Caribbean - Martinique, Dominica & Guadeloupe
We arrived in Martinique early on Christmas Eve, anchoring in the dark out from Sainte Anne, then later in the day in Baie des Cyclones amongst the mangroves and much fewer boats. There were thousands of boats in the Cul-de-Sac du Martin, is this what the Caribbean was going to be like? We had left the Canaries on Dec 6th and apart from one night at anchor in Cape Verde, had been on the ocean for 19 days travelling 3,020 nautical miles. We really enjoyed the crossing but were looking forward to getting a good night’s sleep.
The Caribbean, the stuff of pirates and buried treasure, but underneath a much more sinister history. I knew little about this part of the world so turned to James Mitchener’s Caribbean, it gave me a brief historical overview, and was a good start. First settled by the peaceful Arawaks, they were overtaken by the fierce Caribs (both from South America), and then Christopher Columbus brought Europe to these shores in 1492. He named the region the West Indies, gave the islands Spanish names, and European diseases, discovered the hammock and opened the door for the enslavement and assimilation of the Caribs and any remaining Arawaks.
The southern islands were of little interest to the Spanish Conquistadors, as further north and to the west, gold, silver, and precious stones beckoned, focusing their attention on Hispaniola, Puerto Rico, Cuba, and Jamaica, before ravaging the civilizations of Mexico (Aztecs), Guatemala (Mayans) and Peru (Incas). This left the southern windward and leeward islands to be fought over by the English, French and Dutch with the occasional Scandinavian, for the next four hundred years.
They sought strategic geographical positions and wealth, and privateers, aka pirates, lurked in the islands ready to waylay a passing Spanish galleon. The climate and terrain were ideal for the highly prized white gold, sugar, but working the cane fields and mills was hot, hard, and dangerous work so millions of Africans were enslaved and brought across the Atlantic in shiploads to do the work. Despite the years of abuse and neglect, the African population swelled, and uprisings became more common until slavery was abolished in the early 1800s. The sugar cane industry collapsed, some islands gained independence and today the population of most islands is of African descent with tourism the main source of income. Independence also brings the opportunity to design a new flag, rich with colour and meaning.
So, back to Martinique, population 366,981, charted by Columbus, but settled by the French in 1635, it became the first coffee growing region in the western hemisphere. Nowadays the main agricultural crops are banana and sugar cane, rum being a major export. Although the English did take possession a couple of times, France took ownership under the 1763 Treaty of Paris and it has remained French, becoming an overseas department of France (Département d'Outre-Mer or DOM) in 1946; the official language is French, although creole and English are also spoken, and the currency is the euro. Warm, rainy, and mountainous, it is one of the Windward Islands, so named because they are closer to the easterly trade winds.
Priorities were Customs, data, fresh provisions, and a cold drink. Customs, the French way is so easy - we discovered that most marina offices, some chandleries, and the occasional dress shop have a computer hidden in the back where you can create an arrival (and departure) record, pay a couple of euros, get a stamp and it’s done, so easy. Data however wasn’t as straightforward, initially. Our Airalo SIM which had worked perfectly in Europe didn’t seem to like the Caribbean as much, so in the humid heat we walked for miles to find a telco and found Digicel. And what a find - covering most islands as far up as the British Virgin Islands (BVIs), our chosen plan cost €39.95 per month for 130 gig, perfect. The nearby Carrefour was not what I had expected - frozen meat, wilting produce, and a bewildering selection of wine – was this another indication of what to expect in the Caribbean? Or was it because the French like to import their goods from France? At least the bars served local - accras de morue - salt cod fritters – delicious, especially with a cold beer.
Christmas eve, the town was surprisingly quiet with only one open restaurant, Indigo Factory, it had a set menu, live steelpan music and we spent four hours waiting for our meal. When it arrived the blood sausages brown and white alongside the wilted lettuce and overripe tomatoes, were not a culinary highlight. But the next day - Christmas day - was superb. Lunch at Zanzibar, we dined on champagne, crab, and langoustine, followed by music, laughter, and platters on NOETA. Celebration time.
