Martinique is a single volcanic island the size of Greater London, and it changes completely from end to end. The north is Mount Pelée — whose 1902 eruption destroyed Saint-Pierre and killed 30,000 people in minutes — with rainforest, the Gorges de la Falaise and beaches of black volcanic sand. The south is dry, and the sand turns white: Les Salines at the bottom of the island is the beach every Martinican names first. In between, the Route de la Trace crosses the interior through tree ferns, and the island's twelve distilleries make rhum agricole under the only AOC awarded to a rum anywhere in the world.
- Mount Pelée and the ruins of Saint-Pierre
- Les Salines beach
- The Jardin de Balata
- The Route de la Trace and the Pitons du Carbet
- The rhum agricole distilleries
- Fort-de-France and the Schoelcher Library
- Best time to go
- December–April for dry, breezy weather; Carnival peaks just before Lent. June–November is the wet and hurricane season. The Tour des Yoles round-island sailing race is in late July.
- Getting there
- Direct flights from Paris to Fort-de-France (about 8h30). Fast ferries to Guadeloupe, Dominica and Saint Lucia. A car is needed to see both ends of the island.
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Headline places
What france.fr leads with in Martinique.
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Mount Pelée The 1902 eruption killed 30,000 people in minutes; UNESCO-listed since 2023 -
Les Salines The beach every Martinican names first — a kilometre of it -
Jardin de Balata 3,000 tropical species and a rope walkway through the canopy - The Ruins of Saint-Pierre What is left of the 'Paris of the Caribbean' after 8 May 1902
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Pitons du Carbet Five rainforest peaks crossed by the Route de la Trace
Cities & bases
Where to sleep, and what each place is good for.
Martinique by experience
The themes this region delivers on.
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Culture & heritage 53 UNESCO World Heritage sites, and the cathedrals that invented Gothic -
Nature & outdoors Glaciers, gorges, volcanoes and 180,000 km of waymarked footpath -
Coast & beaches Three seas and an ocean — around 5,800 km of mainland coast, and far more overseas -
Mountains Six massifs — the Alps, Pyrenees, Jura, Vosges, Massif Central and Corsica -
Cities Paris, and eleven more cities that would headline any other country -
National & regional parks Eleven national parks and 58 regional ones — about a fifth of the country -
Remembrance The Somme, Verdun and the Normandy beaches — two wars written into the landscape -
Romance The Riviera corniche, a Loire château, a Provençal village, a Paris weekend
More of Overseas France
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Guadeloupe A butterfly-shaped Caribbean archipelago — rainforest on one wing, dry coast on the other -
French Guiana Amazon rainforest, a European spaceport, and the prison islands of Papillon -
Réunion An Indian Ocean volcano with three collapsed craters, and 1,000 km of walking trails -
Mayotte One of the world's largest lagoons, humpback whales, and a double coral barrier