The Death March – Les Saintes, Guadeloupe, May 2, 2023

Terre-de-Haute is a lovely little seaside community in a terrific anchorage.  It is definitely the touristy part of Guadeloupe but very safe and nice to walk around.  On day one here we decided to do a hike marked “moderate to hard” on the all trails map, which what we have used to guide us on all our hikes so far.  Note to self, their scale of moderate to hard is different than the “Campbell Scale” (our ability rating scale).  The hike was named “Le Pain” and it definitely was!  It was 5.5 miles with final elevation of 1,210 feet straight up!  Basically, we spent the next 2.5 hours hiking up a steep rocky off-road path up to a little set of ruins.  Apparently, this little set of islands has changed hands many times between France, Spain, and Britain due to its strategic location but in the end landed with the French.  It was by far the most challenging hike we have done this season and brought both of us to our limits.  At least when we got to the top, the views were worth it!

Funny story on the way to the trail we passed a little house with about a dozen bird cages one of which was home to a parrot.  The only word the parrot knew was “asshole.”  Pretty funny as we walk by, he calls Ron an “asshole.”  We got a good laugh our of that one.

After that we took a couple days to snorkel which was fun since Guadeloupe is a volcanic mountainous island and the coral against the black sand was really pretty.  I haven’t seen this since Hawaii many years ago.  The amazing thing here is how big some of the sponges are.  They are as big as me!  It was kind of nuts but the water is clear and warm as bath water.

On our next hike we ended up going to Fort Napolean which was a nice little history lesson.  It was not nearly as difficult but still a nice little uphill walk.  The fort was cool but sadly all the explanations were in French so I ended up doing a little reading when we got home to interpret what I had just seen.  The fort itself was huge and the first moat I have seen.  Pretty cool overall with a brick oven, cistern, and slits in the stone for gun protection.

We had intended to head over to Dominica the next day but not realizing it was a holiday, we did not get to check out.  Who know the French Labor Day was on May 1^st.  We waited and headed to Dominica the following day.  The nature island is awaiting.