one of the short stay buoys just to the west of the channel between Pigeon Island and its small off-lying rock, Petit Îlet. Donning our snorkelling gear and rolling over the side, we were immediately rewarded with the sight of a myriad reef fish.

Stoplight parrot fish

We finned around near the dinghy mooring area for a while, enjoying the shoals of small fish and the lazily cruising barracuda that seemed to enjoy tailing Nicky. We then headed west, across the shallows between the islands and out into deeper water on the other side. We worked our way along some of the south side of Pigeon Island there was relatively little to see though and quite a lot of Sargasso weed so we turned back to Petit Îlet. The west and south sides of the rocky islet were much more interesting with the rocky shore dropping almost straight down giving us a deep wall to snorkel up and down.

Charlotte and Nicky diving down to about 7 metres to look at the sea wall close up

There was less to see near the surface than I had expected but we all dived down to about 7 metres to get a closer look at the lower part of the wall, particularly under the rocky shelves where we saw fish hiding. As we pottered back toward the dinghy we saw more shoals of reef fish and Nicky’s barracuda picked up her tail again. Somewhere around Pigeon Island is an underwater statue of Jacques Cousteau but we didn’t find it – one for next time! After about an hour we headed back to BV and from her Charlotte and I braved the shoal of small stinging jellyfish to search for turtles who graze on the seagrass in the middle of the bay. We were fortunate enough to see 6 different turtles, mostly grazing on the seabed, and we also saw one swimming up to the surface to breathe. Another holiday wishlist item, swimming with turtles, ticked off by Charlotte.

As well as snorkelling around Pigeon Island, Nicky and I also took the opportunity to get some last food items from the French supermarkets close by. We left Charlotte on board relaxing in the afternoon sun whilst we did a quick dash around the Carrefour and Leader Price stores [Ed: note, not a quick dash ashore in our long-suffering tender!]. We also found an excellent boulangerie/patisserie where we bought what we expected to be our last decent loaf of bread for a very long time – we were not wrong! Having stocked up on goodies, we retired back to BV for sundowners before an early start (yes, again!) for our 50-mile passage north to Antigua. Murray and Cate from Cool Changejoined us for rum punches on BV. They had seen us in The Saintes and, coincidentally, had also come up to Pigeon Island and anchored not too far from us. We heard how they were on their way towards New Zealand, and that they knew about us having met Philip and Claudia on Bruno’s Girl. It sometimes seems that the sailing community is very small!

Pigeon Island, Guadeloupe

Îles des Saintes Guadeloupe

Charlotte sailing us towards Îles des Saintes

As pretty as Îlet de Gosier was, having anchored off it for the night, we wanted to move on to explore some of the islands we had told Charlotte we would visit during her stay with us. The first group on that list was LesÎles des Saintes, just a few miles to the southwest of Guadeloupe.

Sailing past Basse-Terre (L) and approaching Bourg des Saintes

Secured to a mooring buoy off Bourg des Saintes

We left at 0930 for the 21-mile passage with a nice 10-15 knot wind from the east. It was all very civilised and BV was sufficiently level for Charlotte to begin some early panic tanning up on the foredeck.

We made reasonable time and arrived between Îlet de Cabrit and the main island of Terre d’en Hautjust before 1300hrs. Here we were lucky enough to find an available mooring buoy to secure to, tucked into the corner of the bay where we were out of the swell. There are large mooring fields in many of the bays around The Saintes and anchoring is only permitted outside them. Unsurprisingly, the mooring fields are located in the most protected, and usually the shallowest, parts of the bays so anchoring off can result in a very long dinghy ride ashore and a rolly night’s sleep.

Since we had arrived on Sunday lunchtime, we assumed that everything ashore in Bourg des Saintes would be closed. Instead, we hopped in the dinghy and puttered across to the southern tip of Îlet a Cabrit where our pilot book assured us the snorkelling was good. The outboard engine was still very sick after the impeller failure and overheating incident in Dominica, despite my ministrations in Pointe Á Pitre. The last thing we wanted at this stage was for the engine to overheat again, forcing us to row with 3 people in the dinghy.

Happily, it got us to the island [Ed: and back again later] and we had a lovely hour snorkelling around some interesting rock and coral formations, with a good number of fish to see too. By the time we returned to BV it was surprisingly late but there’s always plenty of time for rum punch sundowners, particularly when you have friends in the anchorage, and we had invited Tom and Pam (and McDuff, their dog) from Stealin’ Timeover for a catch-up when we had seen them on a mooring not too far from us. As ever, the rum and the conversation flowed and all too soon it was much later than any of us had planned!

