First Island of the Bunch - Mahe Island, Seychelles Islands
Mahe Island, Seychelles Islands
Where I stayed
Sailfish Beach Villas
What I did
beach
First Island in the Bunch
Oh my gosh. Our flight last night left Dubai at 2:30 a.m. That’s very, very early and of course, it’s hard to try and go to sleep at 7 or 8 and then have to get up at 11 to go to the airport. So of course we didn’t. just stayed up the whole time. Have to say that Emirates Airways has cleaned up their act a lot since I flew them a number of years ago and had nothing but problems from beginning to end. It does help to have business class tickets as they are much more accommodating and I cannot imagine how they are in economy class and just don’t have the desire to find out. Been there, done that. Wasn’t any fun then.
So in the middle of the night, we are sitting in the business class lounge and we can board the airplane from the lounge. That’s really nice. At the proper time, we just walked down the gangway and hopped on the plane and no worries. We were probably asleep by the time the plane lifted off the runway. We had already put in our breakfast order so it was time to get some shut eye. It’s not a very long flight though and seemed like they were waking us for breakfast way too soon and on this end, the food wasn’t great which was a surprise because on the flight over, food had been fantastic. Just shows you never know how airplane food will be. Have had lovely food on very, very cheap flights with very, very cheap airlines and ****** food in first class seats. No way to tell really unless you bring your own chef with you. We haven’t reached that scale yet.
So we arrive on Mahe, the largest island of the Seychelles and the first one of our “bunch”. It is also where the capital, Victoria, is located. I’d say it’s got the largest airport too but can’t verify that. Many of the smaller islands have airports and there are heliports everywhere. The Seychelles have gone from a backwoods tropical sleepy laid back country to a high end resort tourist destination to the point where many of the islands are privately owned and for a fee, you can go there and be welcomed or stay at the private hotel. That’s what a lot of the helicopter pads are for. As I have a hard time justifying well over 500 pounds a night for a hotel, we found a very nice place on Mahe, close to the dive center, that was quite reasonable and had good reviews everywhere I looked. So we are staying at Sailfish Beach Villas. The beach part is visible but I don’t think walkable. Maybe there is a path down but we are up a hill and overlooking a very shallow bay.
I get ahead of myself though. We are through immigration quite fast but he makes sure we have a plane ticket for leaving before he will stamp our passports. Have really never had anyone want to actually see that before. Usually just writing it on the form is enough. Then all of our luggage made it to our destination - always a plus, and we are met outside of customs by the driver who will take us to the villas.
We are quite tired but watching around us as we drive away from the airport. We turn away from the road to Victoria and drive down the coast a bit then up over the mountain spine that runs down the middle of the island. The road is very twisty and turning everywhere and very steep climbing up and over the mountain and down the other side. Our driver is pointing out the grocery stores and restaurants and closest ATM machine as we pass. They have arranged a car to be delivered for us too and it will be needed to go anywhere.
Finally we find out villa which is in the hills, overlooking a nice shallow beach (only swimming during high tide because otherwise you a re just wading) and then we find out it is a self service place. I’m sure I knew this at the time of my booking but that was way back in March and I had forgotten. I’m sure it seemed like a very good idea at the time I made the booking too but this morning, because we were so tired, it was quite an unpleasant surprise. So we have a very nice two bedroom apartment with air conditioning ONLY in the bedrooms, and everything we need for the kitchen and lovely balconies but no food. I think we’ll get breakfast and lunch and then eat out at night. Dang. totally forgot that bit of it. My hubby was somewhat seriously surprised. I probably forgot to tell him.
Our guide gives us the tour of the house, how to operate the gas stove and such, shows us where additional restaurants are located and where to go for beaches and parks and tourist attractions and such and then she’s gone and in a bit our car arrives. It’s a nice little automatic. Was hoping for a manual to do the hills better but we’ll manage. The man who delivers the car finds out we live in the U.K. and he starts asking why we ever gave them independence! Wow, that was a surprise. Not sure of the history yet of the islands but France and Britain must have fought over them for awhile and at the end, just let them go their own way. He seemed to think it was not a good thing and they’d have been much better off to have stayed under the British crown.
A bit more relaxing and then we head off to find the ATM and some groceries. The hills are rather steep so I’m not going very fast even though the speed limit is 40 kph. I’m doing about 20 because the roads have no sides. You hit the edge of the pavement and you fall off into the ocean or into a ravine in many places. They drive like the English here so good thing I am rather proficient at it (except I backed up a steep hill to our parking lot and ran into the wall! DANG. first day! I’m rather proficient at running into walls too)
Anyway, we find the dive shop, we find the ATM, we find the gas station, we find the grocery and get all our errands completed. The groceries around here are small and rather dismal really. It is hard to get anything in small quantities and we only need things for 5 days before we head over to another island. Fresh fruit and veggies seem to be lacking in the market but there are some stands, we just need to find them. And there is a fresh fish market but we might have been too late today to get anything fresh so another day perhaps. One good thing - there seems to be plenty of ice cream at all the stores and plenty of cookies and chips and such like that. I do hope the hotels and restaurants where we choose to dine will have better selections. Many of them will apparently serve Creole food. Always a good thing.
Back at the villa for some scrumptious lunch of PB&J and it was so good that we both had 2 sandwiches apiece. Then some R&R in the hot villa in the afternoon. We get a rather big thunderstorm and rainstorm in the afternoon. This might be one of those places where it rains everyday around 4 or 5 p.m. Good thing we plan to do our diving in the morning.
So soon we will head out to dinner, up the steep driveway, down the steep and winding and narrow road , to one of two restaurants close to the villa and then I think we will hit the A/C in the bedroom and be happy for it. Looking forward to diving tomorrow.