Deishaies - Guadeloupe

Stargazer of Southampton
Susie and Adam (both think they are skipper)
Sat 5 Mar 2011 20:29
04:03.11, 16:18.49N 61:47.93W
 
Decided to sail around the leeward coast of Guadeloupe so set off early to get up to Deishaies which is the perfect springing off point for Antigua - had a good sail and managed to sail most of the way even though we lost the wind once in the lee of the mountains.  Amazed by the number of turtles out here - we passed 3 sailing.  Passed by Pigeon island which is where the Cousteau marine reserve is.. . . but managed not to stop despite being tempted
 
Anchored in a very pretty little bay with the fishing village of Deishaies - the anchorage was really busy so we looked around for a spot and found one (we thought) once we had anchored the guy in the boat next door politely told us that his anchor was where we were. . . there was no wind so the boats were just floating about all over and you just can't tell where the anchors go.  we thought we would see how it went . . .it all went fine until we were having dinner at about 9pm when the wind suddenly appeared and the other boat started to get dangerously close - it was a rapid engine on and reverse hoping we could drag the anchor back and prevent a horrible crunching noise of two yachts crashing. . . luckily the holding isn't great and the anchor dragged back so we reset it a safe hundred metres back, but had bit of a stressful night as the anchor dragged itself again after another couple of hours and we ended up in deeper water than we really would anchor in - we decided if it dragged one more time then we would stuff sleeping over at Deishaies and just leave and sail through the night to Antigua. . . but it didn't budge again so at least we got a few hours sleep! 
 
 
A view of the Western isand of Guadeloupe (Basse Terre) as we sailed by
 
 
Cliffs on the approach to Deishaies