Views over the mooring field (above) and towards Bourg des Saintes

In the morning we went ashore; slowly again for obvious reasons! Terre d’en Haut is a small island, just 3 miles by 2 miles, perfect for a morning walk and explore whilst the outboard cooled off from its exertions.

Bourg des Saintes’ main street

Bourg des Saintes is a delightful little holiday town and is the main populated area on the islands. It’s full of little boutique shops and restaurants, all brightly coloured in the Caribbean style. We had 2 admin tasks to do in the ‘metropolis’: buy some bread and complete the clearance process for leaving the Guadeloupe islands. The latter was done very quickly at a computer in Les Saintes Multiservices; the bread took a little more of a walk.

The island is blessed with some lovely beaches and the whole scene thrilled Charlotte who was very excited to be in the Caribbean. But she also added to our tasks ashore because she wanted to see some iguanas. Kaia and Kjell on 2Khad already visited Terre d’en Haut and, when we had met them at Pointe ÀPitre, they had told us about an area where we might find some. Seeing iguanas close up had immediately become one of Charlotte’s ‘must do’ holiday activities.

As briefed by Kaia and Kjell, we walked up the ridgeline to the east of the town and found the patch of scrub ground they had described. Sure enough, almost immediately we spotted 3 iguanas creeping about.

Leaving Bourg des Saintes and anchored off Pain de Sucre

With iguanas ticked off the holiday sightseeing wishlist and the departure paperwork completed, we moved onto the next holiday wishlist task; improving Charlotte’s snorkelling technique. A mile to the west of Bourg des Saintes, at the tip of the bay there is a distinctive headland called Pain du Sucre, with clearly defined basalt columns on its northwest side and good snorkelling around its base. The bay just to the south is deep but has about 15 mooring laid in it and we had hoped to pick up one of them; sadly, they were all full. We thought that we were in luck when a yacht moved off but the crew left their dinghy attached to the buoy, ‘reserving’ it for when they came back from a day sail, which we thought was rather selfish. Huffing somewhat, we anchored outside the buoyed off mooring field instead and had a surprisingly tranquil night. Later on, a motor yacht turned up and obviously thought the same as us about the dinghy. Being French, he just moored up to the buoy anyway!

Charlotte had done plenty of snorkelling before but following the previous day’s swim said that she had struggled to overcome her natural buoyancy when trying to dive down and had found that her ears hurt if she swam down more than just a couple of metres. So we lent her a weight belt to trial to see if it helped with the buoyancy and also explained how she could balance the pressure in her ears by holding her nose and blowing gently as she dived down. Both proved a great success and in next to no time she was happily diving down to 6 metres to take a closer look at the corals and fish.

It was a good snorkelling site with lots of colourful soft and hard corals to look at.

There were also lots of small reef fish…

… including this balloon fish, which we found hiding in a large yellow barrel sponge and which we all agreed looked a lot like ET.

We also saw some small spiny lobsters and a group of reef squid with pulsing coloured spots on their skin. All in all, there was plenty to see, far more so than in most of the places Charlotte had snorkelled in Greece and she was hugely enthused by the extra sealife you can see in the Caribbean.

After over an hour of fun, we retreated back aboard BV to discuss where we would go next. Our clearance gave us 48 hours to leave Guadeloupe and so we decided that we would start early in the morning and head around the west side of Guadeloupe to another area reported to have good snorkelling, Pigeon Island.

Îles des Saintes, Guadeloupe

Pointe À Pitre Guadeloupe (Part 2)

Museum about slavery (L) next to the empty anchorage by the town

The news from the airline was that Charlotte’s bag would be in Guadeloupe the following day arriving mid-afternoon. That scuppered our plans to head off in BV first thing in the morning and so, instead, Charlotte and I hatched a plan to visit Pointe ÀPitre town in the morning.

The bus ride was very easy to get us into town but because of the one-way system we needed to keep our eyes open for the return trip bus stop. Walking from where the bus dropped us off we passed the empty anchorage that Nicky and I had chosen not to use; probably just as well because it looked like work was being done on the harbour wall and BV might have been in the way.

Charlotte and I got our first close-up look at a pelican which was sitting on the back of a fishing boat right beside the market. Smart bird; I suspect there were plenty of scraps to eat from the fish stalls!

Quai de la Darse market hall

The fish stalls were right beside the Quai de la Darse market hall. We dallied a little enjoying the vibrant colours and looking all of the fabulous fresh fruit and vegetables on offer. It was Charlotte’s first visit to the Caribbean and so it was interesting for her to see all of the different produce sold here, many of which just aren’t available in the UK. We spotted some okra which Nicky and I had failed to find during our mega-food shop the previous day, so we bought some before moving on to the main part of town.

