Who’s peeking out from under the stairway, calling a name that’s lighter than air,

Who’s bending down to give me a rainbow….everyone knows it’s…

Guadeloupe is little piece of France plunked right down in the middle of the Caribbean Islands. It has a personality distinctly French and both Jim and I agree; it is our favorite Island.

We first made landfall on this epicurean Mecca, at an anchorage off of a small fishing village called Deshaies (pronounced day hey, like HEY…how’s your DAY? Or got any HAY toDAY?) The cruising guide we use describes Deshaies as a delightful anchorage with great French restaurants and good holding; which means your anchor will not drag, which means you won’t wake up in the middle of the night, look our your portal (window) and see right into the portal of a boat that used to be 100 yards behind you. Our Northern Virginia readers are used to looking out their windows and into the windows of their neighbors. It’s not nearly as acceptable for this to happen on boats. The guide also mentions in passing that the anchorage has one little quirk caused by the position of the hills behind the village. They form a saddle which funnels the wind blowing over the north eastern part of the island right through Deshaies. I bet if I look up Deshaies in a French dictionary, I’ll find that it means windy as a sombitch, as in, Got any HAY toDAY? Hell no, it all blew away. For as windy as it was, the cruising guide should have gone into a bit more detail. We had no idea what was in store for us.

Another reason Jim and I love the French islands is that they LOVE dogs. Unlike the British islands, where rumor has it, they make pies out of them. Remember Sweeney Todd? He started with cats then moved to dogs and he was British. I think I’ve adequately made my point. So, with the dogs in the dinghy, and a light but suspiciously increasing September breeze blowing, Jim and I headed for “the cute fishing village” in search of an authentic French meal served in a restaurant where we would have no problem dining with our dogs.

Because it was September, a month fraught with hurricane possibilities, and every other sane sailor was way further south than we were, almost all of the restaurants in Deshaies were closed. We did happen upon a place that looked inviting. I asked the hostess in my most proficient French if we could dine with our dogs. She replied in a French that was both spoken quickly and with a Caribbean accent that her establishment did not, under any circumstances, cook dog; and that I might find a British island more to my liking. Sheepishly I explained that we just wanted to eat WITH our dogs not with our dogs covered in a beure blanc sauce. Her manner improved remarkably and we were seated at a table on a terrace overlooking the bay. She lit the candle on our table which promptly blew out, handed us our menus, lit the candle again, asked if we wanted still or sparkling water and then lit the candle one more time. My but that wind is really picking up!

The restaurant must have had seating for at least 100 people but Jim and I were the only ones dining. In spite of the windy conditions, we had a delightful meal while enjoying both a great bottle of French wine and the company of our dogs. We paid our bill, got back into the dinghy and I swear, without turning on our outboard engine, were blown the 600 feet back to our boat.

Sleeping that night was cool, cool, cool. Sleeping that night was loud, loud, loud. Man did that wind howl through our ringing, our hatch (skylight) and our nerves. It wasn’t until the next morning when we realized we had anchored in the windiest spot of a windy anchorage. We moved the boat, got a respite from the wind and thoroughly enjoyed the next two days in Deshaies.

