Javouhey

Javouhey is one of the two Hmong villages of French Guiana, settled in the late 1970s by refugee families from Laos who were given land and turned it into the territory's vegetable garden, and its Sunday market is the reason to come: stalls of produce grown in the surrounding fields, Hmong embroidery, and bowls of noodle soup eaten at long tables. Like Cacao, the other Hmong village, it feeds Cayenne's markets all week.

What you actually see

• The Sunday market - produce, embroidery and cooked food at long tables.
• The Hmong farms - the fields that supply much of the territory's vegetables.
• The noodle soup - the bowls that draw people out from Saint-Laurent and beyond.
• The 1970s settlement - a village built by refugee families from Laos.

When to go

Sunday morning is the market and the reason to time the visit. July to November is the dry season. Other days the village is simply quiet farmland.

Honest expectations

Outside Sunday morning there is very little to see or do. It is a long drive for a market unless combined with Mana and the coast. Stalls wind down by early afternoon.

Nearby

Mana is north, and Saint-Laurent is south.