Today wraps up a fun filled adventurous week in Guadeloupe. With all of our boat projects done, we rented a car and picked up our friend Erin at the airport. We spent the week in style, our first week off the boat since St. Thomas, over 3 months ago. The resort Erin picked was swanky, with a wonderfully refreshing pool, delicious restaurant and bar and beach front property. Not content to lounge around, we embarked on a week of "active vacationing." Every morning started off right, with fresh patisseries from the local bake shop.
The first day we drove the Route de Traversee, through the mountains of the western island of Guadeloupe. Yes, Guadeloupe, shaped like a butterfly, is technically two islands. The western one is called Basse Terre and is mountainous with rainforest lushness. The eastern one is called Grand Terre and is more flat, filled with farms and some nice beaches. The boat and resort are right in the middle, making exploration convenient. So, we worked our way to the leeward coast, which we had come down by Navigator, and rented kayaks to show Erin the awesome snorkeling we had discovered at the Jacques Cousteau underwater reserve. We spent the morning snorkeling and exploring Pigeon Island and kayaked back for lunch. We were rather ravaged from all the exercise, so the kayak proprietor recommended the "bokit" truck across the street. After Chris asserted himself as next in line (in French no less)...aside: the French have no concept of the queue, being "next in line" is highly debatable. Anyway, he brought forth ridiculicious bokits. Our new favorite sandwich. Its a fried dough sandwich, delivered warm, with ham and cheese inside. Unbelievably awesome.
That afternoon we worked our way north along the coast, hoping to check out the "house of cocoa" but it was mysteriously absent, so we continued on to the Botanical Gardens in Deshais (pronounced Day-ay). We took the macro photo lens and got some fun pictures of flowers close up, and marveled at the diversity of flora. The fauna were quite fun as well. The koi fish, the parakeets and the goats were all VERY eager to be fed and Kellee did her best to accommodate. She drew the birds like moths to a flame and ended up with several on her arm. The goats were fun to watch, especially the kids as they head butted each other for a better spot. We drove back to the hotel and enjoyed a nice creole meal, Chris' french gets better with each restaurant! We crashed pretty early after our fun filled day, a pattern destined to repeat itself for the rest of the week.
The next morning we got another early start and included sandwiches with our breakfast order from the bake shop and drove back to Basse Terre to conquer La Soufriere, the volcano summit and highest point in the lesser antillies. We were fogged in for some of the hike, but found a beautiful overlook just before the peak that was extremely lush and verdant. The peak was like walking on the surface of the moon, and the volcano is still venting poisonous gas. It got so bad our eyes started watering, so we evacuated the sulfurous peak to enjoy lunch at the previously mentioned overlook. It was fun to hear "bon appetite!" as other hikers passed by. After a successful climb down, we made our way over to the "Chutes de Carbet" which are two 300 foot waterfalls in line with each other. You can see both from the trail entrance, but since it was getting later in the day, we opted to just check out the close one, only a 30 minute hike. It looked like the river had taken out some of the trail, so we had to scramble up rocks in the river to get to the pool. It was surprisingly chilly! Not to pass up an opportunity, Erin and Kellee jumped in for a quick photo. By the time they got out, they were so cold, they were reminded of snowballs.... Dinner was quite the adventure. We were hoping for pizza, but apparently every pizza joint in Guadeloupe is closed on Mondays, so we opted for the place next door. Since the menu was not appetizing, but we had already sat down, so we got "accras boudin". It was interesting, like a mushy sausage, but tasted okay. Later, when we googled what it was and found out that we ate pork entrails and blood, a tsunami of mirth was expelled. Eck! Oh well, gotta try everything once right?
The next day's adventure was to circumnavigate Grand Terre, the eastern island. We first stopped in a beach town of Saint Anne and checked out the tents on the beach peddling wares. The day before we had introduced Erin to the local bananas and pineapples, which are much sweeter than what you find at home. She exclaimed, "these are WAY better than chiquita bananas (scoot scoot!)" so we stocked up at a market stall in Saint Anne. We also got some spices, a curry and another spice mix to use with chicken.
We continued out to the eastern point of the island, where the Atlantic meets the Caribbean and watched some heavy seas roll up to the cliffs and hiked up to the bluff to take in the view. The beach was hot, but a woman was selling sorbet (coconut or tropical) in the parking lot, and watching her make it in an old fashioned hand crank ice cream maker made it taste that much better. We stopped at two beaches on the way back from the eastern point, one on the Atlantic side with some ripping current, and another on the Caribbean side, nice and calm. We had seen a bokit truck on the drive out and stopped there for lunch...they were even better the second time around. We headed north to take in more sightseeing and made our way to the northern tip of the island, and what luck! another sorbet maker! This was the most amazing sorbet/ice cream we had ever had...ever. It must've had some coconut husk in it because it tasted so fresh, like the coconut had been in the tree that morning...probably not too far from the truth! We picked up some groceries on the way back and ate home made chicken curry on the Navigator for dinner.
Wednesday's plan was to try kitesurfing, but unfortunately, the trades had been flukey for the past couple of days and looked like they were going to remain so, so no lesson to be had. We opted to instead go back to the Chutes de Carbet and tackle the first falls, a grueling hike but well worth the effort. The waterfall was magnificent, but the pool was bright orange from the volcano runoff, so we just stuck our feet in to cool off. We had brought along baguette sandwiches again and thoroughly enjoyed them beside the running river. We definitely tired ourselves out on that hike, enjoyed a dip in the pool when we got back to the hotel and finally got some pizza for dinner. They don't use mozzarella, but instead a cheese called "emmental" which is more like swiss, but it was thin crust and very yummy.
Thursday we took Erin sailing to a nearby cay, did some snorkeling, checked out the island and enjoyed the afternoon on the boat. We tried the spice we had bought on some chicken and it was awesome, and watched the sunset over the mountains from at anchor. We dinghyed back to the marina and are at the hotel for the last night. Tomorrow we'll lounge by the pool for the morning, hit up the boulangerie one last time to stock up on baguette sandwiches and patissieres and seeing Erin safely back home. We'll fuel up on Saturday morning and head toward Le Saintes, a group of small islands just off the coast of Guadeloupe. From there we'll probably head to Martinique, the last of the French islands and then back track to Dominica. Despite the congregation of clutzy people, there were no more miracles on the Hudson. This week has been so much fun, exploring a beautiful island and catching up with a great friend.
After saying goodbye to Guadeloupe, we sailed over to Les Saintes, a small archipelago south of Guadeloupe, for a couple days of sightseeing before heading out into the Caribbean Sea again.
The weather has been great, although it is a bit rolly in the anchorage here. Tomorrow we head out to sea for an overnight transit of about 80 miles to the other major French island in the region, Martinique. We'll spend about 10 days there, then backtrack to the independent nation of Dominica (said to be a natural wonder), for some more hiking/climbing and the visit of our friend Heather. 
