More on Guadeloupe, etc.

First European to visit was Christopher Columbus himself in 1493. Under French control since 1635, except for a few periods in British hands, and one stint 1813-1814 under Swedish rule! How did that happen?

There was indeed unrest during the early Spring of 2009, with demands for increased minimum wage. The tourism business was shut down for a couple of weeks, but the turmoil now seems to have dissipated. I read a couple of very positive travel reviews. I think Guadeloupe just bumped Belize off the top of my list of places I'd like to visit during late winter.

I found a nice page with travel info. Looks like Delta has the only nonstop flight from the US (Atlanta). American Airlines do have flights, but they have a connection in San Juan, Puerto Rico, with a pretty long layover. The airline code is PTP (Pointe A Pitre, the biggest city). The distance from MIA (Miami International Airport) to PTP is 2216 km / 1377 mi. From Europe, it's an eight hour flight from Paris.

It does seem like all EU law applies, including immigration legislation, so an EU passport should indeed allow you to work and live there permanently.

Saint-Pierre and Miquelon however, DOES require a visa for EU citizens who stay more than 30 days. So in summary, it looks like only Guadeloupe and Martinique meet the criteria of i) being close to the US and ii) letting an EU citizen work and stay permanently with no other documents required than an EU passport. Guadeloupe and Martinique seem similar (islands in the Caribbean, between 1,000 and 2,000 square kilometers of land area, populations just north of 400,000), but it seems the former has slightly better connections by air. You'll probably need to know French if you really want to live there though. Sounds like English is mostly spoken by those in the tourism industry.

A couple of the islands in the Netherlands Antilles might also move toward closer ties with the EU, perhaps even close enough to meet the criteria above in a couple of years?

Sorry for the font problems in this post, I can't make blogger not screw it up...