We spent two weeks on the west coast of Martinique and Petit Anse d’Arlet was our first introduction to Caribbean sealife - the snorkeling was outstanding. I had become used to the Med with its sea urchins, damselfish, bream and the occasional colourful wrasse and parrotfish. My first foray into the clear turquoise water, I saw a goldspotted snake eel, gold, and red cushion seastars, a flying gurnard, yellow and black striped sergeant majors, banded butterfly fish, french angelfish, stoplight parrotfish, a doctorfish and spiny lobsters crawling amidst the rocks, three metres from the beach. Bloody hell. And then at night we were visited by large tarpon (I thought they were sharks) circling around our stern. Tarpon and rain showers, both soon became nightly occurrences.
Main town Port de France, once a malarial swamp, is a colourful, shabby town with narrow footpaths and weathered buildings. Overlooked by the 17th century Fort Saint-Louis, tricolour proudly flying, we bid a rehearsal farewell to our crew, they were checking into a hotel for a couple of nights before flying out to Guadeloupe. But before they left, we were all keen to explore inland and catch a glimpse of the wilder east coast. Deciding we needed two cars, Skip and I managed to find a rental Europcar out near the airport, a 25 minute taxi ride, we then spent the morning driving up through switchback mountain roads, tropical rainforests, streaming ravines, and intermittent showers to visit Jardin de Balata and have lunch in St Pierre. It seemed fitting on the “Isle of Flowers” to visit a garden, so we wandered amongst an impressive collection of bromeliads, begonias, bamboo and about 300 different types of palm trees before happening upon the hummingbirds. Magnetic, beautiful darts and flutterings of colour, they were the pièce de résistance. West coast St Pierre is sad. Once the “Paris of the Caribbean”, it was destroyed by Martinique’s active volcano Mt Pelée in 1902. The entire population of 30,000 people were killed by the pyroclastic flow, except for three people, including a prisoner in a stone cell, who says crime doesn’t pay. We split up for the afternoon, the crew deciding to check out rum distilleries, while Skip and I headed eastwards, back over the mountains, past sugarcane fields and banana plantations as far as the eye could see, to the wild rolling Atlantic seas.
Last night crew shout in town was dinner at the superb The Yellow restaurant, langoustine ravioli and canard por moi. Ooh la la. And the next morning, a proper farewell. It was very strange and sad to be saying goodbye to friends we had lived in such close proximity to over the past month or more, but we all needed to get back to our real lives, the Atlantic adventure was over.
So after farewelling our crew we headed back down to Anse de Fortune. Skip had come down with whatever lurgy the crew had given him as their parting gift, so he slept and I swam. Anchored amidst fishing pots in eight metres of sand just out from a reef we stayed for four nights. The weather was grey, showery, and warm, but with the occasional sunburst so perfect for hull cleaning and reef snorkeling. This time the sea life was more about the garden, snorkeling over one metre diameter giant barrel sponges, sea pearl bubble algae, red star coral, green and yellow fan coral, blue sponge and golden elkhorn coral heads were amazing. A cacophony of geckos from the shore at night and Frigatebird wars in the daytime were our only company. It was great.
Northern Martinique is steep and the northeast winds travelling down the slopes made for a good sail up the coast, that is until we cleared land and the wind turned to the south, grrr. So motorsailing five hours up to Dominica we were entertained by plunging brown boobies as I hastily made a Dominican flag using a cushion cover, felt pens and bleach.
Wild, green, and volcanic, Dominica, population 73,040, is known as the “Nature Island” due to its unspoilt rain forests, spectacular waterfalls, and volcanic crater lakes. It is special, and although we only spent a couple of days there it is one of those places that leaves an enduring impression. First sighted by Columbus on a Sunday, he named it Dominica and for the next two hundred years, the French and English fought over it until England was granted possession under the 1763 Treaty of Paris. The southern coast is a protected marine reserve and needing to clear Customs our first port of call was the main town Roseau, so we sought an anchorage in Citronier village the bay before. A waterfront of brightly coloured houses, it was to too deep to anchor so we took a mooring ball from Mr Beanz at Seacat for EC$50 per night - NZD30. Oui, au revoir French and euro, hello English, kwéyòl, and the Eastern Caribbean dollar.
Clearing Customs the next morning we were told that we could have sped up the process online by using SailClear.com. It covers fifteen Caribbean countries, including Bermuda which technically is not, and is a great system, good to know.
