Mauritius! Day 67

A warm hello to you friends and family!
        And greetings from the lower Indian Ocean! It is day 1 since leaving the absolutely perfect island of Mauritius and I miss it dearly. Our brief 36 hour stay was simply an inadequate amount of time one would need there to truly soak it all in. If you’re at all naïve or clueless like myself then you probably have not heard of Mauritius. I know the first time I ever heard that name was as I was applying for this program! However, dear friends, if you have not heard of it then you can thank me later because Mauritius is a fascinating country you don’t want to miss out on. Located just a few hundred miles off the east coast of Madagascar, this place is home to an overwhelming amount of beauty, culture, diversity, and all around excitement. What blew me away almost immediately was the rare ethnic mix of a typical Mauritian. Our first cab driver was an African-Hindu speaking fluent French with a hint of an English accent. Now, just picture what that person would look and sound like, surround that image with a picture perfect tropical island, tack on some bright colors, friendly smiles, and cyan ocean, and you have yourself Mauritius. I’m ashamed of myself for having the preconceived notion that Mauritius was just some tiny, rather insignificant, touristy island. Boy was I oh so wrong! While the pictures that come up on “Google Images” look appetizing, there is absolutely nothing that compares to spending a couple afternoons there. From the gorgeous Port Louis and Flic en Flac to Grand Baie, this place was like a foreign version of Hawaii. Mark Twain could not have put it better when he said “Mauritius was made first, and then Heaven, and that Heaven was copied after Mauritius.” Spot on!
        We were quite sad to leave but I feel as though my short time there was very well spent. Traveling in a small group again, we hopped a cab and drove an hour south (pretty much the opposite end of the island) to the Black River National park and had ourselves and adventurous hike. Adventurous meaning we ditched the whole “follow the map” thing and wound up trudging through forest, wading up snaky streams, and crossing mini waterfalls. Even when the pouring rain started up, we were having a wonderful time. On our way up to Grand Baie, we stopped off in an animal reserve where we wound up in a caged off area the size of a squash court, casually hanging out with 5 very big and very intimidating African lions. Before entering, we were given wooden sticks no longer than 3 feet and no thicker than a golf shaft, told to shake the stick at an “out of control cat” (whatever that meant), yell “NO!” and hit its face…oh and of course no sudden movements. After several minutes of fighting every voice in my head screaming to “get the hell out of there!” I settled in and before I knew it, I was having my picture taken kneeling down next to a 2 year old male lion, petting it like my dog. Now, because my computer has been inundated with hundreds and hundreds of photos these past two months, the lack of hard drive space will not allow me to upload more than 30 of the 300 photos from Mauritius. This news comes to me as I write this! So, when I go through and clear up some space, I’ll get a few photos on so you can see what I’m talking about. After our lion social, we cruised on up to Grand Baie, went for a night swim in the incredibly warm ocean, checked out the night life, then awoke early the next morning and lived like bums on a beach for a better part of the day. After a snorkeling excursion to locate my misplaced sunglasses (which I found…hooray), a buddy and I dusted off the old sailing legs, rented a sunfish and caught some of that mighty Mauritian wind. One man overboard and a capsizing later, we were moving on an even keel cruising all up and down the beach. In the afternoon we took a bus back to Port Louis, explored for a bit, then boarded our floating house for an 8:00pm departure.
It was disheartening to see the island disappear on our wake but we can now set our eyes on Cape Town, South Africa!! We are due to arrive in 6 days and are expecting some rougher waters as we approach the southern tip. That area is the meeting point of the Indian and Atlantic oceans so the waters are known to be a bit choppy. Fortunately, a close friend of mine is from South Africa and has family in Cape Town so I hope to be getting a good tour of the place. With only 40 days left (and 67 behind us…whoa) South Africa will be our third to last stop, with Ghana and Brazil to wrap things up. Forty days is quite a long time but on the Semester at Sea clock that’s a heartbeat.
Well, there it is. Thirty-six hours in a country smaller than Rhode Island and I still managed to pull off 2 pages. I could make it 4 or 5 but I’ll spare you loyal readers the time. As you can tell, everything here I just fine and I hope the same for all back home. I send my best wishes from around the world and look forward to hearing from some (or any) of you soon! Take care everyone.

- Chris Constantine