Port Louis, Mauritius

Mauritius. Is. Amazing. I had a blast. On the first day, Alex, Catherine, and I took a buses to Curepipe and Henrietta to go hiking in Tamarin Falls (I doubt I spelled that right, sorry). We found a guide when we got there, and this was NOT an easy little walk through the woods. It was partly raining, the ground was mudding, and the trail was steep. We climbed over rocks, Catherine slipped and would have fallen a ways if Alex had not been behind her, and I would have too if the guide (Kevin) hadn’t been right in front of me to help. I kept finding it hard to believe that I was actually there, AND I jumped off a waterfall. Yes, it was into water – I find it surprising how many people ask if I jumped into water. The spot Alex and I jumped from was about 6 m high, and the water was supposedly 20 m deep. IT WAS EXHILERATING! I almost pussed out, but I’m extremely happy that I didn’t. The day was definitely up there among the top days of my life. In the evening, we walked to the Waterfront area. We met three Mauritian women and a little girl who had rode an hour in a taxi to Port Louis to watch the ships come in and out! They said they had wanted to see the ships up close, but security won’t let you get close without a ship ID, so we showed them some of our pictures. One of them asked for our names and email addresses so she could find us on Facebook. Catherine and I spent a good hour or hour and a half talking to them about the United States and life on the ship before we all went home.

On the second day, Catherine, Alex, Stephanie, Andrew, and found a cab driver to take us to Grand Bay, and he actually took us a few kilometers past it to a small beach where there were less people and a swimming area. After a while, Catherine, Andrew, and I asked the driver to take us on a hunt for goggles, which we found at a superstore that was vaguely similar to a Wal-Mart. We swam for a while and sat in the sand; there were no SASers at this beach (at least we didn’t see any, and I’m pretty sure we would have seen them if they were there because it was a pretty small beach). It was fairly awesome. After a few hours, we left to get lunch and to find a place to exchange money, buy stamps, and buy souvenirs/postcards.

I must say, the two days in Mauritius were quite wonderful, and I wish we had gotten more time. Unfortunately, voyagers before us found it their responsibility to trash the place and treated it with no respect, so Semester at Sea doesn’t have a very good reputation on the island. I wouldn’t be surprised if that is the reason we were only there for one night.

-KW-