First-class Ticket to Dodo-Land

Ah, the weekend. Our first pleasant surprise was that the travel agency in charge of all our arrangements managed to upgrade all of our tickets to business class for the 4-hour flight to the island nation of Mauritius. Mauritius is way, way out in the Indian Ocean, hundreds of miles east of Madagascar. This is the (dormant) volcanic island where once lived the unfortunate flightless bird known as the Dodo. These isolated fowl were so unused to predators that settlers didn’t even have to chase or shoot them. I read that some Dutch guy walked up and bludgeoned the last one to death. Poor little fellas. Why did God make you taste so good?



Disembarking the plane, I felt we had been transported to the Caribbean. The culture however, belongs more to South Asia. Diwali decorations were all over the airport. The air was surprisingly cool, as it has been at all our stops, luckily. We hopped on a bus and drove to the north-west coast – about an hour and fifteen minutes. After quickly checking in to the Hotel Maritim, the tour members were treated to a reception with local school and embassy employees down by the water. Since booze was provided, and there were no activities scheduled for the next day, a group quickly formed towards the end to continue the evening at a nearby bar favored by both tourists and locals.

Drinking here continued apace. Some of our hardier members decided to continue on to a late-night club. I did not. I’d had a lot to drink, but not nearly enough to dance. That would require liquor, which I am still taking a break from, and I wanted to enjoy the next day – our first day off.



I woke around noon. In the lobby I joined our tour leader, an embassy employee, and three fellow tour members. We had been invited to visit the home of a local Franco-Mauritian businessman for lunch. Wow, what a pad. If I ever have the luxury of retiring, I'd like it to be to a place like this. Right on the water, open to the breeze... He also took us out on his boat. This was the French version of what we in the South would call a redneck speed-demon. Way too much horsepower for a narrow 20-foot hull. But, it was fun, in a "Holy shit, he almost killed us" kind of way.

Next day: back to work. School visits and flight back to Joburg.