ISPC supermarket Archives - Escapes From The Little Red Dot

Everyone slept in late and only woke up after 8am. Mommy woke up to prepare lunch for K while I stayed in bed with K who woke up 8 plus. I sent a message via FB messenger to ask about the boat schedule to Curieuse Island, to plan for the activity for the day. After we washed up, I went to the reception to ask about breakfast and they mentioned that breakfast will be served at the apartment itself. So I agreed to that at a cost of 15Euros per adult.

Soon one of the staff brought a tray of fruits and bread and a jar of fruit juice and tea. She also made used of our kitchen to cooked 4 sunny-side-up. K had a bowl of cereals. The birds here were very fast, and while we didn’t realized, I found them already on the table about to dig in before I quickly shoo them away.

I realized the accommodation also offered boat trips to Curieuse at 50euros per pax inclusive of island fees. This was about 10Euros more than what Sagittarius boat taxis were offering but they hadn’t reply. Starfish boat charter have 2 timings of 9am and the other at 130pm.

We decided to visit the Valle de Mai today instead, and before driving out, I got the message reply saying that we could come in anytime. We would check them out the next day and drove our way to the UNESCO forest of Valle de Mai.

Before reaching, we stopped by ISPC supermarket to see if we could get any mosquito spray but it wasn’t sold there. Then another 10mins drive up the curvy road before we turned into the carpark of entrance.

We met one of the guides that mentioned that she would be taking people into the forest for 150rupees per adult and so we agreed to follow her. Mommy went to purchase the tickets for 700rupees and a mosquito spray from the shop there. After using the restroom and applying the repellent, we walked with the guide into the forest.

The 1hr guided walk was pretty informative and we definitely learnt a lot more from her information of the many different species within the forest, the Coco de mer plant and how it germinate, how to determine their age. At a certain point in the forest trail, she left us to complete the remaining 15mins back to the exit ( there was a much longer one but as it was repetitive and K was getting fussy, we took the shorter one). The repellent seemed to work against the mosquitoes. Everything seemed well until K became fussy and wanted to go home. He became uncooperative even with my handphone. I quickly stole a shot with the famous coco de mer seed before we exited the forest. It must have been the humid weather and him being bored. Bought a souvenir from the shop there, and a tee for K and visited the small museum opposite the stall that had some exhibits before we took the car and returned back to the apartment.

On the way back we stopped by a meat store Rosebelle store that sold meat and some other things like vegetables and drinks. We bought some pork and drinks and carrots and got back on the road.

After we parked at our apartment, I entered the cleaned up apartment to place the stuff we bought in the kitchen while mommy brought K to the next door for lunch, at La Goulue.

Mommy ordered a prawns with chips and I had curry fish. The food was overall decent but the flies flying around trying to sneak a landing on the food were quite annoying. We ended the lunch in the hot weather with a nice scoop of vanilla icecream, for 545rupees.

Back at the apartment, we took a short shower and changed into something comfortable to take an afternoon nap. It was already 3pm plus coming to 4 when we all fell asleep.

About 2 hours later, the night routine started with mommy and her meal preparations while I entertained K with his toys before we got out to the Cote D’Or beach before the sunset.

It was low ride and we played around in the calm waters and small waves. I carried K walking towards the sea trying to find fishes to see. There were really tiny ones and no sea cucumber which he wanted to see. Suddenly from our backs, two boys were saying something like “No shark”? That got me startled a little but as the water was clear, we didn’t see any sharks. As they got closer in the waters they started to throw lines with a attached bait and I asked if they were fishing for sharks. They replied affirmatively but I wasn’t sure if they understood what I meant.

After a couple more water plays and photos of the beach at sundown, we went back to take a nice shower and dressed up for dinner. Took a quick look on TripAdvisor and there was a Cafe des Arts nearby that was high in position and so we drove there. It was a small street that seemed to led into village rather than the beach but on reaching the end of the road, there was a parking space.

A security guard stood nearby and asked if we had reservations but we didn’t. He told us to park the car first and as we got off, he said that there was a dress code and took us to walk through the beach entrance instead of through the resort itself. From a distance to the dining area, he signaled to a lady staff who came over and I asked if we could have dinner here. She said that the restaurant didn’t cater for kids and pointed us to Pirogue Restaurant & Bar lodge instead. Too bad.

