# Caribbean Vacations Forums > The Rest of the French West Indies >  >  Anyone have experience with this place?http://www.grande-anse.com/

## Petri

Anyone have experience with this place?

http://www.grande-anse.com/

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## Karibien

Not with the hotel, but I briefly stopped by in Deshaies. Unfortunatly it was on a day when the sky opened up to a downpour that lasted more or less the entire day :Frown:  Anyway, we had a creole lunch at a small restaurant by the beach - and the beach looked lovely even in the rain :) By many considered the best on the island, our teacher said. The small town looked cute, had some hotels and tourists, but not the big complex thing.

Staying in Deshaies will also put you fairly close to Le Parc National, and St Rose with Mus

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## Petri

Musee du Rhum and ther distillers sound very interesting.  How was the creole lunch, comparable with the lunch places in St. Barth?  (Food is the reason why we'd prefer french island and my girlfriend's first comment about Anguilla was that "there's no good food there" ;-).

For the first week we usually just lay on the beach, enjoy the sun and ocean, and try to get even a hint of colour on our pale skin.  The contrast to the darkest time of year, typically without snow to brighten the world yet, is so huge.  We want to stay away from the big resorts.  How did you find the beaches on Guadeloupe compared to e.g. St. Barth (or Anguilla)?

Over the weekend I found an alternative for our plans -- flying through Stockholm.  We're using British Airways Frequent Flyer Miles and not only they charge more miles when flying from "friendly place" like Helsinki (Finnair and BA are part of Oneworld) but they've also blocked the flights on the xmas week.  The availability from Arlanda is much better as it's "enemy territory" (SAS and StarAlliance), BA even has four flights to London compared to two from Helsinki (plus four that are Finnair metal).  Flying HEL-STO-HEL is cheap and the terminal used by AY/BA at Stockholm is small and efficient, so flying through Stockholm is not a big deal.

Petri

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## Karibien

Hi Petri

I don't think I can be of much help when it comes to restaurants, as my friend and I mostly cooked for ourselves both at Guadeloupe and St Barth. I know, we missed out on a lot of good stuff, but it was the only way to make the trip affordable for us. Consequently, when we did eat out, we did not frequent the gourmet/upscale places. Still, from hanging out here I think I got an idea of what to expect on St Barth. We did not see that on Guadeloupe - although we did not look for it. There might very well be tip top dining restaurants for example in the hotel areas wich we did not visit.

What we did find, in the small towns and on the beaches, was simple, colourful, friendly restaurants that served good cr

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