Our Island adventure

As we arrived around 17:00 in the afternoon at Roland Garros Airport in Reunion Island our unforgettable adventures began, which basically translates into “the first challenge arose”.

We had booked a campsite in ‘L’etang – sale les Bains’ months in advance about 40km from the airport and had hoped that the fact that we had estimated the bus times with precision would serve us well in this regard. We quickly came across the information office only to find out that we had just missed the last bus that heading towards our campsite…. Regretfully no one had mentioned that the busses stop running after 17:00 on Sundays? First lesson learnt…. never assume that transport is always available.

So…there we were with our broken French trying to figure out what we were going to do. The taxis were ridiculously expensive and we as always were on a very tight budget. So we did the next best thing… We teamed up with an innocent young woman who was renting and apparently heading the same way. The idea was to split the rent for the car… We shortly afterwards came to know that she had cheated us and we could’ve rented our own car for the amount she charged us. Lesson 2 learnt: “Never judge a lady by the type of car she rents”.

So we finally arrive at our campsite with excitement and ready to set up camp… in the dark… cause we arrived very late after having gotten lost. What a great start we had!

It was early December so the high season still hadn’t started yet and we were the only people in the campsite. Clean and close to the beach, we paid about 14 Euros per night. The nearest beach was called Sable noir, which translates into English as ‘black sand’, and yes… seeing as it was in the middle of summer, this beach would turn into what I could only describe as ‘the nearest thing to walking on the surface of the sun’… it was BLAZING hot. Sitting on the sand without shade would prove to be fatal so everyone took a seat further up away from the shore where a couple of trees brought relief from the almost diabolical heat. However… that meant crossing this black desert to actually get into the water. This proved to be quite entertaining as people would walk back and forth from the ocean to the distant trees only to realize halfway how #$@ing hot the sand was and left with no choice but to start running in a state of panic back to the safety of the shade.

In this level of heat there was one specific drink that made us feel as if we were placed in one of those adverts where people are stranded in the desert and drink an ice cold beverage… Radler! This citrus flavoured beer could quench your thirst like nothing on earth baby. So it was absolute bliss to down one of those at any given beach bar after a long day of walking and discovering.

There wasn’t much to do in L’etang – sale les Bains aprt from going to the beach, rent a Stand up paddle, practice some French with the locals and enjoy the beautiful sunsets. After two weeks of sleeping on the hard floor of the campsite and the hot sands of Sable noir we were ready to move on.

Our next destination was St. Joseph where we were going to meet our ‘work-away’ host. For those of you who don’t know, ‘work-away’ is a website where hosts offer accommodation and food in exchange for a couple of hours of work per day. After a tough couple of hours in the heat, walking many blocks with al lour luggage we finally met our very friendly work-away host. He showed us to his home and the amazing cabin that we were staying in, built by himself and his partner, in a beautiful botanical garden in which we would be working for the next couple of weeks. After 2 weeks of sleeping on the floor, the bed was extremely inviting. The cabin had no windows nor doors and was completely open. The shower and kitchen were in the garden and a self-sustainable toilet made for a very natural environment. The toilet was something new to us… you finish your business, throw sawdust on top and once it is filled up, you then have to empty the bucket, clean it and then use it again. It was actually not that bad, it is impressive how much the sawdust removes the smell. It felt like we were in the middle of the jungle in our little cabin.

The amazing thing about Reunion island is that there is absolutely nothing that proves dangerous as far as animals are concerned. Yeah there are some spiders, but nothing poisonous, there are no snakes nor any sort of mammal on the island. Apparently the island, which is actually a volcano, was a place where they would leave prisoners to die, but after a couple of months they passed the island and saw the prisoners were nice and fat and tanned. Turns out the prisoners ate all the food that was available on the island, and for that reason there are no mammals left on the island. So you get the absolute amazing nature of the jungle without the scary stuff.

St. Joseph is a very small town, with beautiful surroundings and beaches. Everyday after working about 4-5 hours in the garden, raking up leaves, picking leechies, picking up the fallen mangoes (and eating them) cleaning up a bit, we would walk around to the beaches and town. The buses don’t pass as frequent so we did quite a bit of walking. We also hitchhiked a lot. People on Reunion island are probably some of the friendliest people we have ever met. We were even invited to join this one guy and his family for Christmas, and we just met him for 2 minutes while he was giving us a ride.

Our workaway host was so welcoming and showed us so many lovely things on the island. He took us out to this restaurant where we tried shark. He showed us how to make rhum arrangé. This is very popular on the island. You can buy these pre packed packages of dried fruit and herbs that you infuse into rhum and then you let it sit for a couple of months. You can even put fresh fruit in. We infused leechies, mangoes and pineapple. We also tried some candy infused rhum at a restaurant. This pre packed packet is also a very nice souvenir and gift to take back to family and friends. The most popular dish is called the “Americain”. This is basically a footlong baguette filled with “bouchons” which are dumplings filled with pork, then on top of the dumplings they put a layer of French fries topped with a layer of cheese and then grilled in the oven and afterwards topped with ketchup and mayonaise. This is mostly served at all the beach bars and is absolutely devine! Wash it off with a Radler Beer and you are good to go.

