Seychelles - Thursday 2010/12/02 |
On this day was our planned trip to the islands Praslin and La Digue. We got up at 05:00, had a small breakfast and then were picked up with a bus at about 06:00 and brought to the harbour in Victoria where our ferry to Praslin would be leaving. On our ferry there was also a funny Japanese film crew who were apparently creating a documentary for kids.
There were quite strong waves on our trip and when we arrived about 45 minutes later, there was heavy rain on Praslin. Luckily we didn't stay long because we only switched boats to get to La Digue where we arrived after another 15 minutes trip with the sun welcoming us.
On La Digue we switched from the boat unto ox carts, which brought us to L'Union Estate, which is a Copra factory. There we were shown how coconuts can be opened with a sharp stick. The coconuts will then be dried and the resulting copra is processed in a mill to get coconut oil.
Nearby is the Anse Source d'Argent, which is the famous beach on which many commercials like Bounty are shot and which has also been used in an Emmanuelle film. Since it wasn't cleaned when we were there and was full of seaweed it didn't look all that impressive. There is also the house used in an Emmanuelle film and an enclosure with some giant tortoises which can be fed and petted.
From there we went further through a vanilla plantation (which didn't smell at all because vanilla only gets its smell after a long process of drying and fermentation) to a very nice beach. Since we didn't have much time we didn't go swimming but spent our time walking along the beach with some amazing rock formations. We then were brought back to the harbour and took the ferry back to Praslin, where by now the sun was shining as well.
Our first stop on Praslin was at a restaurant for lunch. It was a buffet with different curries and some grilled fish. Since we had announced Anna's allergy to cinnamon before this trip, they were nice enough to prepare all the curries without any cinnamon.
After lunch we made a short stop at a waterfall to take pictures and then went on to the Vallée de Mai. We got a very thorough description of all the different parts of the Coco-de-Mer palm tree and then walked a bit through the forest, getting explanations about different plants and animals along the way. There were some small geckos on the male parts of the Coco-de-Mer which are important for the pollination. We also saw one very large, brown gecko which was eating white slugs on another male Coco-de-Mer. There're supposed to be endemic black parrots but we only heard this one. We also didn't see the chameleons or snakes which are also supposed to live there.
Afterwards we were brought to Anse Lazio which is a wonderful beach with unbelievably fine and white sand. We spend some time swimming and watching the rockskippers on the nearby rocks. With this our day on Praslin ended and we took the ferry back to Mahé with the sun setting while we were on board. We were brought back to our hotel just in time for dinner.
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