It was raining. Never a great start to the days ride if it’s already raining, but I was happy to begin with me and all my gear being dry. My bike was parked at the front door and so I slowly decluttered the apartment and put everything in its spot on my bike. I was deliberately taking my time as I didn’t have a long ride to the border, and it was raining, and I wanted to check out late, as some sort of protest about having been forced to check in late. Self serving, but satisfying. Eventually after a pause in the rain and no one coming to tell me that I was late checking out, I left.

245 kilometres. 3 hours and 5 minutes. According to Google Maps. Rain all the way according to the weather app. Both turned out correct. There was fort thingy on the side of the road on the outskirts of Cayenne. It was small but cool and made me think more about what it would have been like being around the area in the era of slavery and colonisation in these terrible conditions. It was closed and there was no one around so I didn’t bother getting off my bike. I just rode it around the ruins instead of walking.

French Guiana has a space port called the Guiana Space Centre. It was on my way near a town called Kourou but for some reason, probably the rain, I missed it and couldn’t be bothered going back. It’s been there since 1968 and is where most of Europe’s rockets and satellites are launched from. Because it is near the equator it means the earth is at its widest point and therefore spinning the fastest and therefore a good place to launch rockets. I didn’t know that. Maybe I should have gone there for a look and I would have found that out instead of reading about it now.

I did cross a cute bridge into a nice little riverside town for lunch. Across from the church there was a woman selling food. I have no idea what it was, but it tasted nice and was a good price. I’m still struggling with the people speaking French. As I entered Saint-Laurent-du Maroni, let’s just call it SLdM, I saw a few side roads with letterboxes on them. There must be a few people live down this street.

SLdM is a smallish border town of 50,000 people and it is located on the Maroni River about 30 kms upstream from the ocean. The river is quite wide and serves as the border between FG and Suriname. There is no bridges and the only way to cross is by ferry, and finding out information about ferry times seemed difficult online.

Like Cayenne the accommodation was expensive but I found a nice little apartment with parking in the centre of town for $100AUD. All done by phone, with a key box on a wall but unlike the last owner, this guy was very responsive. Sadly, there was no off street parking. The guy said that Airbnb did not say parking was available but then apologised when I sent him a screenshot of it. To be honest I think the next place with parking was another $60AUD a night and so I decided that despite the dodginess of the town, that I could put my bike in a safeish spot and put on my alarmed disc lock and another disc lock and the cover and it was also just outside my window.

It was a very small apartment but had everything I needed. The sofa bed took up most of the floor space. I had to take everything off my bike and stack it in the shower cubicle as that was the only free floor space. But that was fine because it was all wet anyway. It was a strange little collection of apartments and people but felt safe enough.

I wandered down to the river and then followed it for a while and came across a lot of old buildings. Also, being a Sunday, there were lots of families down enjoying the river. A couple of people stopped me on my walk and asked for money. I said that I only had my card, and one guy asked me to follow him to the bakery to buy bread for his children with my credit card. I hadn’t seen a bakery anywhere, and it all seemed a bit sus. So I politely moved on. I had passed several interesting old government type buildings on my walk and a church in the middle of the road and some nice drains. People often overlook nice drains when they visit places.

As I neared the river I came across Le Camp de la Transportation. A big walled facility. It was getting late but still light, and despite saying it was closed, the guy on the gate let me go in for a wander around. It would have been a huge complex in its day.

In the mid 1850’s the prisons in France were overflowing and so Napolean decided to send the prisoners to FG in South America and New Caledonia near Australia. In a system that would be a wonderful idea for Donald Trump to use, they sent the prisoners to build their own prisons for free. The jungle was dense and dangerous and there was nowhere they could escape to, so it was a perfect location. In the early days they lost about 75% of the prisoners to disease and malaria, poor sanitation, malnutrition and brutal hard labour.

The worst of the prisoners were relocated to Devils Island which I had also heard about but missed on the ride up. Strangely enough it was located off the same town as the Space Centre. Devils Island was the basis for a book (1969) and films called Papillon (butterfly in French) and was the autobiography of Henri Charrière who was nicknamed Papillon because of a butterfly tattoo on his chest. I remember the book was very popular when I was a young kid. It had a pretty blue butterfly on the cover. And obviously a horrible story inside which I was too young to read.

The SLdM prison was due to close prior to WW2 but was delayed until 1953 when the Red Cross returned the last of the convicts back to France, Over 70,000 convicts had been held in FG. Most of them in SLdM. It was declared an historical monument in 1994. It didn’t seem to be set up as a tourist attraction. Just a few old signs in French and English and you were free to wander around by yourself.

