Terre-de-Haut Les SaintesCruise Port Guide

Terre-de-Haut is the main inhabited island of Les Saintes — a tiny archipelago of eight islands belonging to Guadeloupe, lying just nine miles south of Basse-Terre's southern coast. The island is so achingly, almost impossibly French in character that first-time visitors often feel they have been teleported to a Mediterranean fishing village and placed, without warning, in turquoise Caribbean waters. Fresh-baked baguettes at the morning patisserie, a boules court near the church, hand-lettered café menus in impeccable French, and a harbor where weathered fishing boats mingle with visiting yachts all conspire to create an atmosphere that delights the palate, the senses, and the soul simultaneously. The island's 1,500 residents — many descended from the original Breton and Norman fishermen who settled here in the 17th century — maintain a lifestyle of remarkable simplicity and aesthetic coherence.

The island achieved its greatest historical moment at the Battle of Les Saintes on April 12, 1782, when Admiral Rodney's British fleet broke the line of the French fleet under Admiral de Grasse in the Saintes Passage between Guadeloupe and Dominica — a naval engagement that ended France's Caribbean ambitions and established British naval doctrine for a generation. The battle is commemorated at Fort Napoléon, a well-preserved fortification on the hilltop above the village, which was subsequently expanded by Napoleon's forces after the islands were briefly returned to France. Today the fort houses a fascinating museum dedicated to both the battle and to the island's natural and cultural history, surrounded by a botanical garden of cacti and succulents with spectacular views of the harbor and neighboring islands.

The harbor of Terre-de-Haut, viewed from Fort Napoléon's ramparts, is one of the most beautiful natural anchorages in the Eastern Caribbean — small enough to feel intimate, large enough to shelter dozens of yachts, and framed by green volcanic hillsides descending to turquoise water. The beaches of Terre-de-Haut, particularly Plage de Pompierre with its calm, sheltered water and Plage du Figuier on the eastern coast, are among Guadeloupe's finest.