Islands worth every promise
This is the first part of my "travel the world" series of blog entries... among many other entries I write, as always totally random and irrelevant to any specific topic a proper blog should have... but I have been to many places, mainly thanks to one amazing person in my family, and sharing it with whoever wants to read, is a good way to share some stories, I think.
So to start...
There is an amazing lady, full of energy and vitality, who comes from the Seychelles. So actually she is a Seychellois. Her name is Therese. Thanks to her I discovered these beautiful, exotic and unbelievably amazing islands and their food and culture. I will come to the food later...
The reason why I mention Therese is because she is a local. It is always worth visiting a place with a local person, which every tourist guide will recommend too... but apart from the greatness of Therese's generosity, kindness and great love of these islands... her greatness also comes from having a beautiful house with a beautiful view on the Island of Praslin. Thanks to her, I saw these islands like no other tourist probably has.
The thing about going to places with locals, is that they show you places you would never dream of. You probably wouldn't even think of visiting them... because you wouldn't know about them. Simple.
So our journey to the Seychelles started with an approximately two hour flight from Mauritius. And I can really say sitting at the airport at two in the morning is not exactly my view of a holiday, but it was the only flight available... so worth the lack of sleep.
The first thing you do, before you actually step foot onto the tropics of the Coco de Mer, is attempt to land on a ridiculously short landing strip at Mahé island.
Since my fear of flying is pretty bad, this part really turned into my worse nightmare... but after a successful landing! we could happily step into the blinding sunshine.
We rented probably the smallest car you can imagine... (I swear even smaller than a smart car) and managed to fit four people and six suitcases (three out of those four people were women...) into this car. Pretty much a miracle.
So p.s. If someone who reads this decides to go to the Seychelles, I would seriously recommend renting a car there. (probably not one of those proportions but...) The islands need to be explored and Mahé is one of them!
We drove through Victoria (the capital of the Seychelles) which is a beautiful and very clean and well taken care of city. Unlike many other tropical islands where I have been, the Seychellois really take care of their heritage, which is great.
Since for the first night, before going on to Praslin, we stayed at some lovely and welcoming friends (thanks to Therese again), we got a chance to see how some people live on the islands.
Not bad, right?
Well apart from the house, the views from it were magnificent. Located on top of a mountain, we had the view over Victoria harbour and of course the Indian ocean. After a welcome drink of wine, we explored Victoria itself.
The fruit and vegetables market was amazing. Unbelievably colourful and full of coconuts. And the great thing about being there with Therese, was the fact that we got everything at the 'local' price and everyone was very very friendly towards us.
And fresh coconut water, I can say, has become my most favourite drink in the world.
However... since this entry should not be too long... I will write more about Mahé later.
I will also cover the ultimate paradise greatness of Praslin, La Digue, Bird Island and others.
But to end for now I just wanted to say... that
THE SEYCHELLES LOOK EXACTLY LIKE THEY DO ON POSTCARDS
-> really.
No comments:
Post a Comment