Street stalls and music (L) The marché central couvert (R)

The side streets were lively and full of music. There was a cruise ship moored by the town and so, as well as lots of stalls selling souvenirs, we watched a fabulous drumming band play in the street. A little further on we came across another square with the central covered market. Brightly coloured towels, clothes and potent looking rum infusions were on sale, as well as various fiery hot sauces to go with the local food.

The Spiny Lobster bar with more live music

Just beside the covered market we spotted the Spiny Lobster bar. It too had a live band playing and so everywhere we had gone so far in Pointe ÀPitre was a foot-tapping experience. Too early for a stop, we continued our explorations and a couple of blocks further on came face to face with the cruise ship. They are not my idea of a fun holiday but we were grateful that we were also able to benefit from the town’s efforts to make the cruise ship passengers feel welcome.

L’Eglise St Pierre et St Paul

Taking a wide arcing clockwise route we found ourselves in Place Gourbeyre dominated by the neo-classical L’Eglise de St Pierre et St Paul. Slightly reminiscent of the covered market, inside the church was full of riveted steel girders and uprights rather than the stone pillars you would have expected from the exterior. This metal frame construction was made popular by Gustave Eiffel, of Eiffel Tower fame, as a method to try to make buildings hurricane and earthquake resistant. Certainly this church seems to have survived as long as the Eiffel Tower and so I guess the building philosophy works.

Place de La Victoire surrounded by colonial buildings

On our circuitous route back to the Spiny Lobster bar we found ourselves in the Place de la Victoire, at the opposite end to the Quai de la Darse where we had started. Surrounded by old colonial buildings it certainly had a pleasant atmosphere now but during France’s transition to a republic, the square had apparently been the location for the island’s guillotine, used to dispatch any local aristocrats opposed to the new, revolutionary French government.

Pointe ÀPitre was great to wander around and it was lovely to see so many examples of French Caribbean architecture, but Charlotte and I also really liked the style of the plainer wooden homes tucked away in the back streets which had been made more fun by the application of some colourful paint and carefully tended flowers.

We completed our circuit of the town and, as expected, found the Spiny Lobster to be a good spot from which to watch the world go by whilst enjoying a cool beer. The only slight disappointment was that we timed our beer stop just as the live band also stopped for a break! We sipped our beers slowly in the hope that they would start playing again but had no such luck. With one eye on the clock with a view to picking up Charlotte’s bag, we wandered back to the corner of Place de la Victoire. This was an important place for us because not only did it have our bus stop for getting back to the marina, it also had an ice cream parlour…… and jolly good ice creams they served up too!

Back at BV we had a bit of a song and dance getting Charlotte’s bag back. We knew the time that the flight with the bag had landed but, a couple of hours later, we had heard nothing from the airline and our phone calls went unanswered [Ed: presumably because all the airline staff were busy reuniting passengers with bags]. So Charlotte and I hopped into a taxi and went up to the airport to recover the missing bag. Exactly as you would expect in a comedy, we had no sooner arrived at the airport than Charlotte’s phone sprang into life with the message that her bag had just been delivered to the marina office! Well, at least we’d boosted the local economy by funding two very pleasant but over-priced taxi rides.

Ilet du Gosier

With Charlotte reunited with her luggage and an overall feeling that we had been in port far too long, we decided that a late afternoon move to a small Caribbean island was the appropriate move, especially given that Charlotte was on holiday. A couple of evenings previously we had had drinks with Kaia and Kjell on 2K(a few moorings up from us in the marina) and had discovered that they were also in the marina to pick up family guests whose flights had also been delayed by the Air France strikes – there had been lots in common to discuss. As a part of those discussions they had told us about Ilet de Gosier. Just a few miles to the east, close outside the entrance to Pointe ÀPitre’s river, it was exactly what we needed.

Sunset over Basse-Terre anchored off Ilet de Gosier

So, after a very short motor, we escaped from the marina environment and got ourselves to a proper Caribbean anchorage complete with the palm tree coveredIlet de Gosier in one direction and an amazingly fiery sunset to the west over Basse-Terre. Charlotte even wore her crazy holiday Caribbean shirt for sundowners which matched the sunset perfectly. The 24 hour delay in retrieving her bag was a frustration but, with everything resolved, we’d had the benefit of a fab excursion aroundPointe ÀPitre and a lovely evening anchored off Ilet de Gosier, neither of which we had planned to do.

Pointe ÀPitre, Guadeloupe

Pointe À Pitre Guadeloupe (Part 1)

There is a large gap in the Blog entries. The entries for Ste Pierre Bay and Dominica I think have too many pictures in them and so they have not uploaded properly with the poor or non-existent internet we’ve been experiencing over the last couple of weeks. I’ll rework them and hopefully you will see them posted soon. 

