Ilse de Saints – Bourge des Saints at Terre d’en Haut

Monday, Feb 27^th, we pulled anchor around 11:30AM and sailed 3 hours to Iles Des Saints.  The winds averaged 24 knots and the sea swells made going uncomfortable.  One following sea swept
over the back transom surprising us and wet washed everything in the cockpit.  Luckily, it was not enough to get over into the companionway.  Ken and I looked at each other and asked what just happened.   We had, by now decided that wearing a life vest and tether was the best regular routine for us considering the constant high winds we had been experiencing.

When we arrived at The Saintes, we stopped at 3 different bays looking for a nice anchorage including the Bourg de Saintes near the town (all mooring  full).  We went back to Pain du Sucre bay and anchored along with about 10 other boats.   We held most of the afternoon and then found we were moving.  We reset the anchor 2 more times before being satisfied we were holding.   (anchor alarm on).   Around 5AM, I heard a neighbor boat owner yelling and went up top to check it out, only to find we were feet away from their boats bow.  Ken and I got the boat started and I pulled the anchor up as it started to pour out.

We moved to another open spot in the bay and reset in our wet night clothes and half cat-napped until daylight when we moved back to Bourg de Saintes where this time we found a good mooring ball (#43), open and tied up to it.

Satisfied and tired after several hard days of wind and poor anchorages, we decided to stay for 2 nights.   Went to town, paid our 1Euro for clearance and 11 Euros per night for the mooring and found a great French restaurant (la Case aux Epices)for lunch.  I was happy to relax, shop, reprovision and get some great coffee there.

One of our first dinghy stops for lunch.