Ft. de France, Martinique
14.35.977N
61.04.151W

This morning at 9:00am we stood in front of the statute at the park just across the street from the dinghy dock waiting for our tour guide/driver. The only thing we knew for certain was that he would be driving a mini-bus and wearing a black hat.

So when Pedrick, came around the corner and asked for us by boat name, we knew we had the right person in spite of the fact that he wasn’t wearing a hat or driving a mini-bus. However, he assured us that the small car he suggested we all shoehorn ourselves into came with air conditioning. So off we go, 5 of us stuffed into a Peugeot; the air conditioning? All 4 windows rolled down. In spite of the shaky start, we ended up having a great time and Pedrick was a wonderful tour guide and spoke English fairly well, at least considerably better than our French.

We snaked our way up the mountains to the Eglise de Balata, a twin to the famous Basilica de Sacre Couer, located in Paris (that‘s a church to you heathens). We weaved our way through the valleys to the Balata Garden (botanical gardens) where I snapped a few hundred photos and came away with a list of names of the 200 plants that grow there. We stopped for a dip of the toes in a river of cool water descending from Mt. Pelee; drove up Mt. Pelee’ as far as we could in a car and finally toured the Bienvenue a’ la Distillerie Depaz, a rum distillery. No tour is complete without a rum tasting. This particular distillery was one of the two that was destroyed when Mt. Pelee’ erupted in 1902. Obviously, it has been rebuilt. The family that owns the distillery still maintains their lavish mansion to the side of the distillery; too bad we weren’t allowed to tour that.

We stopped for a bite to eat at the restaurant located at the distillery and thank heavens Pedrick was there to translate the menu for us. In fact, some other boaters we’d previously met in other anchorages asked to borrow our guide so that they could order too.

I ordered a rum punch with my meal thinking that I would get the normal fruit juice with rum. Instead I was given a bottle of rum, a small bottle of syrup, and a small glass with a stick of sugar cane in it. Pedrick showed me how to pour the sugar syrup into the glass, followed by a shot of rum, stir the mix with the sugar cane stick and then sipped. My first sip sent shivers up and down my spine to the point where I ordered a soft drink, any kind soft drink, that I could water down my “fruit punch” with. I ended up leaving most of it sitting on the table. I think I’m getting soft in my old age. Either that or the family rum is rot gut.

We finished the day with Pedrick taking the coastal route back while we sat catatonic after a big meal, transfixed by the scenery before us and a long day.