We are spending a very pleasant couple of weeks in Martinique, anchored in the capitol, Fort-de- France, which is a very large and bustling city. It is also a very old city, settled in the 1600s by the French. It was fought over by the British and the French in the 1800s, and is now a departement of France (the equivalent of one of our states). We realize that Martinique and Guadeloupe are very similar to Hawaii for Americans - an overseas tropical destination on home soil for the French. We see tourists from France here in Martinique. France also subsidizes the islands here, and it shows in the infrastructure of a modern bus system, good roads, a drinkable water system, and other outward signs.
We helped our friend Sue on Enee Marie deliver her boat about 10 miles down the coast to a boatyard, where she will leave it for hurricane season while she and her husband go to Chicago. We had some adventures getting back to our boat after the delivery - from Marin, about 30 kilometers away by road, collective taxis are supposed to run until 5:30 every afternoon, but we couldn't find any. So, for the first time, we hitchhiked back, and were picked up by several wonderful Martiniquans, the last one who sought us out to deliver us directly to our dinghy dock.
We also had a package delivered to us at the FedEx office, at the airport. Our water jugs from Reliance had all failed with cracks in their seams. Larry found the telephone number of a vice president of the Canadian-based company, who was very interested in our problems. She found mistakes in their manufacturing process and wanted to replace our jugs, free of charge - almost unheard-of for a company to stand behind its products in this way! Kudos to Reliance.
We also have had a very good time walking around the city, seeing all the French shops, walking to the suburb of Schoelcher for a large supermarket (they call it a Hyper Marche), and visiting tourist sites in town. We've developed quite a liking for French bread of all types, from baguettes to pain complet (whole wheat), pain compagne (country bread), pain de cereales (multi-grain), batard aux noix (bread with walnuts). We will miss the French bread, French cheese, and French mustard, among other culinary delights available here.
We will be sailing on to St. Lucia and St. Vincent in the next couple of weeks, as we make our way south for hurricane season.