We were in Antigua before Deshaies and in St. Barts before that. Jim usually takes care of checking us through customs and immigration when we arrive and before we leave an island. In St. Barts, I thought I’d give him a hand with the checking out. He usually seems a little bit frustrated when he gets back from the Customs and Immigration office so I figured since we were on a French Island and I did speak some French, this would be a good opportunity to score some points with Jimmy. We had pulled Eyes of the World up to the Custom’s dock in Gustavia and were filling up with water in preparation for our sail to Antigua. With the boat documents in hand, I headed for the Customs office. I had all of the immigration documents and the passports out and in hand when I stepped up to the counter. I’ve watched too many boat captains get reprimanded at the Customs counter when they start digging through their backpack looking for their documents. So, with my papers all in order, I exclaimed in my best French, “We are ready to go.” To which the Customs man said, “I am so happy for you.” While that wasn’t the response I expected, I decided to run with it. “Thank you for your kind thoughts, how much do we owe you?” At that point, he seemed to lighten up and said something like “Eight Euro.” I offered him the money and the boat documents. He took the cash but wasn’t interested in the boat docs. I commented that when we checked in, we told him that our next port of call would be Guadeloupe but that we had changed our mind and were heading to Antigua. “Do you need to change that on the boat’s papers?” I asked. “Non”, was his short but direct reply. “Do I need a receipt or do you need to stamp our passports”, I asked? Again with the “Non”. Being the record keeper on the boat, I managed to get him to stamp the Customs receipt with some official looking stamp and then had him sign it as well. He wasn’t keen on either task; however, I do like to keep things in order so I insisted.

I proudly informed Jim that Customs and Immigration had all been taken care of and we were cleared to leave. Off we sailed to the British island of Antigua. After a very nice overnight sail, we navigated Eyes into Jolly Harbour, Antigua. The first step after arriving in a new country is to visit Customs and Immigration and clear in. Up until this point, we had only cleared into one French island, one Dutch island and then another French island. Antigua was our first British island and we were kind of expecting the same procedure. Nope. The first thing we were told was that we needed to go to an internet café, pay to hire a computer, go to a website and fill out a form online. Then we were to pay to have that form printed and bring it back to Customs. Apparently, the people of Antigua are trying to rid the island of a pesky little thing called penmanship. The immigration office had forms, they had computers, they had staff and they only had us as customers…oops…troublemakers.

Like the un-pushy Americans we strive to be, we dutifully headed to the internet café, tugged on the door and almost dislocated a shoulder. It was 10:30 in the morning, the sign said the place opened at 9:00 and the sign on the door said OPEN. Hmmm. I understood the French signs in St. Maarten and St. Barts….what were these English Islands up to? Thinking that it was a time zone thing and that factored in with the Island time thing might mean that a place that says it will be open and in fact says that it IS open, might be opening soon. We waited an hour outside the closed OPEN café until we finally gave up and went back to Customs. To our surprise, the place was packed…with the same two Customs officers sitting in front of the same two computers doing god knows what (AOL chatroom…IMing important government business with someone with the screen name jnkindatrnk). I put on my best please-oh-please-god-help-me face and proceeded to start the mind control. I knew that I had to convince one of these two guys to use their government computers to do a little government work. It took me 10 minutes (impressive!) to convince the first guy to help me. It took him 30 minutes to convince swngindafrntporch (his AOL screen name) to stop chatting with jnkindatrnk and let him use the ONE computer in the immigration office actually hooked up to the internet to do a little immigrating.

Soooo, with the forms finally printed, we head to Customs where we are asked for our exit documents from our last port of call, St. Barts. With all the flourish of one who knows with confidence that the hard times are over, I produce the stamped and signed receipt I insisted on (and at this point I need to add how proud I was of myself for asking for the signed and stamped lifesaving document) from the Customs man in Gustavia. The Customs man in Antigua, and I kid you not, looked at the paper and said, “This is a receipt for water.” Drat. Foiled again.

Upon closer examination, the French word l’eau did appear many times on the official Customs document I had secured, but in my defense, we are a sailing vessel traveling on de l’eau.
It took me 45 minutes of pleading to convince the Customs man that while I thought I was checking out, the Customs guy in St. Barths thought I was just paying for my water. Back to the French books for me. I tell you all this because when we finally left Antigua and sailed to the windy village of Deshaies, we had to check into Customs. I knew better than to take on this task myself, however, I did go to the Customs office with Jim so I could provide moral support if needed. But lo and behold, we were back in France where the dogs are loved, the winds are strong and you can check into to Customs with a note you wrote yourself upon which you forged your parents signature saying you had permission to enter the country. They smile, stamp your passport and let you in. They even have candy on the counter. God I LOVE France.