Today I completed a self-assigned 95km long trip in a quest towards the East of the Island! Yes! Having travelled a lot round the island during different journeys from 2010 up to now, I regularly try to discover new things or things I haven’t explored round my lovely little island of Mauritius. Saddled-up on my faithful motorbike, I can say I covered round 50,000km on various exploring-only assignment trips here and there and many places have no secrets for me. Some times back I heard about the aeolian farm that was set up at Bras D’Eau/Roches Noires and I was eager to check this out! Somehow, when I plan my trip, I also tag other places on the same route that need my attention. Unfortunately it is only recently that I’ve started blogging and this is my first written discovery journey, even though most of the others have already been explored before that.
Mont Songe Sugar Estate Ruins
I started off at Capital Port-Louis towards the north and took the ‘Old Flacq Road’ at Khoyratty towards Roches Noires. On the way I stopped at ‘Mont Songe’ near Barlow since I wanted to take a few pictures of the old sugar estate ruins from another perspective… yes this means that I had already been there before. After some 15 minutes I continued my trip to the next destination on my list.
Haute Rive/L’Ilot
I headed towards Riviere du Rempart, which is a rather busy village, losing some 10 minutes in traffic, and arrived at the construction site of another phase of the Azury hotels in view to search for the ruins of an old Lime Mill (tipped from a watchman on another discovery quest). Unfortunately couldn’t find anything as the site was too messy with all the constructions going on and headed towards the jetty of Roches Noires instead, the 3rd place on my list. Wanted to visit the Natural Reserve again but wasn’t allowed access from some people there… it was ok, I had already checked that too before!
Poste Lafayette/Bras D’Eau
The main and final aim of my quest was the turbines of Bras D’Eau aeolian farm and from Roches Noires I followed the coastal road towards Bras D’Eau. Somehow, on the way near Bras D’Eau I noticed some old ruins I hadn’t seen before and I had to stop to take a closer look.
Ruins of Bras D’Eau
Bras D’Eau is known for its very nice and natural forest area and also for the history behind the region whereby French settlers had established this place for whatever reasons I don’t know yet. Luckily, the place where I came up to was the other end of the forest entrance and found an old chimney of what was a sugar estate and some meters away also found an old Lime Mill. Continued further to find the trail of forest exploration of Bras D’Eau. What I saw in front of me was very appealing for some more discovery but I was already behind in my time schedule. Took some pictures and put that in a future list.
Aeolian Farm of Bras D’Eau/Roches Noires
After another 10 minutes ride I reached the place some maps refer to as Plaine des Roches, but it was too close to Bras D’Eau for me. The HUGE wind turbines were on both sides of the road, 3 on one side and 8 on the others. Normally this is a restricted or gated area but fortunately for me, I found a clear passage some meters before that lead right at the foot of the very tall aeolian tower. The sound these made rotating with the wind was quite loud and strange, and frightening at the same time, especially when being right below it. Took some more pictures and headed back afterwards.
Back, I was quite tired of this day’s adventure, but happy for what I discovered!
