This morning we swam with wild dolphins!

We went in a speedboat outside the reef in a small group of 5 people down to the mouth of the Black River and there we found a pod of Spinner dolphins feeding .

They are just so beautiful and graceful in the water. We were lucky enough to swim with them 3 times. I saw them each time, including a baby one swimming alongside his mum. Jeff didn't manage to spot them the first time we jumped in but did on the next two attempts.

Basically you "snorkel and fin up" then sit on the edge of the boat with your Baywatch red floaty under your arm ready to jump in when the guide says "now". And believe me, you really do need to go for it when they say "now", and then swim like the clappers to try and keep up with the dolphins. So worth it and such an amazing experience. One dolphin turned around and was coming back towards me at one stage - almost, but not quite close enough to touch. 

The highlight of the dolphin swim for an Italian guy in our group was a very special up close and personal encounter, or as he told us "A dolphin shit in my face!!"

Once back at our hotel we had a nice leisurely breakfast then went to pack up. Had planned to go for another swim but ran out of time as couldn't get a late checkout. Meanwhile while packing, reception rang us 4 times to ask when we wanted them to come pick up our bags. Even after we gave them a time they rang again "to confirm". Jeff told them not to ring again. Was starting to feel a bit like harassment .

Checked out and left our bags then went for a final walk around to take photos and have a farewell drink overlooking the beach. The sun obligingly came out and made everything look amazing. Even saw some angel fish in the water by the jetty. At first thought it was seaweed as they were hardly moving but no, it was a small school of fish.

Saw a few women topless bathing (grannies with saggy jubblies and nubiles with mosquito bites). Did not take photos of either.

Kanal was right on time to pick us up. Our flight was't until 10:30pm so we decided to use the time to see a bit more of the island. My only instruction was "I don't care where we go so long as it's not too strenuous". At this point I'd have been pretty happy to just look at view points haha.

This time we made it to the Chamarel Valley of the Coloured Earths as we didn't go to a Rhum factory first . Cough

Here we visited two natural waterfalls and a high viewpoint over the coloured earths. The coloured earths are basically 23 different shades of soil (not shades of grey), all due to different minerals from various eruptions from the now dormant volcano. It last erupted > 1000 years ago, not like Reunion's volcano which last erupted 3 months ago!

Lovely gardens at Chamarel with lots of moss and ferns and tropical plants everywhere. Very well tended and definitely geared towards the tourist experience. They also have a 1.5km zip line and quad biking to the various activities. We did the slacker way and had a driver take us around in a Range Rover no less (bit of overkill actually). Quite a few cute and well looked after cats at Chamarel too. I'm sure Kunal was thinking "again with photos of cats??"

After leaving Chamarel we continued driving along the south coast and stopped at Riviere des Galets and La Roche Qui Pleure .

Riviere des Galets is a beach made entirely of black stones and when the waves crash and then retreat out to sea you can hear all the rocks tumbling back into the water. It doesn't sound exciting written down but it sounded quite cool in real life.

La Roche Qui Pleure is a lava headland where the waves crash up through what used to be a blowhole... until 12 years ago when the roof collapsed. Kunal told us this while we were standing on the edge of it. Awesome.

Dark by then so we drove for what felt like ages to some restaurant for dinner and as we got there Kunal started talking about the giant crabs and lobsters you can eat but he'd never eaten there himself but "all his clients want to come here". Really? It's in the middle of nowhere! Anyway, so obviously we didn't eat there seeing I don't eat seafood.

Ended up at a local Mauritian restaurant which on this occasion meant "Chinese" food . Surprisingly nice food and so much cheaper than the resorts. 3 dishes plus a massive bucket (and I do mean bucket) of rice came to around A$20. Since we paid that much for a skinny tomato and cheese panini the other day this seemed like a real bargain. Though I guess we'll find out on the plane in a few hours! Hmm

Made it to the airport in time, checked in, went through passport control and then through security where sadly we lost some of our duty free drinks from Reunion.

Even through we had our booze in a sealed duty free bag, apparently that was just a "transit" bag and only valid if we had connected with our Perth flight on the day we left Reunion. Not that it said that anywhere on the bag mind you!

After a bit of a barney with the security manager including Jeff telling him to use his brain (my god, I thought I was going to spend the night locked in a Mauritius cell after that...) by some miracle he decided to actually be reasonable and only take the small bottle of island punch and leave us with the rum we had bought as a present. So then we ended up with a bottle of rum in an unsealed duty free bag in our hand luggage but somehow that was "ok".

He also said if we had packed it inside our hand luggage instead of having the duty free bag visible in the open then he could have let us through with all of it... but because it's on camera he had to be seen to be doing something. An interesting lesson in airport security.

And now we are in the lounge, calm again and smelling a whole lot better after a nice shower.

As usual at this end of a trip .. where did the time go? Loved both Mauritius and Reunion despite anti cyclones, child sized spiders and dubious duty free carriage laws.

It's time to go home now. Au Revoir Maurica, until we meet again.