Fort de France 14:36N 61:04W

Serenity of Swanwick
Phil and Sarah Tadd
Mon 1 Feb 2016 23:41
We had a fabulous sail from Anse d’Arlet, departing from the mooring under sail and not starting the engine until we approached the anchorage in For de France. Right under the walls of the fort and just off the town. We were a bit wary of the anchorage as it gets negative comments about it in the pilot and the Swedes we had been alongside in Le Marin hadn’t enjoyed their time there. As it turned out we thoroughly enjoyed its situation, easy access to town and lots of life. More than can be said for F de F on a Saturday afternoon, shops closed and very little happening . We pitied the cruise ship passengers who had paid so much to be here.
Saturday evening however was totally different. We were sat on board and Phil said he wasn’t bothered about going ashore. About 7.00 there was music drifting across the harbour and then the drums started. It became obvious that there was some sort of parade so we had to go and satisfy our curiosity. As part of the build up to carnival there was a parade of the carnival street bands from all over Martinique, each band is led with a name banner then dancers and then the band playing mainly drums and other percussion instruments. Drums varied in size from small to about the size of 50 gallon oil drums, the sound was deafening. After watching for an hour or so we went back on board, the parade didn't finish until about 11.00!
Sunday again the town  was pretty dead but we did have good look around identifying a phone shop to try and sort our communication problems but not managing to get any WiFi connection. We are having a great problem with our Tesco phones, they don't work here and the on line assistance from Tesco  we are finding hopeless.
Monday, the town is open for business, ashore to buy a new phone and to top up the SIM with more data. Still didn't solve the communication problem with Tesco’s though. Did some shopping and found free WiFi and prepared to leave tomorrow.

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