It turned out that SLdM decided that I wasn’t free to leave the next morning as planned. I had to stay another night in my small expensive cell. I knew that I had to go to the Suriname Consulate in town to get a Tourist Card (visa) on Monday morning and so I went to check out what time it opened. It didn’t. There was a sign saying they would be closed for a public holiday on Monday. Something to do with Ramadan? It was a Suriname public holiday and so nothing would be open even if I did sneak across the river. The sign said it would be open at 9:00am on Tuesday. Which was the exact same time that the ferry was leaving. Fortunately there was another one at 3:30pm. Unfortunately everything closed at 4:00pm in Suriname. So even if I got my Tourist Card and took the late ferry I couldn’t enter anyway. That would mean staying a third night in SLdM. I wasn’t happy. I spent the night in my $100 cell drinking beer, and eating a nice baguette.

Tuesday morning I was up with a positive approach. I packed up my bike and parked up in front of the Suriname Consulate an hour early, in the rain, hoping someone would arrive early and take pity on me and I could get it done early and quickly and get to the ferry, which was only 5 minutes away. And then a lady did show up early. Unfortunately she didn’t have a key. Her colleague with the key had a little sleep in and arrived about 9:15. It only took 10 minutes and about 20 bucks and I zoomed down to see if the ferry was running late. Nope. It had left on time and I could see it unloading across the river.

I had heard the entry process once you’d crossed the river took about 2 hours. And I was also told if I thought SLdM was a dodgy town then wait until you see the border town of Alina in Suriname. So I sat by myself in the rain at the empty ferry terminal contemplating my life choices. Should I go back and take a third night in the cell, or cross over and spend the night in Albina. I googled and couldn’t find any accommodation places at all. And I would be staying there illegally anyway. But maybe there was a third option?

I had noticed a couple of little gondola type boats crossing the river. If I could find one that would take my motorbike I could get over there early enough. After a few enquires I found out only people can cross by small boat and vehicles are not allowed. Then I thought of a fourth option.

I asked if I could leave my bike in the ferry terminal and go over in the small boat and do all my paperwork to get into Suriname and then come back to FG and catch the afternoon ferry with my bike. This was done with me speaking Spanish to another person who then translated it into French. What could go wrong. They said it was fine and stamped me out of FG and I jumped in the next available boat. It was about $10. And he said he would wait for me. I tried to explain I would be a long time?  Anyway I crossed the river and went to immigration. They checked my tourist card and stamped me in to Suriname. And then it got complicated.

I tried to stamp my bike in but they said I needed to go to the Godo Bank in town and purchase the insurance first. So I found the bank, which was really busy. In theory the people in Suriname speak English. The reality didn’t quite match. But I got through bank security and was given a number in the queue. I ended up in a little office with a nice lady who spoke reasonable English and after half an hour of paperwork she said I had to pay the $6 or whatever the bike insurance cost. I had to pay it at another little window with a queue. But first I had to change some money at another little window with a queue. The lady from the office came out and suggested it would be much quicker if I went into the shop next door and changed some money. Which I did.

I then got back through the crowd outside the bank, past security and got my ticket to pay the fee. After that I went back to the office for more paperwork and an online form thingy and after only 2 hours I had my insurance paper for the bike and was free to go back to the immigration office. Once I got back there I tried to get my bike into Suriname but turns out you need to have a bike to show them. And pointing at it across the river wasn’t going to cut it. So I found another little boat and went back to French Guiana without checking out of Suriname and without checking back into FG. And I was hungry.

I left my bike at the port and headed up the road to where I could see some shops. Outside was a young guy selling stuff from a big saucepan. It seemed popular so I peered in. A few too many chicken feet for my liking but someone bought most of those and then it looked better. The guy was nice and spoke a bit of English and offered me a free sample. I then felt obligated to buy some. Turns out it was delicious. You just choose an item from the pot and he puts it in a small plastic bag. I ended up having 4 go’s. Mainly the sausages, which he makes himself every day. We had a great chat between people rocking up and buying food. So many people were drinking cans of beer and it was lunchtime. He said it is a big problem in FG. We exchanged WhatsApp numbers and then I went back to the port where I admired some nice bundles of wood, while I waited for my ferry to arrive.

Boarding the ferry was quick and easy and when we arrived I was first off and I already knew where to go. I showed customs my bike and my insurance paperwork from the Godo Bank and they gave me my Temporary Import Permit (TIP) and I was good to go. They opened the gate and let me through and I was on the road and heading for the capital of Paramaribo with just enough daylight to get there. But as I rounded the first bend there was an idiot on the wrong side of the road. Although we weren’t going fast I had to take evasive action and ride off the road on to the grassy shoulder. Bloody idiot. I knew that unlike the rest of South America, they drive on the left hand side of the road in Suriname and yet here I was, riding on the right, almost causing an accident!