3279 MAURITIUS - Chamarel

Chamarel is a village located in the western hills on the west coast of Mauritius at an elevation of about 260 m, 6 kilometres from the coast, where the cascades are formed on the River du Capano flowing through an "amphitheater of abrupt rocks". It is named after the Frenchman Charles Antoine de Chazal de Chamarel, who lived in the area around 1800. One of the notable places of interest is the Coloured Earths, which is about 4 kilometres to the south west of the willage. It is a phenomenon resulting from colour variations due to cooling of molten rock.

0948 MAURITIUS - Wild and free

Not long ago I was the lucky winner of a lottery, and this wonderful postcard is the prize. A reason for joy, of course, to which is added the fact that it is a limited edition, that comes from Mauritius and, not least, that was made and sent by my pals Samuel and Vivi, whose works you can find here. It is however, also a cause for nostalgia, because I was (once upon a time) wild and free, like this bird, and now I became domestic and constraint, like a turkey. So it goes.

0320, 0584 MAURITIUS - Le Morne Cultural Landscape (UNESCO WHS)

Posted on 12.09.2012 and completed on 02.04.2013
Star and Key of the Indian Ocean, as says its official motto, Mauritius is an island off the southeast coast of the African continent, in the southwest Indian Ocean, about 870km east of Madagascar. It's part of the Mascarene Islands, along with Réunion, Rodrigues, Cargados Carajos shoals, plus the former islands of the Saya de Malha, Nazareth and Soudan Banks. When the Arab sailors visited the island, during the Middle Ages, it was uninhabited, and so remained until the arrival of the Dutch, although meanwhile it has been accessed several times by Portuguese.

In 1598 the Admiral Wybrand Van Warwyck named the island Mauritius, in honour of Prince Maurits van Nassau, but the first settlement was founded only in 1638, and abandoned in 1710. France, which already controlled neighbouring Île Bourbon (now Réunion), took control of Mauritius in 1715, keeping it until 1810, when the island entered under British administration. Mauritius has proclaimed independent (as a Commonwealth realm) in 1968, becoming a republic within the Commonwealth on 1992.