Bird Island, 29/04/03, Day 1
Flying to Bird Island from Mahe and first excursion on the island
(Please click on a picture to enlarge it)
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| The day starts with a bus transfer from my hotel to Praslin airport, where I soon board a Shorts-360 with service to Mahe'. The flight is about 15 minutes long. |
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| After taking off from Praslin, I see Anse Lazio beach and Curieuse in the distance. |
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| Once in Mahe', I shortly board a Twin Otter with direct service to Bird Island, my final destination of today. |
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| Unfortunately the airplane had a failure to the left thurst reverser, so we had to disembark and board another aircraft. On the left picture: ground personnel trying to repair the Twin Otter. On the top picture: the Dornier 228 where we will actually fly. |
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| After 30 mintues of flying, Bird Island is in sight and the pilot makes a circling approach to the grass runway in the center of the island. We finally reach the air terminal, that is within a walking distance from the lodge. | |
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| The immense beach surrounding Bird Island all around (it's about five kilometers of circumference) |
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Jeremy Radiate Tortoise is usually hard to be located because of its size (just a bit more than a coconut) and because she prefer to stay hidden in the shadow for most of the time. On the left picture, the carapace is damaged because she had an accident: a lot of years ago, when this island was used for copra production, she was confused for a coconut and "harvested" using kind of pickaxe. |
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| A Tropicbird is incubating the eggs at the foot of a big tree. |
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Esmeralda is a giant tortoise of an estimated age of about 200 years and a weight of 298 kilos. Although his name, he is actually a male and he is probably one of the worlds oldest tortoise currently living on the earth. |
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| Me near Esmeralda. |
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| Another nice turtle, much more smaller than Esmeralda, marked as Number 6. |
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| Fairy Terns under a big tree. |
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| It is finally dark and I go back to my hut. The bed is protected in order to avoid the insects to go inside. |
SEYCHELLES PICTURES |
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ALPHONSE - An incredible wonder, part of the Amirantes group, about 400 Km southwest of Mahe'. Characterized by a huge lagoon and surrounded by sandy flats, it can also be used as a base for sightseeing and fly flishing trips to the nearby paradise of St. Francois, the kingdom of the mangroves and giant crabs. ALPHONSE DAY 1 | DAY 2 | DAY 3 | DAY 4 |
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LA DIGUE - A granitic island where the time seems frozen at the past century. Can be entirely visited by bike and with its many opportunities for hiking and trekking, offers a lot of activities for either adventurous travellers and for who prefers to relax on a beach doing swimming and snorkeling. LA DIGUE DAY 1 | DAY 2 | DAY 3 | DAY 4 |
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PRASLIN - Another granitic island, home of the world's only population of Coco De Mer tree, is also characterized by many white-sand beaches and can be used as a convenient base for several daytrips to the nearby islands. |
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BIRD - A lovely paradise for bird watching and birding tours, hiking, swimming and snorkeling. Home of Esmerlada, a tortoise about 200 years old, this coralline island also hosts a colony of Sooty Terns coming here annually to feed and to grow their chicks. A large beach of pure-white sand surrounds the entire island for a circumference of about 5 kilometers. |
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MORE INFO ABOUT MY VACATION TO SEYCHELLES This section contains information about the trip to Seychelles and theme pictures. SEYCHELLES INFO | SEYCHELLES WILDLIFE | SEYCHELLES VEGETATION | SEYCHELLES TRANSPORT | SEYCHELLES BEST PICTURES |
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