We decided to try this small municipal marina on the SW corner of Guadeloupe en route to Deshaies as it was advertised as having a car rental company which would allow us to tour the island.  Our first discovery was that this is really a local marina ill equipped to handle large boats, so we moored on a buoy just outside.  Our second discovery was that the car hire company is now a bicycle hire company which tries to arrange car hire if someone turns up wanting one.  In our case, repeated promises of a vehicle during the course of the afternoon failed to produce anything, even by the next morning.  However, all was not lost as it is only about a mile to walk along the recently completed waterside esplanade to Basse Terre, the island’s colourful Creole dominated capital which was a bustling hive of activity, combining old covered markets and (relatively) modern shops.

 

Nightfall produced interesting fish sightings in the illuminated margins of the small marina;  a large Puffer Fish, ambling comically along the water’s edge propelled by its small fins; the enormous splash that appeared to be a Tarpon leaping.  However, the greatest interest was a green Moray Eel about 1 1/2 m long apparently hunting shore crabs for several minutes as we watched;  it seemed quite willing to look above the water line for its prey, as well as below, frequently breaking the surface as it writhed over the rocks in the shallows.  Its serpentine body, thick as a man’s arm, easily penetrated deep between the boulders, where it eventually disappeared in less than half a metre of water.

 

Next day, a bus ride to Pointe à Pitre at the centre of Guadeloupe highlighted the juxtaposition of new and old industries.  Walking the mile or so from the bus station to the local marina, which is the largest on the island, we stopped for lunch at a modern coffee shop.  We subsequently found ourselves walking through increasingly poor neighbourhoods until we passed a group of half a dozen Gendarmes inspecting a car.  A hundred yards further on we were very clearly in the middle of a brothel district, with the girls touting for trade in front of rickety bare wooden buildings.  This didn’t seem like the road to the island’s biggest marina, so we returned to check our directions with the Gendarmes, who confirmed that this was indeed the correct route! Sure enough, we came at last to the Marina Bas du Fort.  It is a busy place of much practical application, with considerable space given over to people doing their own maintenance rather than the usual purchased services.  Perhaps, though, we underestimated the importance of the industry just outside the marina!

 

The following day we walked up to Fort Louis Delgrès, which we had seen illuminated the previous night a short distance from Marina de Rivière Sens.  The earlier glimpse was quite misleading as the fort extends over several acres. Established from 1649 by the Governor and owner of Guadeloupe, Charles Houël, it was overtaken by the English and used as a base to raise Basse Terre in 1691; and again in 1703.  The then Governor of Guadeloupe, M de Gabaret, was sent to reinforce the fort, but chose instead to evacuate and destroy it to prevent it falling into enemy hands.  By 1709, however, a new fort was being built, which again fell into English hands in 1759 when Governor Nadau Dutreil surrendered it without a fight.  In 1763, the fort was returned to the French as part of the Treaty of Paris, but was again occupied by the English in 1794 after a six days siege, but recaptured the same year by troops of Victor Hugo.  It finally gained its now high stature when Louis Delgrès led the slaves’ revolt in 1802.

 

Fishermen at dawn outside Marina de Rivière Sens

Surgeon Fish along the Marina de Rivière Sens breakwater

 

Fort Louis Delgrès

 

 

 

Memorial to the 1802 slaves’ revolution led by Louis Delgrès

 

Tucanon from Fort Louis Delgrès

Sunset