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Landing in Mahe, we board an island-hopper for the Island of Praslin where we check into "La Reserve". We are delighted to have a charming cottage on the beach. We think we've arrived in "Paradise" until later, when we try to go to sleep and discover the cottage is not air-conditioned. The equatorial weather is hot and humid with generally minimal relief from cooling breezes. Even the breezes seem hot and humid. Who said "Paradise is Hell"? We did.
It is picturesque. Lynn freshens up on the patio for dinner.
We enjoy a colorful sunset from the cottage patio before heading off to dine in the pavilion over the water. The clouds are dramatic and sometimes ominous, but the Seychelles lie outside the Indian Ocean cyclone belt, so high winds are rare and hurricanes non-existent.
It was a rough night without air-conditioning. Any potential relief from the ceiling fan was foiled by the bed's overhead canopy. But the morning's showers leave a rainbow and a promise of a better day to come. Just around the point of land to the left is the popular beach Anse Lazio.
We take a guided tour of the tropical rain forest Valle de Mai in Praslin National Park, where we are introduced to the Vanilla Bean (left), an export crop, and the fatty Tallow Fruit (right) ...
... and the giant fan-like fronds of the Coco de Mer palm.
A single fruit of the Coco de Mer can weigh 40 lbs, so stay clear when they start dropping! The nut inside the fruit looks like 2 coconuts fused together, resembling the shape of a pelvis. The female tree takes about 100 years to bear fruit for the first time. The Island of Praslin is the only place in the world where the Coco de Mer, sometimes called the Double Palm, grows. Out of the sheltering shade of the rain forest, the midday weather is oppressive. I estimate it's 99 degrees, 99% humidity, with a 1 mph breeze. The climate may suit the metabolism of a giant coconut, but we find ourselves "Perspiring in Paradise".
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