Seychelles
Jeremy Atiyah visited the islands where
he was one of the few people not related to an ex-president - and discovered Eden Indian Ocean
It can be hard to take seriously a place
whose name sounds like it was invented to sound like "sea-shells". A
hundred islands sprinkled over four hundred thousand square kilometres of ocean
and only 70,000 people living in them? What was this? A corny beach paradise
designed by tour operators? A film-set dreamt up for Bacardi commercials? Or a
raw, wild country, waiting to be explored by travellers like me?
It was certainly raw and wild 200 years
ago when people first started settling here. In those days the population
comprised a few dozen French desperadoes who made a living by running after the
local wildlife - tortoises. If that wasn't embarrassing enough, they also kept
slaves, eight each on average. It was onto this seedy little world that the
Brits came to impose 150 years of colonial rule before independence (in 1976).
Even today, arriving at the Seychelles Indian
Ocean a thousand miles off the coast of Kenya
In contrast to the environmental
hooligans that first settled these islands, latter day Seychellois governments
are bent on keeping their islands clean and exclusive - the international
airport remains a tiny, colonial relic, with lazy fans swishing over the heads
of elegant black ladies in cotton dresses, and tropical rain drumming outside.
Raw and wild? I set out for a quick tour of the archipelago to find out.
Mahe
Downtown Victoria Seychelles
Men in shorts, trilbies and open shirts
stand in porches watching rain fall like glass rods. I noticed a printed notice
on a wall, from the Supreme Court of the Seychelles
Why shouldn't the sale of a water
sausage make legal news in a city where the town centre is marked by a clock
tower half the size of a palm tree? In the town bar - the Love Nut (decorated
with paintings of floral pubises and penises) - I sat chatting to a local
eccentric who turned out to be the brother of the former president. "In a
country this small," he chuckled, "just think what proportion of the
population are brothers of former presidents."
Praslin
The 5,000 residents of Praslin, the
second island of the archipelago, reckon that Mahe represents life in the fast
lane. Every inch of shore is a perfect beach. Clothes hang out to dry on
bushes. Road signs indicate that drivers should watch for tortoises crossing. I
passed a football stadium containing a single spectator, staring at the empty
pitch.
By far the grandest building on the
island is the Praslin Casino, gleaming with so much white stucco that I
temporarily mistook it for the national parliament. Inside, what looked like
the local mafia (both of them) were at the gaming tables. Real life? A dark guy
with a Clark Gable moustache and dangerously puppy dog eyes, with a floozy in a
pink dress at his shoulder ...
But sexy goings on in the casino mean
nothing for the island that produces the world's only Coco de Mer trees, the
last word in suggestive flora. A century and a half ago, the Vallee de Mai, a
jungle in the middle of Praslin, was pronounced by General Gordon - after arcane
calculations surrounding the flow of rivers from the Middle
East - to be the original garden of Eden.
Curious to see what had so stimulated
Queen Victoria
The male Coco de Mer produces a sticky,
semi-erect stamen, a foot or two long, that may have raised brooding questions
in Gordon's mind. As ever though, it is the female of the species that gets most
attention, with its slow maturing, curvaceous seed (the largest in the world)
which bears an odd resemblance to the female pelvic area. Local hotels go to
town over this happy likeness, with lewd insignia cropping up on key-rings,
murals and table mats, not to mention the walls of the Love Nut pub.
La Digue
Every island seems to be the little
brother of another, slower and more laid-back than the last. La Digue is
Praslin's little brother, and you get here by boat in an hour. In this place,
the fastest moving object is a tourist on a bicycle or in the back of an ox
cart.
There is a well-established touristic
cycling route round the island: the rambling wooden house in the grass was
where Goodbye Emmanuelle was shot; the decaying old cemeteries are full of dead
pirates; a pen overlooked by drooping banyan trees is the stomping ground of
giant tortoises, the survivors from those turbulent early days.
The main reason for coming to La Digue,
though, is to make the pilgrimage to Anse Source d'Argent, said to be the most
photographed beach in the world. Cycling along a path through giant boulders,
the approach recalls the road to Petra
The abundance of fish is another
embarrassment. Tired after a morning cycling in the sun? Then stop for a creole
fish lunch under a verandah. Choose fish according to the ones which looked
prettiest when you were snorkling. I chose parrot fish. Others swear by the
octopus curry.
Aride
This is another island within easy
reach by boat from Praslin; unlike La Digue it contains no permanent human
settlement. But as a protected nature reserve, it is the island you should
visit if you want to know what the Seychelles
The island contains a forested mountain
and millions of birds. One of the four resident park-keepers will take you
along a shady path up the mountain, pointing out the chicks nesting under
almost every rock. Giant spiders and zillions of beefy lizards add to the
effect. Work is being done to remove those species artificially introduced by
settlers (coconut trees) and reintroduce others that have been exterminated
(the magpie robin, the tortoise).
Denis
Flying around in tiny local planes
gives a strange perspective on the country. Popping across a hundred kilometres
of azure ocean, dancing around storm clouds, feels like taking a local
bus-ride. My furthest outing was to a flat coral atoll nearly 100km from Mahe,
named Denis.
Despite its unpromising name, Denis has
recently been turned by its French owner into an exclusive desert-island
hideaway, a place where tourists can enact their Robinson Crusoe fantasies:
basically there is no room for more than a couple of dozen of them at a time.
