Devil's Island, May 2006

Or more precisely, the Iles du Salut, a group of three tiny islands ten miles off the coast of French Guiana. Even the largest, Ile Royale, is barely ½ mile long, and takes little more than half an hour to walk around.
These islands were once France's most notorious penal colony, which finally closed in 1953. This was the place made famous by Papillon, the film starring Steve McQueen and Dustin Hoffman, about Henri Charrière, the only man ever to escape. Devil's Island (right) was reserved for political prisoners.
Now the islands are maintained as a park, a little tropical paradise. The surviving prison buildings (right) are being preserved, and a few, such as the warders' houses, restored and converted as exclusive holiday cottages. There is even a bar/restaurant.
How strange, midway between Brazil and Trinidad, to find ourselves for a day in this tiny outpost of France, where everything was well kept and worked properly, we could buy things with Euros, and enjoy French cuisine. « Island Website
Some of the animals we spotted on Ile Royale.

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