We tend to be slightly reticent when local guides approach us and offer tours, however the two times we have accepted (Morocco and Türkiye) we have ended up having a fabulous experience and this time was no exception. What a day! Seacat’s Octavius is our age and a superb guide; his local and historical knowledge is outstanding and he kept us entertained all day, especially when he snuck away discreetly for a quick doobie, every now and then. The ramifications of independence attained in 1978 were evident, from the hillsides of overgrown lime trees and the abandoned Rose’s Lime factory to the Chinese built hospital and stadium - tourism and foreign aid is now what pays the bills.
We drove up to the Morne Trois Pitons National Park for a one hour muddy hike to the high freshwater crater lake, a hydropower storage resource. It was hard going in places, the path washed away by recent rain and slippery as hell. Back down for a swim in the Titou Gorge, we passed a geothermal drilling site, 10 MW in the making. The Gorge was beautiful and challenging, swimming against current through shadowy pools to hidden waterfalls. A well-deserved rest and lunch at the River Rock Café, we dined on shrimps and rum punch, before clambering up and over large slippery boulders to the Trafalgar Falls, pools, and streams of alternating cold and hot water, before heading home past sulphurous spas. And all of this whilst roadside foraging for nutmeg, cinnamon, avocado, cocoa, starfruit, grapefruit, passionfruit, and calabash. Magic.
It was hard to believe that in 2017 category 5 Hurricane Maria had ripped through the island with winds of 282 km/hr destroying homes and vegetation, still very fresh in the minds of the islanders, it was a topic that came up often.
Before we left the following day, we wandered around the busy, colourful, hustling town of Roseau with its cruiseships, and craft markets in the old slave market, music and marijuana smells wafting around street corners; ah the Caribbean.
One regret I had was not visiting the Kalinago Territory, an area on the northeast coast, it is home to the 3,000 remaining members of the ancient Carib tribe, known as Kalinago. Dominica, known to the Kalinago as Waitukubuli, which means “tall is her body”, experienced the same European ravages, but unlike other islands, the natives managed to escape into the volcanic and mountainous regions, where they survived and in 1903, under British rule, were given an area of 3,700 acres that they could call home. A portal to the past. Perhaps on our way back down next year….
Oh and the Dominican flag - the green field represents the lush vegetation of the island, the cross Christianity, with the three stripes the Holy Trinity. The stripe colours are also symbolic - yellow for sunshine, bananas, and citrus, black the fertile soil and African heritage, and white for pure water and aspirations. The 10 stars stand for the country's 10 parishes and the red disc for justice. The purple Sisserou parrot Amazona imperialis is the endangered national bird. Fun fact only two other nations use the colour purple in their flag – El Salvador and Nicaragua.
We had a great five hours sail up from Dominica to the island group of Guadeloupe, population, 395,839. The two main islands are shaped like a butterfly – mountainous, volcanic Basse-Terre to the west and flat, hospitable Grand-Terre to the east, bisected by a narrow muddy, mangrove lined channel, the Rivière Salée. Priority, you guessed it, find Customs and clear in. Except it was a Friday afternoon and the Capitainerie in Rivière Sens had closed at 1330, for the weekend. We could have chosen the main town Pointe-à-Pitre lying along the southern coast 20 miles away, but 20 miles is at least three hours travel and although we did need to go there at some stage to get Volvo and genset parts, we had other plans for getting there that would keep us up north and on track. So up the west coast, stopping for a night at Pointe Pigeon, dinner at a simple waterside shack, smokily delicious cuisse de poulet et ti’ punch. Then Deshaies, a pretty, northern seaside village where we managed to clear in and out at the Pelican clothes boutique on a Sunday, during a power cut, and even though we had already been in country for two days and weren’t leaving for another two, it was all good for €5. Parfois j’aime le français.
The discovery, colonisation and ownership of Guadeloupe is the same as Martinique. Being tied to distant France, gives them both a much higher standard of living than their Caribbean neighbours, local autonomy without independence seem to be working for them.
After we had cleared in and out (did I say how much I love the French Customs system) we continued up the west coast, past beautiful little bays where Death in Paradise was filmed. We found the north hot and still - air and water temp 27 degrees, and shallow - many marked channels, pelicans, and plenty of pots to dodge. Anchoring in the muddy bay we were hoping that Rivière Salée was indeed navigable, it was, phew. A one hour tender along a narrow mangrove channel under two bridges and past the main airport to big, busy Pointe-à-Pitre. Our Volvo mission was successful but our genset not - Mechanique Marine had gone out of business during COVID and Google maps hadn’t been updated, frustrant pour nous et triste pour lui.