When we eventually spotted Denis from
the sky the pilot had to buzz around it several times so that the boys using
the grass runway as a football field could finish their game. The airport
comprised a couple of waving women with wrap-round skirts; the only piece of
machinery was a rusty old weighing machine. When we suddenly landed, one of the
women propped up the back of the plane while the other opened the door.
The island consists of sand, grass,
palm trees and lots of crabs; the main events are falling coconuts. I was
escorted to my chalet by the manageress, an island queen with silver ear-rings
called Fiona who would have looked more at home in Manhattan. "Oh, but
Americans don't care for it here," she declared. "It's too rustic.
There's no air-conditioning. There are banana-tree leaves on the roof and
open-slats on the windows and doors. You Europeans love it. The rusticity is
the beauty of Denis of course."
Of course. Playing castaway doesn't
come cheap (reckon on pounds 300 a night, full-board, for a two-person chalet)
but Denis does lend new meaning to the phrase "getting away from it
all".
Further information
The author travelled as a guest of the
Seychelles Tourist Office (0171- 224 1670).
More islands
Highlights include Silhouette (whose
mountainous, seductive profile resembles a classic treasure island), Bird (a
coral atoll similar to Denis, home to the world's heaviest tortoise) and
Desroches (very remote, and strong on water sports).
Getting there
Air Seychelles (01293 596656) fly
direct twice a week, as do British Airways (0345-222111). Return flights before
July start from around pounds 570, rising to about pounds 770 in July/August.
Getting around: air
About 20 scheduled flights a day from
Mahe to Praslin; a 15-minute flight costs about pounds 43 return. Flights to
more remote islands including Denis, Bird and Desroches are chartered by
respective island hotels. Sample prices include Mahe to Denis, a
four-times-weekly 25-minute flight, which costs around pounds 114 return.
Access to Silhouette is by helicopter
(about pounds 100 return).
Getting around: boat
Mahe to Praslin once daily, taking
about 21/2 hours, costs pounds 16 return. Mahe to La Digue, once daily, taking
three hours, costs pounds 20 return. Praslin to La Digue (five daily; 30
minutes) is pounds 10 return. Praslin to Aride is by organised excursion only -
for a reasonable pounds 48 you'll get transport, a fantastic lunch and a guided
tour of the nature reserve, altogether about six hours.
Places to stay and eat
Self-catering accommodation, guest
houses and tourist hotels are plentiful though by no means cheap; double rooms
are rarely cheaper than pounds 100 a night though two couples sharing can get a
chalet for about pounds 25 a head. Few people coming from the UK book their own
accommodation - it is usually cheaper to book everything from the UK in
advance, including stays in two or three different islands.
Tour operators
Most major operators deal with the
Seychelles including Abercrombie and Kent (0171-730 9600) Elite Vacations
(0181-8644431) and Kuoni (01306 740888). Sunsail (01705 222225) offer the
chance to sail your own yacht round the islands for a few days.
THE Indian Ocean combines a clean,
unspoilt environment with accessibility from Europe - most of the following can
just about be reached within half a day from the UK by air. Venture into these
idylls and you'll realise that all those brochure shots of turquoise waters and
icing sugar beaches overlooked by palm trees really are true. One popular
holiday is to combine a few days on the beach with a safari in east Africa.
Mauritius
A tiny volcanic island a few hundred
kilometres east of Madagascar, Mauritius is uncharacteristic of the Indian
Ocean insofar as it is overcrowded and, in parts, even industrial. This is,
after all, the island where the world's most famous extinction occurred, that
of the Dodo. What Mauritius does have going for it are luxurious hotels and a
tradition of fine service. There is also a range of much cheaper hotels and
restaurants here than in, say, the Seychelles, not to mention a degree of urban
and cultural life. Some fairly cheap packages are available from the UK.
More than 60 per cent of the population
is Hindu but the atmosphere can seem remarkably French despite the fact that
this was a British colony from 1814 to 1968. Although English is an official
language, it is French and Creole that are more widely spoken.
Mauritius is actually two islands, and
the smaller - Rodrigues - remains unspoilt by industry or tourism. It is,
however, remote, and takes 24 hours to reach by ship, or one and a half hours
by plane, from the main island.
For more information, call the tourist
office on 0171-584 3666.
Madagascar
By far the largest of the islands (it
is the world's fourth largest) and very much a part of Africa
rather than a product of colonialism. As such it is not a "resort" at
all, and is characterised by grinding poverty as well as natural grandeur.
Boasting high mountains, areas of rain-forest and savannah and vast numbers of
unique species, the island is a naturalists' paradise. If you are travelling
around, don't expect problem-free connections. Visas are required but are easy
to obtain from the consulate at 16 Lanark Mansions, Pennard Road, London W12
8DT. Getting to Madagascar is not particularly cheap; the best deals usually
involve flying via Moscow with Aeroflot.
The Maldives
If anything, these beat the Seychelles Maldives Maldives UK Maldives Dubai Colombo
A fantastically beautiful volcanic
island near Mauritius Reunion
has remained a piece of France Reunion
are its mountains, which are dotted with gites. The trekking can be as
spectacular as in the Himalayas ,
though it can only be done during the dry season from April to October. Note
that Reunion is
an upmarket destination. For flights, you'll need to go via Paris
Despite some problems (see the front
page of this section) Sri
Lanka
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