Mahe is the largest island of the Seychelles. It is home to the capital city of Victoria and 86% of the country’s total population. The Seychelles were not on our original itinerary this time. We had visited La Digue, Seychelles on our 2023 voyage. It (La Digue) is still tied with Antarctica for The Most Beautiful Place I’ve Ever Seen. Needless to say, I was very excited when I saw Seychelles on our revised itinerary and I couldn’t wait to wake up this morning and look out at the same beauty as La Digue. After all, it’s the Seychelles, right?
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| Seychelles 2023 |
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| blue on blue |
However, when I pulled back the drapes, we were docking in Mahe at Port Victoria, an industrial working port in a busy city. The water is still beautiful and I’m sure the beaches are just as white, but it was otherwise nothing at all like La Digue.
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| not what I was expecting |
I was looking forward to the same kind of day we had before. I had watched a fisherman bring his fish up from his small boat and sell them to locals who rode off with them hanging from their bicycle handlebars. Visitors and locals rode bicycles along La Digue’s one main street which was home to a few eateries, a small library and some souvenir shops.
Mahe, unlike the quaint little town I was so looking forward to, is home to an International Airport, two Marine National Parks and the University of Seychelles.
Most of our excursion options were water-related or had “wet landings", meaning you should expect to get your feet in the water getting on or off a boat. None of the options interested us very much, so we were looking forward to a lazy stroll around a small but beautiful island. So much for that idea.
Knowing it would be hot, I decided to forego a shower and shampoo since I knew I would be doing it again upon our return to the ship. Not having anything planned, we decided to just walk into town and see the silver Clock Tower, the monument and landmark of the town’s colonial past.
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| oops, 123 year old Clock Tower restoration in progress |
We enjoyed seeing some school children in a parade and stopped to eat some homemade fruity pops before heading back to the ship. I had passion fruit and Ronnie had pineapple.
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| friendly school kids waiting on Tuna Parade to begin |
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| Tuna Day - Children's Educational Parade |
And a few more photos I snapped around town.
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| 2 locals shooting the breeze |
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| Unity Monument in traffic circle |
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| National Museum of History (closed) |
As we started back, we ran into an older gentleman we recognized from the ship. Before leaving Miami, he had very recently had both knees replaced at the same time. He always rides a battery operated scooter. We spoke to him and he asked us which way the ship was. He was headed in the opposite direction, so we told him to follow us.
Long story short, the experience was a bit harrowing! Traffic was heavy and we had to cross busy streets (no crossing lights) and hop curbs in a couple of places. He had "zero" business being out by himself, but we thankfully were able to keep him upright on his scooter and see him back to the ship. I felt like we had done our good deed for the day!
Barbara..So this is Vanilla from Seychelles? I have Madagascar vanilla, Philippine Vanilla and Mexican, but never saw Seychelles. Next time I need it I will search it out. Hawaiian Islands are like this. If you go to Molokai, it is not lush. If you go to the wrong areas of Maui or the Big Island, you are in lava land. I wonder if the eastern side of the island had some beaches. I'd get the dragonfruit bar too! Honolulu port looks industrial depending on which pier you come into. Smaller ships can berth at the Aloha tower and are literally downtown. But the piers to the west of there are seedier and not scenic and have heavy traffic. Sorry the clock Tower and museum were closed. But now you have been to the Seychelle you didn't see before!!
ReplyDeleteThe Tuna Parade looked fun, at least. I am shocked someone riding a scooter would be out alone. I am also shocked he is not walking a lot. Within 6 weeks my knees were rehabbed and I could walk 2-3 miles. I did do 6 weeks of therapy to get ROM back. I could kneel on a cushion at the end of therapy.
Yes, I know exactly what you mean. The other time we came, we were here for 2 days and we did have an excursion - rode on a catamaran to Mahe (probably opposite side of the island). Water was beautiful and Ronnie and some of the others snorkeled, then we were taken to a spice garden where we saw different spices growing (you could buy them too, of course). I bought nutmeg and worried about getting home with it, but thankfully it made it. We saw vanilla, black peppercorns and nutmeg growing and maybe some others I can't remember. Re: the man - it looked like he had just gotten his stitches out when he got on the ship - no joke. I've never seen him walk, but someone told me that he can. He certainly had no business out on busy streets alone. He's doing the 180 with his grandson but word has it that they're not getting along. We see both of them, but never together. The grandson was on the same excursion we were on Sri Lanka. I suspect his parents don't know what's going on!
DeleteBarbara: I'm glad you got to see the spices on your prior trip. I love the spice market in Singapore. I was lucky that back then, inter company mail did not have to go through customs and I got them all put in vacuum packs and sent inter company. Those were the good old days!
ReplyDeleteDo you always use credit cards or do you have separate money for each country you visit? I have heard most countries want credit cards , not cash, but when you buy small items such as snacks, wasn’t sure if they take cards!
Deleteoops! Sorry I forgot to reply to this. Good question! It really depends on where we are. If it's a reputable business, they will take a credit card. Small vendors often will not take anything except their local currency, and the ship does not have currency from the many countries we're visiting. If it's a group of vendors set up at the port, they will often accept US dollars, although I'm sure they would prefer local currency. We usually don't buy snacks because 1) we eat so much on the ship and 2) we don't have the local currency. If we're off the ship more than a few hours, we are given bottled water, and we'll sometimes we'll throw some peanut butter crackers or nuts or something in our bag if we think we might get hungry. ;-)
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