Guyene Francaise - French Guiana

We’re in one of the most sparsely populated countries of the world, exploring the paradise of Ile Royale, 10 miles off the coast! Well, almost paradise: the dense and varied vegetation, the undulations of the small hilly island and the fascinating animal and bird inhabitants make the place feel very special indeed. In fact, without even trying, Ile Royale has given even the Seychelles a run for their money in terms of atmosphere and experience. Our visit to the Iles du Salut have coincided with a massive tropical downpour (it’s the rainy season right now) and getting thoroughly drenched by cool rain in this incessant heat only adds to the magical experience. But here there are one or two things which detract from that first impression of paradise.
Firstly, there are no real beaches so to speak of, and the coastline is rocky and dramatic, which churns up the waves as they approach the shore. Swimming here would be impossible, the sea is so violent, and it’s far from that enticing turquoise blue of just a few days ago; it’s more green which reflects the dense palm forests which tumble down to the rocky water’s edge. But swimming would be a bad idea for the other obvious reason: these are shark-infested waters!
Perhaps that’s why the French established a prison colony here over 160 years ago. Nobody would ever be able to escape…
The tropical rain beats down as we explore overgrown paths, careful to avoid the falling coconuts, and weave in and out of the derelict buildings that remain from the prison. It was such a curious experience to be trekking both off and on road with the few gingerbread-like sandstone paths that actually exist probably having been built for the prison guards by the convicts that had been banished from France.
Ile Royale has a fantastic array of wildlife including the green-winged ara macaw, capuchin monkeys, even pheasants and cats (that had probably been introduced from France), but most of all, agoutis. Not to be missed! This is a species of rodent that resembles a slightly oversized ginuea pig with short front legs and disproportionately large hind legs. Goodness knows how they scamper so bleeding quickly! Their bristly pelage merges from a slate colour at the front to an almost ferric orange behind. In fact, one of us did comment on how it looked as if these agoutis had coconuts permanently capped over their hides. We were also fortunate enough to get a close up of an iguana, and just as fortunate not to have got so close to the lake below that caimans inhabit!. Anyway, it was the greenest iguana either of us had ever seen! Sadly we couldn’t get a picture as Jon stopping Simon in his tracks and almost winding him, just centimetres from where the iguana was perched, caused the iguana to twitch and she fell to her watery bed. The poor creature will have to spend a very long time climbing up again! Deepest apologies.
Out of the three Islands that make up Iles du Salut, the Ile du Diable (Devil’s Island) is the most difficult to access and is notorious for being the primary prison for French criminals of the past. The prisoners were often subjected to a lonesome stretch of time in small and uncomfortable individual brick huts, where they had a sea view from a window comparable to that of an artist’s viewfinder, if they were lucky. Not even a criminal deserves to be cooped up with barely any space to move around, with no escape from the intense tropical heat and humidity, nor from the invasive insects that no doubt caused intense aggravation from their bites, stings and just simply crawling over them. There couldn’t have been a moments peace.
Despite this inhumanity of the past, Devil’s Island remains very beautiful and untouched with coconut palms and rocks being it’s only inhabitants, although rumour has it that there are swarms of irritable bees there these days. We were fortunate enough to get a phenomenal glimpse of this Island from the Ile Royale, where we were. Our time there was just too short, but now we’re moving onwards to explore a sandy beach over 400 miles from the sea…