Guadeloupe 2015: April 21

When the lights go off on a moonless night in the Caribbean, it is about as dark as dark can be.  I awoke around 2 a.m. this morning to black, and silence, and hot, and determined that there was a power outage.  Bill pulled down the mosquito netting on all the beds and opened the shutters, and then we lay there listening to the roosters, who, yes, know no night.  They'll go for ten or 15 crows, and all the other roosters near and far will answer, and then they'll quiet down for a while.  Now I can even identify the different ones.  There are dogs that bark regardless of light, and cats that caterwaul, too.  And peepers and other buggy things of course.  It is a veritable symphony in the darkness.

I find myself thinking about what it must have been like here, say, three hundred years ago, if you were a planter or a slave.  Planters lived in fear of slave uprisings on such nights, and the way French planters treated their slaves, they had good cause to be afraid.  And this would have been a good night for a slave to run, but to where?  The only place to hide here is the jungle, and you can’t live there indefinitely although I have a vague recollection of something about maroon communities in the lower rainforest.  But the only thing creeping around here tonight are a few teeny lizards.  Everything came back on in a couple of hours of course and woke us up all over again.

Izzy has a marvelous picture book about Jacques Cousteau, called “Manfish,” in which one learns about JC’s youth and love of the sea and invention of SCUBA and of course his red cap.  Today we pay homage to Cousteau, with a snorkel at the Ilet Pigeon marine reserve, part of the Parc Nationale.  Cousteau apparently called this one of the best places in the world to dive, and while we don’t know from diving, we do know that it was a wonderful and memorable experience.  The Ilets Pigeon, named for some old sugar planter, are two barren coral specks just barely off the coast at Malendure.  Seriously, it takes about five minutes on a boat, and many folks kayak there.  There are a whole bunch of companies that will take you out.  We just picked one that had snorkeling prominently advertised among its features, as we were not ready for our baptême, as a first-time scuba dive is called.[1]

We booked our plonge a day in advance, tout en francais with a comical mime until we figure out that we are supposed to bring towels (serviettes, which is also what you call a napkin, so therein lies the confusion). 

All the dive companies and glass-bottomed-boat excursions and kayak rentals are lined up near the pier and it is a bustling scene first thing as lots of folks have been out for early morning dives and many more are gearing up to go out.   We're helped into our gear by a Liverpudlian, which is actually a relief because there really are pas d’Anglais here and while it is not hard to figure out what to do, my diving French is thin.  I am pleased that I have some French because there is not a lot of Anglais here.  But it is kind of exhausting trying to keep up and so once on the boat I just kind of stopped trying to translate for my family and hoped that we would somehow absorb whatever he was telling everyone else.   

We are advised to wear wetsuits so we all stuff ourselves into damp neoprene (that will leave mildew on our new suits dammit).  I think I look like Joan Harris from Mad Men in mine but it is the thing to do, so zip zip but make sure you pee first!  French men often wear bikini-style bathing suits at an age when perhaps they shouldn't, so seeing some of them half-in their wetsuits is really quite a site.[2]

Isabel, a little nervous at managing flippers, mask, and snorkel but looking pretty cute in her little wetsuit, gamely jumps in, and immediately bobs up shrieking “FISH!  I SEE FISH!”  She keeps squealing through her snorkel every time she sees a parrotfish or an angelfish or a blue tang or any of the many other brilliant tropical fish in the coral reef that surrounds these two little rocky piles.  

The water got a bit choppy, some weather came through at first, and we were glad of our wetsuits because after a while it was not super warm (except for Peter, who claimed he was hot).  But it was truly amazing, and even without the sun (which did come out, making it even more Finding Nemo-like), it was amazing.  We only stay in the little narrows between the Ilets, because we are advised by the guide (we think) that farther out is too deep for snorkelers.  But if we had gotten out there, we might have seen the underwater statue of JC, the head of which divers touch for luck.  We imagine that there is a shiny spot on his head, like John Harvard’s left toe.

Here is a partial list of the fish we think we saw:

-       Peacock Flounder

-       Bluehead Wrasse, actually there are many kind of wrasse and we saw several

kinds of Parrotfish

-       Angelfish

-       Foureye Butterflyfish (or maybe a spotfin or a reef but definitely butterflyfish)

-       Damselfishes, including the Sargeant Major (clearly a cross-dresser)

-       Triggerfish

-       Porcupinefish (a.k.a. pufferfish)

-       Grunts

-       Groupers?

-       Tangs

-       Surgeonfish and Doctorfish (the former obviously have more training)

-       Some Boxfishes, including trunk and cowfishes

-       Hamlets

-       Urchin

-       Needlefish

Peter thinks he saw a puddingwife.  Even if he didn’t that is a fun fish name to consider.

We are doing this by looking at pictures of fish online and saying “I think I saw that!”  It is an imperfect science but the point is that there were many interesting creatures down there and we got to swim with them.

Starting your snorkeling career at the Cousteau Reserve around the Ilets Pigeon is a bit like starting your ski career in Telluride:  you will be spoiled for snorkeling anywhere else.  

Later today we did, in fact, find the unnamed Plage Leroux, and it is pretty good but it is no Ilets Pigeon.  We did see a big ol’ iguana, though.

Adding notches to our Death in Paradise belt:  dined at La Kaz, which was the outer setting for Katherine's bar in the series.  Here we met some local cats, practiced in the art of getting fishy bits from tourists like us.  All the local animals here are friendly, but old, with eyes clouded by cataracts.  It is a little unsettling, but we also wonder if maybe they pop in the cataract lens before going out for the evening, the better to work on the tourist sympathies.  

You know that very popular book, written by a frustrated parent, Go the F**k to Sleep!?  I am going to write one for the roosters on Guadeloupe, called Shut the F**k Up!

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[1] Some in our party were tempted by the company that advertised a kayak-snorkel-banana boat combo, mostly because we think the brochure said that you could accost the islands from your kayak!  And then get towed back on a banana.  Pirate imagery was involved.  The leader of our party chose a more sober route.

[2] Also, I am routinely the only woman on any beach in a one-piece bathing suit.  Or maybe one of two.  And most women look pretty great.  No Gabrielle Reece, but just great.  I note again that they are all French.  Clearly they are on to something.