Mauritius —Forests, Sugarcane and Dodo
Now most of you would be aware that Mauritius is an island in the Indian Ocean known mostly for its beautiful beaches but what you would not have heard about are its sugarcane farms spread over acres of land, thick forests spread over mighty mountains and a bird called ‘Dodo’. You will feel there overbearing presence in almost every nook and corner of this beautiful country and therefore I am going to talk about these three things before strolling the beach.
During my 7 day visit to this country I traveled everywhere only by road. They don’t have trains yet and don’t require them either as the roads are top notch and traffic is non existent except for a few patches in the capital city of Port Louis. Having said that they are considering building a metro but the plan is not sanctioned yet, is what I have been told. But when you are traveling by roads these are the views you will get on either side.
Some of the pictures that you will see in this article have been captured while traveling in a moving bus so the quality might have taken a hit but I think I got most of them very well. You will see acres of sugarcane plantations on both sides of the road when you travel across the length and breadth of this country. Sugarcane and Tourism are its biggest industry . Even the hotel that I was put up in was themed on the sugarcane.
The temperature, when I traveled in the month of May was pleasant at about 22 Degree Celsius. There are two seasons in the country - summer and winter, with winter extending from May to September. It rains throughout the year but mostly in summers. They seldom have heavy showers. I got this great capture on a slightly rainy day.
Considering that the country is already a very small one one might think that humans would be tempted to exploit as much space for themselves as possible to inhabit but that's not the case here with forests and animals being conserved very well. One example of this fact is the Sir Seewoosagur Ramgoolam Botanical Gardens. It was my first tourist destination once we had been to Mauritius.
The botanical garden has a huge variety of plants and trees with medical and other uses. Some of them have been brought from other parts of the world and planted here. The garden is so huge that it takes an entire day to see it completely. We could only see a part of it that day but whatever we saw was pure pleasure to the eyes.
Named after its first Prime Minster, Sir Seewoosagur Ramgoolam, who also led the movement for Mauritian independence from the British, the Botanical garden has taken years for its completion and several heads of states of different countries have visited and planted a sapling of a plant belonging to their own country. I could see two trees planted by India’s two former Prime Minster’s — Atal Bihari Vajpaye and Dr. Manmohan Singh.
While I curiously observed the wide variety of trees, what grabbed my attention the most can be seen in the below picture. Nature never fails to surprise you.
I also visited Casela Nature Park, a wildlife sanctuary with well maintained enclosures for different kind of wild animals. So whats so great about that one might think ? Don’t we have many in India? Sure we do but what stood out at this nature park was that besides the usual bus rides that takes you through the sanctuary to view animals you can also choose to use a ‘Segway’ or ‘Quadbiking’ to stroll certain areas of the sanctuary under the supervision of a guide and even feed some of the animals if you like. Not to mention that the guides can speak in Hindi and know most things about India.
The wild animals kept here have been brought from different parts of the world. Some are from Africa, some from China and even India. We were happy to see lion cubs, white tigers, Ostrich, rhinoceros, zebras etc. Here are a few snaps that I managed.
The Safari rides in Mauritius is not just limited to the forests but also to the sea. Yes, when in Mauritius please go for the Blue safari submarine. Its a submarine which can accommodate exactly ten people at a time and takes you about thirty five feet deep in the sea, almost touching the seabed. The tourists are taken on a tour of the corals and the fishes. I was lucky to see a variety of colorful fishes. If you are lucky you an even see dolphins and turtles. Below is a snapshot of a video that I shot underwater through the window of the submarine.
Our next stop was visiting a place where there is a seven colored sand in one place and although I couldn't see all seven colors I could see few. Let me know if you see them all in the below picture.
And just before I reached the seven colored sand we stopped by this amazing waterfall.
Looking at this nature rich country one might think that Mauritians really know how to conserve their flora and fauna but it has not always been that way and a reminder of this fact is the bird Dodo.
This is what a Dodo looks like. A flightless bird which probably had one of the most delicious meat. So delicious that the Mauritians ate it relentlessly until one day it went extinct and I think, as reminder that this does not happen again they made it their national bird. A picture or logo of this bird can be seen in hotels, restaurants, shopping malls across this island nation.
In terms of its religious demographics, Mauritius has people of different religions living in harmony and many of them can actually speak and understand Hindi. The biggest festival in the country is Mahashivratri, followed by Diwal. Not only do they watch all Bollywood movies, they even sing old Hindi songs. They idolize Akshay Kumar, the Bollywood actor, and you can hear his movie songs being played at a lot of Indian restaurants.
Finally I leave you with a few pictures of its serene beaches.
And finally that’s me by waterfall.
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