The guard led us back the same route and explained that the restaurant could be reached via walking but for a car, we needed to make a turn back on to the main road and a left into Cote D’or esplanade road, the same street where we had our lunch on first day, closed to our apartment.

Drove there in less than 5mins and parked just opposite the restaurant, that also belonged to Pirogue Restaurant . The restaurant was pretty packed but we managed to get a table.

While we waited for our meals of chicken and mushroom spaghetti and sweet and sour pork noodles, plus tomato soup, a cooler drink and a banana milkshake, K ate his pasta with the boiled pork mommy bought at the meat shop in the afternoon. The pork was tough though.

The chilled tomato soup was something different as we were expecting a warm one but it was nice, cool and slightly spicy. Then the large plate of spaghetti and noodles came and we already knew that we would be well fed this meal. The mains were ok but mommy thought that her pork was more sweet than sour, typical of the foodstuff here and very tough meat too. K was well behaved throughout, focused on completing his dinner so as to return to the apartment to watch his new favorite cartoon called Messy goes to Okido.

We paid the bill of 759rupees and drove back to the apartment. While we all prepared for the night, washing and cleaning, K stayed in front of the Telly for Little Ponies, Messy goes to Okido and Jarmies before we go sleep with a storybook and a bottle of milk.

It was a moving day with a ferry booked at 1030am to Praslin and as usual, we woke up early to pack and prepare K’s meals. K woke up close to 8 and I had to motivate him to get prepared by bringing him his toothbrush and changing his clothes. After some persuasion, we got out of the room to have breakfast at the same dining area as the day before.

After we spent some time at the fusball machine, the staff served the same drinks we had yesterday. I asked for sunny-side-up this time around and that came soon after the fruit platter of mango, banana and papaya was served. The toast this time came with a small dish of jam and 4 slices of ham.

We finished our meal at 915 and went back up to the room to bring our luggage down. Couldn’t find the landlord initially but she appeared and we handed over the keys. Was informed of transport arrangements when we first checked in but we thought we would just push the luggage to the jetty since it was 935 already.

The short stroll with K seated on top of one of the luggage drew friendly attentions from few of the locals as they rode by on their bicycles. We soon reached the jetty office and learning from the initial boat trip, I brought my printed paper to the Inter Island Boats office at the jetty. After queuing for a bit, the counter staff told me to go direct to the jetty as the company was different – Inter Island Ferries. I knew that the companies were different but that was the closest I could find and I tried my luck.

Walked to the jetty and asked one of the staff there and he informed us to just push our luggage there and wait for the ferry and handover the paper to the staff later on. Much simpler than what we had in Mahe.

Back at the jetty office we sat on the benches while K entertained an Angmo mother and her daughter with his stories of his wooden giant tortoise and roller coasters. It was quite amusing to see the chatty boy going on and on with strangers.

When the ferry pulled in at the jetty, we made our way to lined up behind a short line of passengers while those onboard disembarked and had their luggage unloaded. Then we boarded by handing over our luggage to the staff who loaded into the boat immediately as I handed over the paper. There were passengers who paid on the spot for tickets.

We went on to the second level but under shelter and enjoyed the 15mins transfer to Praslin. K didn’t feel unwell and that was great, compared to the first boat trip to Praslin!

A far away tiny island view from the ferry.

Once we disembarked, we found a lady holding up a name board with my name on it. Immediately we approached her and was welcome with a handshake. She helped with one of the luggage after it was unloaded and we boarded her taxi that took us to the Capricorn car rental 5mins drive from the jetty. In the small office, we were once again welcomed by the staff who proceeded to carry out the paper works and introduction of the island with a map and then charged 180euros for 3days of i10 grand rental (excess 3500euros). A car check later (luggage already loaded in) we were on our way to the apartment 10mins drive away.

