France

Here we are in France, but before we get into that I want to mention that I love this little boat. Today we sailed about 50 miles, over half of them dead upwind, in 30+ knots and we only dropped once. We had 2 reefs and our prototype cruising jib rolled up to the size of a storm jib, averaging about 7 knots at 80 degree tacking angles and passing boats 15 feet longer like they were hoved-2. My eyes are stinging from salt water bullets but Calvin is hanging on the anchor in the lee of a little island outside Point a Pitre, Guadeloupe, dry and ready to go again. Just another leisurely Caribbean daysail in full foul weather gear.

OK, back to France. We crossed to Guadeloupe last Wend. and today is Sunday. Again the forecast 20 knot day turned out to be off by only about 50% and this time the first crew member to visit the rail was me. Our GPS is actually suffering from Y2K syndrome. It thinks today is Feb 5, 1936 (or 2036?). Of course we don't need a GPS right now but I am still wound up to the point where I will sit inside the boat, with all means of ventilation locked down, reading manuals until I heave. From what we are told, this may be the only known instance of Y2K syndrome so someone please contact Oprah and/or Larry King and arrange for a SSB radio link.

Or first stop in Guadeloupe was a fishing village on the NW corner of the island named Deshaies. Deshaies is pronounced "Dey Hey". This is not to be confused with "Der Hey". Der Hey is a place in the south, midwestern US that Jeff once visited on a bicycle trip where all the residents great each other by saying "Hey der, hey", hence the name. In Deshaies, as far as we can tell, no one greets each other at all. The people are friendly enough, but they seem to behave a lot like New Englanders, nodding or raising an eyebrow and leaving it at that. We don't tend to offer much in the way of greetings either because we are never quite sure if we are saying "good day" or "hold the anchovies".

We like this island. The people are handsome and most of them wear either tights or striped pajama pants when they go into the village. We buy fresh food out of the back of trucks on the sidewalks; oranges with the real green skins (Matt- "If we called them "greens" in English, they wouldn't have to dye them"), tomatoes without stickers on them, bananas by the stalk, hoary looking brown gourd-like items still covered with dirt, if you want that. In Antigua, Dani and I took a cab to the weekly outdoor market in St John's to buy fruit and vegetables. St John's is mostly a mess. The new independent government decreed that all 75,000 residents would be supported by tourism so they no longer grow or produce anything. The market had a pitiful selection of wilted produce shipped in from Dominica. Clearly the Dominican's ship what they don't want to eat themselves. Dani was afraid to get out of the cab. So was I. In contrast, Deshaies is spotless and vibrant. The west facing waterfront was wrecked by Hurricane Lenny and the formerly beach front buildings are reduced to rubble, but the streets are clean, there are maintained plantings and flowers in the vacant lots and all the businesses are well stocked and valid. Everyone is busy. The fishing boats and cars are all in good repair. You can buy hot-from-the-oven baguettes at any time of the day. The town has no bank, but they have a new public library and tennis, basketball, volleyball and soccer installations, all with nets and bleachers. In the afternoon everyone sits in sidewalk cafes, under awnings just out of the rain, drinking tiny cups of coffee, or better, Bitburger beer in sweating .5 liter cans.

It rains a lot in Deshaies. The town is settled by the Deshaies river, which is basically a 2 mile series of waterfalls cascading out of a rain forest. We spent 2 days in the river. The first day we tried to find the trails that the author of our guide book fantasized about. The second day we walked to the top of the gorge up the ladder of the river. Dani and I walked and climbed, Matt mostly swam. It was beautiful, slippery and loud. Among other sites, we saw 3 fire ants walking in a row, each carrying a piece of a leaf 3 or 4 times the size of their bodies. The leaf pieces were held straight up like a dorsal fin on a sailfish. Was this a special kind of leaf? Are there no leaves where they live? Were they having a parade? One more mystery we will never solve.

On the way up the river I explained to Dani and Matt that Tevas were originally marketed as "River runners". We'll call that American History for the week. At the top of the river we walked across a long, thorny field and eventually came to some sort of a Catholic retreat with a spectacular view to the harbor and adjacent mountains. On Antigua, Karen and I walked over the tallest mountain overlooking Falmouth Harbor and stumbled onto the remains of a Monastery. The spiritually enlightened get the best real estate.

We liked Deshaies. But alas, there was no one to talk to. So we left. Today we sailed around to Ilet A Gosier. If you look at a map of Guadeloupe you will see that it is shaped like a butterfly. Deshaies is on the tip of the left wing and Ilet A Gosier is right at the business end of the body. We came all the way up here so that we could visit the North Sails loft in Point A Pitre tomorrow. The owner of the loft is Andrew Dove, a native of Great Britain. We are anxious to visit with him so that he can order lunch for us and we will get what we had in mind. So far, Karen has been doing all the talking for the four of us. Earlier this evening we went out for dinner and she amazed us once again with her modest, yet marginally effective command of the language that she learned in the Georgia public school system. After an earnest conversation with tonights waitress, complete with plenty of pointing at the menu and pantomime with the cutlery, the waitress returned to our table and served Karen 3 bottles of beer and a liter of wine.

From here we go to Dominica and then to visit the Windward Islands for the next 6-8 weeks. Email phone lines will likely be scarce so this is probably Calvin-Out for a while.