We have really enjoyed it here in Mauritius and to crown the whole experience, last night Matilda won again. In fact on corrected handicap, we beat the whole fleet on the Indian Ocean leg. We are still not sure how we managed that, but are delighted all the same. The prize was a model of a traditional local boat - a lovely gift that we have dismantled for travelling purposes.
We hired a car for a few days when Brian was here and got to see a bit of the island before the 'official' tour. The highlight for us was visiting the Casela Leisure Park where we got to walk amongst the giant tortoises (unfortunately extinct on this island, but these are from the Seychelles), zip wire flying fox, but best of all, we interacted with the big cats.
A South African couple set it up a few years ago and what they do is get the animals to interact with humans from birth and also get them to recognise that if the human is carrying a small stick vertically in front of them, they must not enter that personal space. The result is that you can pay to go into the enclosures and ''interact'' with the white lions or cheetahs. What this meant for us was that I got to pat a cheetah (pictures on the blog) and would you believe they actually purr - very similar to a domestic cat (although the ground practically trembles when they do it). They also had some young white lion cubs, born in August. What they do is have the cubs around the keepers all day and are returned to their mother at night. I think I want to be a lion keeper when I grow up.
Brian seemed to enjoy himself. His hotel was lovely, we know because we practically took over his room, or in my case, his bathroom to actually have a bath again - bliss. I think it is the main thing I really miss about living on a boat. You get a shower to get clean, but for me a bath is more of a meditational experience and I miss it.
The "official' tour was fun. It consisted of visiting a renovated colonial mansion which was very interesting - I think I could have lived the life of a sugar planter. The next stop was "An Adventure in Sugar" and I can now confidently say I know way more about sugar cane and its production than I thought could be humanly possible!
The final stop was the Pamplemousse Gardens (it doesn't have anything to do with grapefruits, its just a name of the district). You have to feel a bit sorry for any passing VIP, they must practically haul them from the plane and take them there to plant a tree before they even get time to buy their dodo memorabilia. Poor Princess Anne's tree looked in need of a bit of TLC, but you will be pleased to learn Nelson Mandela's ebony tree is in fine fettle. (Unfortunately so is Mr Mugabe's, but I suppose it's not the tree's fault.)
The stars of the gardens for me were the spiders and fruit bats. The bats come every year from Madagascar in time for the jackfruit ripening. As the jackfruit has been introduced relatively recently, how on earth did they know this and change their behaviour accordingly? The spiders are huge and occupy some of the trees much to a lot of peoples discomfort. I now know what a camphor tree looks like and how the leaves smell of, well, camphor. I also know that some trees bleed (secrete red sap).
Tomorrow we set sail for Reunion, which I am ashamed to say I know very little about. No doubt it will be a nice surprise. The passage will only take the best part of an overnight crossing so provisioning will be no hardship (a couple of quiches from the local patisserie should cover it). However Jonathan still hasn't satisfied his desperate need for a Dodo T shirt, so we may still have a shopping expedition to do.