The Transportation Camp — Attraction in Saint-Laurent-du-Maroni

An essential place to visit in St Laurent. There are two separate parts, each has its own ticket. Tickets need to be bought in the tourist information office nearby.

For 5 euro you can buy a ticket for a self guided tour through 3 houses in the main area. These have information about the history of the camp and later about the cultures of the area. All texts are in French.

Then there's a guided tour for 6 euro which starts at predefined times (mine 11am) and takes you to the side area for the disciplinary portion of the camp. My guide Lamion spoke good English and you can probably arrange for an English tour if you let them know early enough. I was by myself on the tour just with Lamion and he was great, giving lots of information. There is a cell where Papillon is written twice on the floor, according to the guide it is really from Charriere, but you have to make your own...

I visited in 2012 and did the self guided tour and then the guided tour one on one. The guides English was pretty poor, however as a prison officer with some French we both benefited. I improved my French and he had the benefit of my prison knowledge in English. Then when I departed back to Suriname I had a great conversation with a seconded French passport officer who's English was superb. We had a long interesting conversation due to our occupations. I am glad the guides do now speak English as they expected to receive more English speaking visitors and were...

If you find yourself in Saint-Laurent-du-Maroni this is an obvious place to visit. We did not elect to take a tour but they depart from the Tourist Office. English is not offered every day so you will need to check. Otherwise, we had a fine time just walking around and were able to read enough on Wikipedia that we felt we got...