French Guiana

1989 -- I don't quite remember much about this little place—it's one of France's colonies. We were not there for long—more of a stopover as we went on elsewhere. There was the mainland and Devil's Island.

On the mainland we visited the one town, and that was for customs purposes. We had a walk to get there, and on the way in once we came across a rather large, mean-looking snake which a local killed so that we could pass. That was pretty much all of the excitement. In the town—which was rather muddy and mossy—we walked around, bought food, announced our presence to authorities. I remember seeing a couple—man and woman—walking down the street, arm-in-arm, with my mother saying something not exactly nice about the fact that the woman was considerably taller.

Devil's Island was interesting; once it was a penal colony. The island was reserved for only prisoners—it was a prison island from which no-one ever left unless they died. Except for the three that escaped, that is. It no longer is one, but walking around you can see the buildings … looked rather inhumane. Beautiful island; making all the more stark the fact that hundreds of people died on that island in buildings and from bad medical conditions. Plenty of coconut trees; we and the other yachties that were there took many with us back on board. We had fun hacking at the vegetation with machetes to get through to where we wanted.