Seychelles - Saint Anne

Anchor in Petite or Grande Anse, Southeast of La Digue. Rent a bike to visit this beautiful island, which is never overrun with tourists. With its white sand trails winding under tall palm trees,houses with palm thatched roofs, small copra factories, fine white sand beaches, and large polished rocks, La Digue might be the most beautiful island in the Seychelles. No cars –only bicycles or carts drawn by oxen.

Sail around Marianne and Félicité. Anchorage on the west coast of Grande Soeur for lunch.Unforgettable snorkelling at Cocos Islands. Made of large rocks with strange regular stripes carved by the sea, Cocos Island forms a beautiful sight with a great harmony of shapes andcolours . The ochre colour of the rocks is in contrast with the bright green palms of the coconut trees and the white sand of beaches lined with deep turquoise water. Under the sea , the vision is equally attractive with large arbores cent corals where thousands of many coloured fish swim in front of narrow breaks and dark caverns. Go to Curieuse and anchor for the night in Baie Laraie, east coast, or go back to Baie Sainte Anne if you need water.

Curieuse, part of the Marine National Park is the home of hundred or so giant turtles, you cannot miss them. 45mn walk, into mangrove and “coco fesse” trees, leads you to the other side of the island, where is a nice beach and small but interesting museum. Sail to St Pierre islet, a mass of rounded rocks crowned with a clump of tall palms swaying gently in the wind : typical and superb scenery of the Seychelles photographed on countless occasions and printed a million times in tourism magazines ! Excellent spot for snorkelling with magnificent underwater scenery. Go back to Baie Laraie for the night.

Aride Island, placed under the supervision of the Royal Society for Nature Conservation, is a conservation area. Narrow paths through the dense vegetationleads to the rocky barrier in the north from where the whole island can be observed. Free of cats and rats, which have ravaged so many tropical islands in the worlds, Aride is a haven for a wide variety of seabirds, unique vegetation and rare land birds. The ten species of breeding seabird include the rare roseate tern and the red tailed tropicbird. The world’s largest colony of lesser noddy, more than 200,000 couples nest there. Open on Mondays, Wednesdays and Sundays. Back to Baie Laraie for the night.

Cousin Island is a nature reserve and bird sanctuary with rare species and some giant turtles. Less than 800 meters in diameter, the island can be visited from Tuesday to Friday. A small path leads to the turtles’ enclosure from where it leads to the summit through dense vegetation. Great panorama and good spot from which to observe the gracious flights of tropicbirds. During the season of southeasterly winds, there may be up to 100,000 couples of black noodies nesting in the trees.Go back to Baie Sainte Anne for the night.