We arrived at L’Hirondelle guest house at around noon and went to the reception to check in. The place looked nice and was near the beach just across the road. Although we were early, the room was ready as we waited and sipped on our welcome drinks. We were given a apartment on the ground level with open concept living room and kitchen. The bedroom and bathroom looked nice but didn’t come with a tub.

Opens directly to the living room and kitchen.

We then drove around in search for lunch, first visiting the stretch of road with restaurants and shops along the Cote D’or esplanade. Didn’t see anything striking and proceeded to drive further north but didn’t expect to not find anything after Raffles so we made a Uturn. By this time K had already fallen asleep so we returned to that steet to find a restaurant Les Lauriers, but didn’t realized that they close on Wednesday’s. Since K was sleeping we decided to drive to ISPC supermarket that we had past along the way from the car rental to get some groceries.

Parked in front of the ISPC supermarket, mommy went down to get the food while I looked after K who had by now woken up from the transferring from mommy to me. He became grouchy until mommy came back and we drove back to the apartment to put the supermarket stuff ( there weren’t much choices in the supermarket and they were expensive) in the fridge. We later drove back to an Italian restaurant Da Luca pizzeria to have our lunch.

Ordered an Octopus curry and Penne allo Norma, a beer and mineral water for 610rupees. The octopus curry was really delicious I thought. Although we would like to have ice cream for dessert, there weren’t any ice cream for sale.

We went over to the KKT supermarket nearby to get more foodstuff like milk and water. Then proceeded across the street to get 2 fresh fishes direct from fisherman who should have just returned from the sea, for 75rupees. He then prepared the fish for us while we went to get plastic bags to bring back the fish. Mommy also bought some fruits from the fruit seller nearby.

We returned to the apartment and prepared K for the afternoon nap. This was when we found out that due to the open concept design, it could get really noisy. Our neighbors were talking really loudly and the noise permeate through the vented doors and into the bedroom. Thankfully K managed to fall asleep. I did for a while but the beer was giving me a headache.

Mommy started the meal preparations at 5ish, cooking the fish that she bought which she claimed was really fresh. K woke up at 6, and we all took our baths and prepared ourselves (dress code for man to be in trousers) for a Valentines dinner at the TripAdvisor number 1 restaurant in Praslin.

While we were about to leave, the rain started to drizzle and I couldn’t get an umbrella from the reception because it was closed. So we hurried to the car with just one umbrella.

The drive there was difficult to say the least, the sparsely lighted street coupled with the rain made visibility low. Furthermore, as we had to drive to the other coast, we had to go through the mountainous roads that had bends but no light reflectors so I just took my time to drive. The headache added to the struggle.

After some 30mins of driving, google led me to the middle of nowhere and I had to stopped to recheck the map. Fortunately it was just a few more meters down the road where we arrived at the carpark of a posh (better) looking restaurant.

Les Rochers spacious interior oozed luxury and the staff recommendation for a seat elsewhere to chill first before going to dinner told of an experience unlike other – it was going to be expensive. We were expecting it anyway and were ok with a little splurge especially on Valentine’s night.

There were seats out closer to the beach but because of the drizzle, we just sat at our table and waited for the meals. We ordered a local crab soup to share, a lobster meal and a grilled fish meal. But what came was a lot more, like banana snacks, fried onions, garlic bread, a veggie salad and boiled vegetables. The table was full by the time dinner was served completely.

The soup was quite tasty with real crab bits to eat (with the shell too). Both meals came with 3 portions and for the lobsters were 3 halves. The fish was fresh and soft like most of the fish fillets that I had in Seychelles and I thought the lobster was ok grilled in ginger garlic. The rest of the other dishes were quite nice, no wonder this restaurant maintained its top position on TripAdvisor.

Dinner was at a real relaxed pace, allowing the diners time to enjoy the food and each other company. There was even a no WiFi board that reiterated this point. We left late after 930pm after a nice family photo and a quick look around the restaurant especially near the beach area.

The drive home was taken slowly because of trying to avoid both a road accident and a puke accident. We arrived back at the apartment uneventfully and proceeded to clean up dishes before getting into bed.

Seychelles 2018 Day 7 – Valle de Mai and the Coco de Mer

Seychelles 2018 Day 6 – Valentine’s on Praslin