St. Joseph is famous for the clear, natural pools and waterfalls. So the water runs from the top of the mountain all the way down for a couple of kilometres, and every couple km there is a natural pool and there are spots where you can have a barbeque or picnic next to the pools, and this is very popular under the locals. The pools are crystal clear surrounded by thick vegetation. It is absolutely mesmerizing. So the one day we wanted to go see the biggest waterfall which is at the top of the mountain, but there are no buses that go up the mountain, so we started walking and hitchhiking. After 5 minutes this very friendly guy stopped and gave us a ride. He was very chatty and we were trying to keep up seeing as we were not fluent in French but we sort of followed that he was talking about the natural pools and the history and somewhere in the story we heard something about a club and “nude” and he wants to show us the nice pool where him and the club usually go. So we stop at this amazing pool and he started undressing while he was telling a story and we realized he was talking about his nudist club. So he stripped down to his birthday suit, my husband thought, “well when in Rome” so he stripped down as well, I wasn’t that brave but I did join them with my bikini on. And so we stopped and stripped down every now and again until we got to the big waterfall at the top. We said our goodbyes to this interesting fellow we just met and we were on our way to explore some more.

One of the main attractions and things to do on Reunion island is to go see the volcano. It is actually an active volcano so there are controlled sightings when the volcano erupts. We didn’t see the volcano erupt but we saw some photos and it looked amazing. But we decided that this is definitely something we needed to do even though we are not big hikers. Another amazing fact about Reunion Island is that you are alowed to set up camp anywhere on the island for one night, but you have to pack up the next day. So we planned on taking our tent with and setting up camp for the night at the base of the volcano, which apparently is also very common for people to do.

After taking the bus for 40min, and walking for 4-5 hours while hitchhiking in the rain, and running out of food in the first 2 hours, we finally got a lift from two angels. And with a shock we discovered that we probably would’ve walked for another 8 hours to get the base of the volcano. So we finally got to the top late afternoon, went to the little tuck-shop which didn’t offer a lot, got ourselves a packet of biscuits and a bottle of wine and that was our dinner. Found ourselves the only patch of green on the volcano and set up camp. We enjoyed our couple of biscuits and wine under the stars. It was absolutely spectacular to be so close to the heavens. Seeing as there is not much to do at the top of a volcano all alone we were asleep at 9pm. We then woke up at five to be greeted by the amazing sunrise, and we started our climb to the top of the volcano. Obviously we didn’t take enough water with us (what is wrong with us!) So we had to stop and ask for some water along the way, luckily the people were very kind. So after 5 hours we made it to the top and back and we were paste!

Now we needed to pack up and go look for a lift back down…. after about 40min of asking around we finally got a lift with this older couple from France. Now you can just imagine how hungry we were after just having biscuits the night before and nothing for breakfast, and the absolute joy we felt when this lovely couple invited us to have lunch with them on their account. We were so overwhelmed by the goodness of this couple. Not only did they buy us lunch but they took us all the way back to the main bus station. I will never forget their kindness.

When we travel we like to keep the last couple of weeks open for “whatever”. We love to see where our travels take us and where our roads lead us. So after our 3weeks at our work-away host we needed accommodation and it turned out that friends of our work-away host was away and was looking for someone to housesit their place in St. Paul. Lucky us!

It was a peaceful 2 weeks as their house was up in the mountains and not too close to town. But we enjoyed the solitude. We went to a music festival in L’etang – sale les Bains and camped on the beach for the night.

New years was coming up and we didn’t really know where to go and what to do. Apparently Saint – Gilles les bains was the place to be for new years with the clubs and fireworks, So we posted on couchsurfing that we were looking for a party on new years that we can join, and lucky enough someone replied who was having a party at his house right on the beach.

It is a tradition for people to camp out for the night on the beach and have their own new year’s party around their camp. It was very ironic because on the beach are these signs that says no camping but It was absolutely packed and every tent had his own music system setup and lights and they were ready for a party. It was absolutely amazing, at midnight the whole beach lit up with fireworks, people were swimming in the ocean, DJ’s with dance floors on the beach. We went tent hopping, crashing the party at each tent as far as you can see. We probably crashed tent parties for about 4km along the beach. By 5 o clock we crashed on the beach while people were still swimming and partying. After only 2 hours of sleep we head home, after waiting more than 4 hours for buses, and almost crying because of the discomfort of the heat and lack of sleep, we finally get home and slept for the rest of the day.

Our trip was coming to an end and we were looking for accommodation in St. Denis the last two nights to experience the city a bit and we needed to be close to the airport. We found a host on couchsurfing, also one of the friendliest and loving people we have ever met. She took us halfway across the island one day and showed us these beautiful parks with waterfalls where people just come and camp out and barbeque and it is free to enter.

She also showed us the famous church where when the volcano erupted a couple of years ago the lava literally split in front of the church and went around it. It was absolutely fascinating. She took us to a restaurant where she made us try “palmito” which is the root of the palm trees that they cook and eat as a salad and mayonnaise. Yuuummmy! She then cooked us an amazing meal the night before we flew out. It is so wonderful to meet people like that on your travels, they make the travelling moments so much more precious.

And there we were ready to check in for our flight and the flight attendant said something in French and we thought, “oh my goodness there is something wrong with our tickets” but turns out we got bumped up to first class. So we enjoyed some coffee and croissants in the VIP lounge and reflected on these amazing 5 weeks we had on Reunion island. Definitely one of our best travels so far.