The underwater world of Marie - Galante/ Plongez a Marie-Galante!

The island with three rum distilleries, the island of the 100 windmills, the island of sugar cane...there are a few different names for Marie-Galante, the round island south-east of Guadeloupe! I will also call it the place for zen-diving:-) It is absolutely wild underwater, there are no crowds of divers, but schools of fishes, huge sponges and curious sea inhabitants looking at you with a question mark in their eyes! Enjoy the encounters I have captured for you and if you ever make it there, do go diving with the best diving school of the island "ManBalaou"!

 

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"Chez Henri": blues-jazz concert and good mood Caribbean vibes...

Last weekend (on saturday, 16.01.2011) a great Blues&Jazz Fusion event took place in Saint-Louis, Marie-Galante. It was hosted by Henri, in his cozy restaurant "Chez Henri" located on the beach...Sitting under the huge breadfruit tree and with toes in the sand we had the big pleasure to listen to several artists.

First the Jocelyn Menard Quartet opened the concert with lovely jazz music and put everyone in good mood. Then Gino Sitson from Cameroun presented his new album.

And last but not least the night arrived with the amazing voice of Roland Tchakounte, an African Blues-singer, accompanied by the great sounds of his guitarist...

The bar-restaurant "Chez Henri" is known and famous place for musical events in the French Caribbean. The house is actually the birth house of Henri, who restored it some years ago. When you have the chance to get there, dont miss to try his famous "omelette creole" too, together with one "´ti punch" of course....while looking at the sea, under the (above mentioned) bread-fruit tree:-)

The rum of Marie-Galante...

This entry is about the most famous (and common) product of Marie Galante: the sugar cane. From February til June every year all three rum distilleries on the island are very busy cutting the sugar cane. Once its juice is extracted, the fermenting process start and the production of the different final products: from the white rum (50 or 59 %alcohol) through the "rhum ambree" (405%) up the the old rum (40%)...

The three distilleries in Marie Galante are Bielle, Bellevue and Poisson (Pere-Labat)...Each one of them is open to visitor every morning till midday. The guests may then walk into the distillerie itself and are offered rum and punch tasting at the end.

Some interesting rum-info is summarized below. 1100 liters of juice are made from around one ton sugar cane. From this amount of juice one will get 60 liters of pure alcohol, which will gives 120 bottles of alcohol at 50%.

Marie Galante: about the beaches and the curious crabs...

As i had mentioned in my previous blog entry, the island Marie-Galante is famous for its beautiful and not at all crowded white-sand beaches. The beaches are coming of course in set with huge coconut palm trees and plenty of signs to watch yourself because of the falling down fruits

Another nice part of the beaches are the plenty of curious crabs running around. Have a look for yourself and enjoy!

Marie-Galante: the Caribbean sugar cane island...

There are several nicknames for the small Caribbean island between Guadeloupe and Dominique called Marie-Galante. Some people call it the island of the 100 windmills (" l'île aux cent moulins "), from which only 77 are left nowadays here. Others refer to it as "la Galette" (a round and flat French cake), having in mind its round shape of 15 km diameter.

 

The name Marie-Galante was given to it from Christophe Columbus in 1493, it was the name of his ship. This green piece of nature is known not only for having the best beaches of Guadeloupe-archipelago but also (on top of that) also for having the best rum-distilleries in the area. The huge fields of sugar cane are used for the production of sugar, rum and the famous local product called "sirop de batterie", a very thick concentrated extract of sugar cane juice.

 
One of the most common landscapes while driving around the island is the one below: cows and bulls with wide sugar cane fields behind or next to them. The island exports 13 tonnes sugar every year for further treating and it uses 1 tonne..

Intro to exotic fruits+vegetables-part 3

As a continuation to the introduction to the exotic fruits and veggies in the French Antilles (from last year) I would love to present to you today the Xmas fruit/flower: "la groseille pays" (also called "le karkade"). The flowers are cooked in water and the obtained juice is very refreshing when served and consumed cold...

Below you can see the famous breadfruit (fr."fruit a pain"). It replaces the potatoes in the Caribbean cuisine. One may boil it or grate it (and then bake it in the oven as "gratin"). We tried the last version yesterday and it was extremely yummy.

 The other day I was lucky to find on the market in Marie-Galante some guavas. See how my fruits basket looks like today:-) Another new discovery is the fruit called "abricot pays", the one between the guava and pineapple (second picture below). The name in English is mamey apple (or Santo Domingo abricot) and its tree is a close relative of the mangosteen.