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Published: February 18th 2015
Past travels.
I think we can call ourselves official island hoppers. Need an island to be explored? Call us, we'll explore, for a small fee, of course or even better, a plane ticket or two to that idyllic destination! We’ll explore on land for you, we’ll explore underwater for you, sample the food and the drink and then give you feedback. Oh, al-right then , I give in, we'll pay our own way, but a complimentary cocktail or two will sweeten the deal. I wish….!
Another dream destination that was on our bucket list, having drooled over other people's photographic memories. Although we had been to many other islands before, this one held an attraction partly because of all the stories that we had heard from Karen, mom & dad, because they had been there and had a great time.
By now yearly holidays overseas were our lifeline, part of our survival package, our adventurous travel spirit needed to be nurtured regularly, or so we convinced ourselves.
In 2007 we were fortunate to visit another beautiful island. But you’ll say an island is an island is an island, right? Not totally true. Each
island is unique in its own way and Seychelles definitely stands out with its own archipelago. Talking of islands, one of the images conjured in one's mind usually includes sipping a rainbow coloured cocktails decorated with a kitsch umbrella in a frosted glass or even better in a coconut, served to you while sitting on white sandy beaches, palm trees swaying in the breeze, overlooking calm turquoise balmy waters.... Ok, you can wake up now and come back down to earth again. Back to work everyone, unless you want to read further. For most people that is a blissful image but for others it would be too boring. We obviously don’t find it boring in the least and we certainly live up to that image.
We flew via Comoros, one of our previous destinations to have a long fuel stop, sitting in the plane in the tropical heat. It didn’t bother us too much because it brought back so many wonderful memories of one of our previous trips and we spent the time reminiscing. These are the 4 blogs for our Comoros trip
Sacrifice a trip? Never!,
Wrecks from sea and air,
A small jewel of an island in the Comoros archipelago and
Island hopping by small plane We landed in the Seychelles in the
evening and as usual the humidity hit us after the air conditioning of the plane. Once we had settled in to our room we decided it was time for a drink. Paul had a local beer and considering we were on a tropical island I thought a cocktail was appropriate. Paul agreed and ordered one for me. The cocktail arrived and it was most enjoyable but when we heard how much it cost I nearly choked on it! It must have been the most expensive cocktail I had ever drunk. After that we bought our stash of drinks, water and cool drinks at a local corner shop as hotel prices were far too expensive for us. There was a little bar fridge that could keep our drinks cold, so we were sorted. We limited our purchase of drinks from the hotel bar. After that first night it became a ritual to find a quiet spot on the beach, have a sunset swim and drink watching the light of day change into night and shout bat...bat as the fruit bats flew over us for their nightly ritual. How can one not enjoy that?
Seychelles is not one of
the most economical destinations but it makes up for that by having some of the most stunning beaches, spectacular views, island culture and flat seas, at least while we were there. Who could believe that just a month or so later in the year the seas could be so rough, according to the locals, that it is difficult to get onto the boats and make any journey on the water unpleasant. Surely they must be having us on. But in reality that is what happens on islands with the various monsoons.
We spent one week at Beau Vallon on Mahé and did the usual touristy things, caught the bus most of the time to get around and went into Victoria, the capital, rummaged through the market, did some shopping and walked around the Botanical gardens.
Paul went diving firs; I decided to stay behind, because this would be a wreck dive quite far out and conditions would not be too my liking. I went for a snorkel just off the beach where there was a reef. The water was crystal clear and I spotted a huge turtle. I was floating while watching the going’s on under water and
listening to it crunching away at the reef. One could easily loose track of time while bobbing about. When Paul came back from his dive he wanted to snorkel as well, because I told him how much I saw while he was out diving but by the time we got in the water the tide had changed and the water was murky and green, so he wasn’t that impressed. To us though, turtles are synonymous with Seychelles, because I think we saw a turtle just about every time we dived or snorkelled.
One of the days we hired a little dinky toy and drove around the island for a day. We had fun exploring, winding up narrow roads, avoiding busses coming downhill at breakneck speed towards us. We drove from bay to bay, swimming and snorkelling. At one such bay we snorkelled at a spot that someone had recommended to us. Unfortunately we were caught out by the tide and had to swim back against the current. We were rewarded for all the battling to get to shore and saw a school of baby squid swimming around us. They danced around and kept us entertained for a
while, before they swam off with the current. There were many other interesting fish, but this stood out for us at that time. We saw some most spectacular views and vistas and chose a stunning little bay for lunch and another swim. Island life is so tough!
After a wonderful week of diving and snorkelling, we flew to Praslin and stayed there for another week at Paradise sun. Praslin airport is one of the most beautiful airports I have ever landed at and it echoes the bliss of a tropical holiday destination. Our hotel room had the most beautiful view overlooking tropical greenery and then onto the beach, looking out onto turquoise waters. We felt quite at home and continued in the same vein as we did on Mahé. We went on many dives, equally momentous for various reasons: beautiful coral gardens, lovely granite boulders under water, numerous different fish, cleaner shrimp, eel and white tipped shark. Sometimes crystal clear water and at other times not so clear. One of those dives was in very murky waters with some swell and surge but not unpleasant and we swam through a gap under huge boulders. There I was
minding my own business having my own mental conversation with the little colourful fish, listening to the coral cracking and the parrot fish munching, fascinated by the unicorn fish and making sure I wasn’t anywhere near the largest stone fish I have ever seen, when I saw another large shape approaching us. I couldn't make out what it was because the visibility wasn't so good, but it looked rather ominous and I tried to get Paul's attention to alert him because he was just ahead of me and didn’t see this potential threat in my serene world. Anything that size I felt we should be weary of, because friendly or not, it could take a big chunk out of me if it was the tiniest bit hungry. I managed to get Paul’s attention as well as the other divers and we watched it get closer. Fortunately it wasn’t a man eating mammal and turned out to be a buffalo parrot fish, a first for us. He was close to 1.5 meters, not a size to mess with but fortunately he didn't consider us to be part of his diet and went on his merry way, quite graceful for the sizeable
chunk he was, gliding through the water.
We went to La Digue, another island, for the day and I have a slight confession to make - one of my blunders in life is that I can't ride a bicycle. Trust me, I've tried, but I just cannot really get the hang of it. My body doesn't want to balance itself on those two wheels and propel forwards in a graceful manner. I always seem to be all legs and arms outstretched while wobbling along, ending up in with a jolt on the ground. Included as part of our tour on La Digue was the use of a bicycle to get around. I thought I could give it a bash, but they aren’t really state of the art bicycles with an invisible balancing mechanism, and though I tried, I knew it would have been a struggle for me, so we had to walk around La Digue. I think my dear husband is still very annoyed with me to this day, that we couldn't sight see on two wheels, but he made sure he dragged me from one size of the island to the other. I found
a mode of transport more to my liking, but I thought the owner would object if I just took it. (see photo) In fact I am going to be hard pressed to choose photos because we have so many beautiful ones, so I will leave them to show you the beauty of Seychelles. Needless to say we had a wonderful time and could easily go back there again.
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Home and Away
Bob Carlsen
I've always thought that the Seychelles are one of the most beautiful spots on earth...
Thanks for sharing your vacation there with us. This may be the closest I get.