13th December 2022, South Coast

Our intention when we set off was to follow the coast road south and then head for Blue Bay but we ran out of time so Blue Bay will have to wait. Part of the road heading south as far as the Chamarel turn off we had travelled before. From the turn off we could see the Le Morne Peninsular and its beautiful sandy beaches so it seemed a pity not to explore it. We parked the car at the end of the beach golf course and I once again tested out the water. People were snorkelling, swimming, kite surfing and we could have hired a glass bottom boat for an hour but we just walked along the beach.

Le Marne was named after a legend that said a group of escaped slaves hid out at the top of the mountain. They hadn’t realised that slavery had been abolished so when they saw a troop of soldiers climbing the cliffs rather than be recaptured they threw themselves off the cliffs hence the name, the Mournful One.

Leaving these beautiful beaches behind we followed the road along the seafront via Baie du Cap and Bel Ombré only stopping to climb the steps to a very windy, Rocky outcrop that jutted out to sea. The views all along this coastline were/are stunning and although most of the beaches were safe for swimming those around that outcrop were regarded as dangerous.

We reached Souillac and then the road headed inland, we stopped briefly to pick up a snack and carried on to St. Aubin.

At the tea plantation that we visited earlier on they mentioned that they owned another place at Le Domaine de St Aubin so when we saw a sign pointing towards it I asked Geoff to turn around so that we could check it out. It was the right place and I was able to buy some of the caramel tea that we couldn’t get before and some of their own sugar cubes. We decided to do the tour which included a video on the sugar cane production and one on the vanilla production. From there we we walked around a small animal compound in which we saw, large tortoises, terrapins, chickens, rabbits, deer, ducks and peacocks. We next found ourselves at the Vanilla House where the production of vanilla was explained to us in detail. No wonder vanilla pods are so expensive as the orchid plant takes 3 years before it flowers and then it only flowers for one day. On that day the flowers have to be manually pollinated to produce a pod ( the plant comes from Mexico and there are no surviving Mexican bees to pollinate them and the Mauritian ones are too big). If the flowering day is missed there will be no vanilla pods. The process of getting the pods ready for use takes 18 months and a different process takes 4 years. All the individual pods have to be measured, again manually and placed in bundles. Needless to say we didn’t buy any today but they did persuade us to try salt flavoured with vanilla.

The tour took us to view the vanilla plants growing and then through the spice and botanical gardens on our way to the “auberge” mansion house which is now a restaurant on the ground floor. We climbed to the authentic top floor up a very dangerous staircase and it was extremely dark and difficult to see much. The final part of our visit was with a very happy girl called Jessica who took us on a mini tour of the rum production ending with a tasting session. Not really my scene but Geoff tried out several before we thought that we should head back. We cut across country through Curepipe and arrived back at about 5.20pm.

Vicky had cooked a whole sea bass for tea together with rice and a tomato and egg dish followed by soup, cheese cake for 3 and ice-cream for me. We are being spoiled and our contribution of a BBQ today will be rather plainer.

I swept and cleared up a few more bits in the garden as it was a bit cooler after we had quickly FaceTimed Nicola and we tried Benj again after dinner so chatted to him as well.

A busy day and Jason didn’t think we would find much to do here!














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