The highlight of our trip to Martinique was the public beach/park called Les Salines. It is only a 5 minute drive from Ste Anne, with free parking and free entry. It’s the kind of beach that you picture when you close your eyes and think of a perfect tropical beach. Palm trees line the beach, and there isn’t a single building in sight. All the concession stands are set back considerably from the beach and can’t be seen. There are public bathrooms and showers. The sand was extremely clean, soft, and white. The only downside was the crowds – during this peak holiday season there was a lot of people, especially on the stretch of beach nearest the car park.

To get away from the crowds, we wandered away from the main part of the beach, and the crowd thinned out, but the beach was just as beautiful. What we didn’t realize however was that the farther we got, the rougher the surf was. We both lost our sunglasses to a large wave, and were knocked to the ground. Fortunately we both had spare sunglasses back at the hotel. So our advice would be to be careful about the waves, and if looking for a quieter stretch of beach, try heading left instead of right when facing the ocean coming from the car park, as it seemed calmer in that direction.

We didn’t try any of the concession stands, but they looked like a reasonable price. There is also chairs and umbrellas for rent.