A slice of France pinned to South America's northeast shoulder, French Guiana is over ninety percent dense Amazon rainforest. The coast holds the colourful Creole capital Cayenne and the rocket town of Kourou, while rivers like the Maroni thread inland to Maroon and Amerindian villages reached only by pirogue. Mangroves, the Kaw marshes and reserves teem with caimans, scarlet ibis, jaguars and leatherback turtles that nest on the beaches. Equatorial humidity, French…
“Papillon” (1973), with Steve McQueen and Dustin Hoffman, etched the Devil's Island penal colony off Kourou into the world's memory.
From Kourou, the Guiana Space Centre launches Europe's Ariane rockets — you can watch lift-offs from dedicated viewing sites.
The Salvation Islands are reached by catamaran from Kourou. An eSIM helps: launch calendars (roads close), island shuttles and equatorial weather before a pirogue trip on the Maroni.