A Tale of Three Islands

Devil’s Island is actually a grouping of 3 islands that served as a prison and penal colony for French criminals and political prisoners for almost 100 years. It was a terrible place where prisoners were forced to work in the miserable heat and humidity doing hard manual labor like felling trees (the islands are covered with coconut trees). More than half the 80,000 prisoners died of disease or during escape attempts. Some completed their sentences and left. Only one was reported to have successfully escaped. He wrote a book to tell his story, and a movie was later made from the book. The prison was closed in 1946. Now all that’s left are a few building that are slowly being reclaimed by the jungle.

Our visit was brief even though we could spend as much time as we wanted walking around the island. There were tour guides placed in strategic places; we only made it to one, and she met us at the end of the pier. She pointed out we were only 7 miles off shore from the mainland of French Guiana, and I could see it on the horizon.

This will interest my Dad. The islands are in the direct path of rockets belonging to the European space program blasting off from the mainland on their way to space with satellite payloads. Because of its location on their flight path, Devil’s Island today serves as a tracking station.

No, Daddy, there were no flyovers today.

It was hot and humid, like Houston on steroids. The islands top out at around 100 feet above sea level and have very rocky edges, no sandy beaches. In an attempt to “take it all in” I found a place where I could see all three islands. I took advantage of a few minutes alone on the path, stood in one spot and took a series of photos until I had completed a 360 degree view.

In this view, the island in the distance is the Ile du Diable, the original Devil’s Island, where the worst criminals and the political prisoners were kept. The name Devil’s Island now refers to the entire penal colony and all three islands.

Devil’s Island is the reason I had to get a yellow fever shot for this trip. Worth it. Totally worth it.

This afternoon I took a tour of the ship's galley (kitchen). It’s huge and every day there are 60+ chefs and staff who work in this one galley 24/7 to prepare the food for most of the ship. In other places on the ship there are a grill, a café, an Italian restaurant, and Asian restaurant, etc. All in all, there are about 110 chefs on staff capable of serving 800 or more passengers and about 600 crew.

We have two days at sea and then arrive at Fortaleza, Brazil.