Greetings From Gwada: Touring Guadeloupe with Willy Monfret

Words by Jesse Serwer—

Visiting Guadeloupe and Martinique from the United States just got a whole lot easier. American Airlines introduced weekly direct flights to the French departments from Miami in April and, adding more connection options, AA’s new partner Seaborne Airlines is now flying four days a week from Puerto Rico to Guadelouple’s Pointe-à-Pitre Airport and Martinique Aimé Césaire International.

In a bid to lure more visitors to the increasingly accessible island chain, Guadeloupe has launched a new, English-language webisode series featuring cultural highlights as seen by  Willy Monfret—the France-based Gwada male model (and DJ/producer) best known stateside for playing Nicki Minaj’s love interest in her “Right Through Me” video.

After catching up with long-lost relatives, sampling fresh sugar cane juice and hitting the clubs in episode one, the second installment of the “Let Me Show You My Islands” series (catch the first here) puts a spotlight on satellite island Marie-Galante (about 14 miles by sea from Pointe-à-Pitre). There, Willy gets in touch with the tiny but culturally rich isle’s history and present, travelling by ox-drawn carriage, kayaking through mangrove swamps and visiting Pere Labat distillery, home to one of the Caribbean’s strongest and most revered white rums.

We already had 99 reasons why we couldn’t wait to hop a flight to Guadeloupe, but it looks like now we’ve got a few more. Looking forward to seeing what new ones Willy and his crew drum up next…