Guadeloupe is known by the Caribs as Karukera; the island of pretty waters, has a population of 330,000 people and belongs to France. Tourism, sugar cane and Rum are the main industries. As in France, shopping hours are from 8-noon and 1500-1730, with a two to three hour break in the afternoon. EVERYTHING closes in the afternoon. Its hard to get used to. One place there is in EVERY town is a local market. This I like.
Besides the delightful time we spent in The Saints, Guadeloupe is unremarkable. It would not be a place we would set a destination to visit, the downtown Point a Pitre is dirty and busy, its typically French. Besides the chocolate croissants and beautiful baguettes, I was not that impressed.
The best thing we found so far in Guadeloupe is that you can buy RUM in a 5 Liter box!!!
We moved from the city of PP to a little delightful island for the night, beautiful white sand beach and Darren and I snorkeld in 2 meters of water for about a quarter mile to the little island for a beer.
The small town of Deshaies, on the Northern West shore was a delightful little town, with charm and character, where we did our check out of Guadeloupe to make our passage to Antigua.
We did have a delightful anchorage and fantastic dive on our way northward at Pigeon Island off the western coast of Guadeloupe. Pigeon Island is a Jacques Cousteau National Park. We had a 45 minute dive for our first dive on FMD in crystal clear waters full of fish, rocks, coral of all types, and tons of sea creatures. It was a fantastic dive, follow this link to see the footage.
Tomorrow morning we leave for Antigua to make our way northward. Pam is scheduled to join us about the 15th, and we need to get to St Marten to greet her. It will be nice to have another woman on board.