We left Prince Rupert Bay on Dominica at 0800hrs on 20 March to continue on north. We could easily have spent much longer exploring Dominica but we now had a deadline and had to get to Guadeloupe to meet up with Charlotte, my daughter, who would be flying in from the UK to join us for 3 weeks.

Passing the Îles des Saintes   

The passage to Guadeloupe was 40 miles of great sailing and on the way we passed the Îles des Saintes. These are reported to be beautiful and most people normally stop there on their way to Guadeloupe from Dominica. We, however, had decided that it would be better to pick up Charlotte first and then route back to ‘The Saintes’ so that she could enjoy visiting them too.

Basse Terre   

Guadeloupe is essentially 2 islands, very close together, shaped like a butterfly. The westerly wing is Basse Terre where the land has much more mountainous volcanic peaks. The eastern wing, Grande Terre, is almost flat. Between the 2 is the Rivière Salée passage which you used to be able to navigate through in a yacht, during the night when they were prepared the lift the bridges for our masts to pass. Unfortunately, now the roads are deemed to be too busy for that and so yachts have to sail all the way around the wings of the island to progress north.

Hotel Fleur Depée   

The harbour that we were aiming for, Pointe à Pitre, is in the entrance to this passage. As we approached, out to our right was a beach resort centred around the Hotel Fleur Depée.

Entrance to the Rivière Salée passage   

Ahead we could see the more industrial looking container port on the west side of the entrance. We navigated our way along the entrance channel, past the marina on our right and looked for a suitable anchorage.

The careenage anchorage and, just beyond, the Slavery Museum (bottom)   

There were 3 options, one on the west side of the river, one tucked close into the town and the final option was just outside the entrance to the marina lagoons by Careenage Bay. Our first choice, the one by the town, was suspiciously empty of anchored yachts and it looked like dredging work was going on in that bay. Having not tested our outboard after its maintenance work, we were reluctant to commit ourselves to a long dinghy ride right across the river to get into complete arrival paperwork and visit the shops. So, we joined the group of other yachts roughly anchored by Careenage Bay. That put us close to an unusual looking building which we discovered is the museum about slavery. We dropped our anchor at 1400hrs and set about inflating our dinghy to go ashore to the marina office to complete the arrivals process for Guadeloupe.

It wasn’t very far in to the marina office but it was enough to let us know that all was still not well with the outboard motor. Despite having picked out all of the bits of broken impeller we could find when it was replaced the previous evening, the cooling water flow was restricted and the engine was overheating. We got the arrivals procedure completed, which is very easily done on French islands using a dedicated computer often located in a marina or bar (very French!) and then contemplated our shopping trip. This was most easily done using the dinghy to get as close as possible before embarking on a 1km hike. The dinghy trip was 2½km to get up to the corner of the lagoon, more than our outboard could cope with, and so we got lots of exercise rowing all the way there. The hike back, laden down with heavy rucksacks full of victualling goodies, was equally good exercise and by evening, having rowed 5km, we felt that we had definitely earned our sundowners drinks.

In the morning the anchorage gave us a grandstand view of the cruise ships arriving, though it was slightly disconcerting when they stopped right next to us and turned to reverse into their mooring; very much a close up view!

News from Charlotte was not great. The French airline she was flying out with had planned a strike on the day that she was travelling. In the end her flight was cancelled twice, each time requiring her to spend several hours on the telephone negotiating to still fly out on the same day.

BV on the visitors’ pontoon in Bas du Fort Marina   

Content that Charlotte might actually get out to us on 23 March and recognising that in its current state, the outboard was not up to shuttling back and forth to pick up Charlotte, we moved into the marina on 22 March. That gave us the opportunity to give BV a good hose down as part of the ‘clean for guests’ procedure as well as using the powerful hose jet to try to flush out the outboard motor so that it would be able to stutter on for a few more islands, perhaps longer.

In the evening we joined Kaia and Kjell on their yacht 2K. We hadn’t seen then since Augustin’s party in Gran Canaria and so it was lovely to hear about their Atlantic crossing and pick up some top tips for the Caribbean Islands further north from where they had just come.

Mid-afternoon on 23^rd March Charlotte arrived at Pointe à Pitre airport. Unfortunately, our plan to head off to the Îles des Saintes first thing in the morning was scuppered because Charlotte’s hold luggage was still in Paris having never made it onto the plane. Having asked for the bag to be delivered to the marina the following afternoon, we spent the rest of the day shopping for essentials for Charlotte and then enjoyed a ‘welcome to the Caribbean’ meal with her in one of the restaurants close to the marina.

Pointe à Pitre, Guadeloupe