Martinique

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Martinique, nicknamed the island of flowers, is a French overseas department nestled in the arc of the Lesser Antilles. Dominated by Mount Pelée (an active volcano) in the north, it offers white- and black-sand beaches, lush tropical rainforest, refined Creole cuisine and an agricultural rum renowned the world over.

Two islands in one

Seventy kilometres separate north from south, and yet everything changes along the way. In the north, Mount Pelée (1,397 m) presides over dense rainforest, black-sand beaches and cool rivers — this is the country of tree ferns, of the Jardin de Balata and the Caravelle peninsula. In the south the climate is drier, the vegetation lower, and the sand turns white: Les Salines at Sainte-Anne, the Anses-d'Arlet, and Diamant bay facing its rock.

The north also carries the island's memory. On 8 May 1902 the eruption of Pelée wiped Saint-Pierre off the map in a matter of minutes, killing close to thirty thousand people. Its ruins, its theatre and its gaol can be visited today — the town once known as the little Paris of the Antilles became the Pompeii of the Caribbean.

Fort-de-France holds the island's energy: the covered market, the Schœlcher library with its iron frame built for the 1889 World's Fair, and the Savane. This is the city Aimé Césaire — born at Basse-Pointe — served as mayor for fifty-six years.

Carême, hivernage and carnival

Carême, from December to April, is the dry season: 28 °C, steady trade winds, a glassy sea — the high season, and one to book well ahead. Hivernage, from June to November, brings rain and humidity, with cyclone risk concentrated between August and October; prices fall sharply and the landscape is at its greenest. Two dates are worth planning around: carnival, in February or March, which ends on Ash Wednesday with the burning of Vaval, and the Tour des Yoles Rondes in early August, when these traditional sailing craft race their way around the island.

Rum, the table and the road

Martinique produces the only rum in the world with a protected appellation of origin, granted in 1996: rhum agricole, distilled from pure cane juice rather than molasses. Almost every distillery opens its doors — Clément and its plantation house, Depaz at the foot of Pelée, Neisson, JM, Trois-Rivières — and the difference between a white rum for ti-punch and an aged one for sipping becomes obvious quickly.

At the table: salt cod accras, Creole boudin, chicken colombo and court-bouillon of fish; ti-punch you mix yourself, to your own hand. On the road a car is essential — distances are short but the northern roads wind. One local habit worth adopting: the ferry links Fort-de-France to Trois-Îlets in about twenty minutes, where the road takes over an hour at peak times.

Essentials & your questions