Le Marin Martinique

The marina at Le Marin has berths for 720 yachts   

In the morning our priority was to complete the arrivals formalities. Interestingly, given its location, Martinique is both a part of France and a part of the EU. You can either complete the check-in process on a computer in one of the nominated bars, or on computers set aside for the task in the marina in Le Marin. We went for the latter and, arriving on the dock, had a nice surprise, meeting up with Ade and Sam from Neva (last seen in Las Palmas) who had picked up some work delivering a charter catamaran. We hatched a plan to get together for drinks later and then, once we had checked in, we went off to explore. 

Martinique is a mecca for sailing yachts in this region because of the food and wine and the fantastic yacht chandleries and maintenance facilities. We knew that we needed to refill our empty lockers and fridge with food and wine and were looking forward to getting our hands on some French pates and cheeses. We also wanted to buy some bits for the solar panel project and arrange for some work to be done on the dinghy and the generator. We hoped that Le Marin would be able to provide for us on all fronts.

Local fishing boats sit side by side the hundreds of sailing yachts   

We did a whistle-stop tour of the many, many marine shops on that first day and, happily, found that we would be able to get the time critical stuff sorted out. We arranged for BV’s generator to be serviced the following week by the Fischer Panda agent and we also booked our dinghy in for some attention. The rubbing strake around the outside of it had, yet again, come unstuck in several places, despite our DIY attempts to re-attach it, and so we had decided that it was time for a professional to have a go at fixing it properly. Food and wine shopping was a great success and we started enjoying lovely French cheeses, pâtes and baguettes with our lunches. We even made some progress on the solar panel project. In the marina complex was a charming electrician from whom we were able to get one of the solar panel controllers that I was after. He set it up with the latest firmware and gave me some good advice for adjusting it when we leave the boat on the hard. Sadly, we didn’t find the size of solar panels we are looking for and 25mm stainless steel tubing seems to be sold out on Martinique as well in St Lucia. We solved the solar panel problem by telephoning one of the big chandleries in Sint Maarten and buying some over the phone which we will pick up from that island in a few weeks [Ed: typically we later found the right sized solar panels in Martinique!]. However, the tubing may have to wait until we are in the USA because the Caribbean islands seem to have used up their stock repairing yachts after hurricanes Irma and Maria hit last year. 

Part of the ‘Cine Searcus’ act – picture taken
 by Anna-Malin on her phone.
 Unfortunately, I forgot to take my camera    

The anchorage close to Le Marin worked well for us and we had a very social time with the other yachts nearby. We even took the dinghy to watch a travelling ‘Cine Searcus’ which took place on 3 French yachts anchored in the next hurricane hole bay. The crews of these yachts performed music, juggling, acrobatics in the rigging and showed amusing films of their exploits travelling the world and performing. They even ran a floating bar for the 50 or so dinghies rafted up to watch the show. However, the water in the anchorage was not somewhere we would swim or run our watermaker [Ed: remember it’s a Cul de Sac with about 2000 boats anchored in it] and so, after a few days close to Le Marin, we decided to move out to the anchorage at Sainte Anne. 

Le Marin, Martinique