Guadeloupe is an overseas department of France, located in the Lesser Antilles in the Caribbean. Like its neighbor Martinique and like French Guiana, it is an integral part of France: same currency (euro), French law, French passports, representation in the French National Assembly.
The timezone is UTC-4, year-round, with no daylight saving time. Metropolitan France is UTC+1 in winter and UTC+2 in summer, meaning Guadeloupe runs 5 or 6 hours behind Paris depending on the season.
Two islands, one administration
Guadeloupe is actually a butterfly-shaped pair of islands: Basse-Terre (the western wing, volcanic and mountainous, with the administrative capital) and Grande-Terre (the eastern wing, flatter and more agricultural). They are separated by a shallow strait called the Rivière Salée.
Both islands share the same timezone, obviously, but they have somewhat different characters. Grande-Terre has the tourist beaches. Basse-Terre has the Soufrière volcano, which is still active.
The sugar history
Guadeloupe’s economy was historically dominated by sugar production, based on enslaved labor brought from West Africa under French colonial rule. The sugar plantation system shaped the island’s demography, culture, and architecture fundamentally. Traces of this history are everywhere: in the names of plantations, in the family histories of the Guadeloupean population, and in the agricultural landscape.
Slavery was abolished in the French territories in 1848, re-enacted after a brief reinstatement under Napoleon, following the efforts of Victor Schoelcher, a French abolitionist who is a national hero in Guadeloupe today.
The sugar industry still exists, producing rum as well as raw sugar, but it is no longer dominant.
