I wonder how many people have been to Mauritius and Slovenia (via England and Italy) in the space of three days? That’s what happened to me last month, and I reckon that travel link is certainly one of the most random ones I’ve ever managed to achieve.
First off, our family holiday to Mauritius was extended for an extra night thanks to a cancelled flight home. Luckily there are many worse places to be for an additional night, and the postponement news from Air Mauritius came in good enough time to arrange an eighth night at the same Air BnB without the hassle of having to check-out and find somewhere else for a single night.
It meant we got a full extra day of chill out time, and travelled back on a daytime flight rather than overnight – always a good thing in my eyes, especially on a twelve-hour long haul jaunt.
We got back to Hereford via Heathrow about 10pm on Saturday, then some 72 hours later I was climbing into bed in Ljubljana, Slovenia, having landed in Venice from Manchester at 5pm on the Tuesday.
I’d even managed an office day in Banbury* on the Monday in between.
*I know, I know, I get to visit all the glamorous destinations!
Anyways, this blog has never been directly about “here’s what we did” and “here’s what we ate” as to be honest, that’s just not me.
So, instead here are some random thoughts about this past month’s destinations –
Mauritius is stunningly beautiful
Hardly a revelation I hear you say, but this heavily French influenced-African isle is simply stunning, with views often even better in person than filtered images or videos you might see on postcards, google images or YouTube.
I’m a bit of a beach-whore. Not so much for swimming and lounging about for hours, but more for sunrise slow-walks, sunset beers and people watching. I’ve been lucky enough to visit some great beach destinations – Antigua, Bali, Koh Samui, Barbados, Langkawi – but Mont Choisy on the north-west coast of Mauritius pretty much kicked the arse out of all of those listed.
The water was picture-postcard perfect. Clear and warm, with golden white sand that just melted between your toes as it lapped against your feet. The waves were practically non-existent, making it a dream for our swimming crazy daughter. There were a handful of street food style vendors tucked behind the beach under the impressive canopy of trees to keep you shaded – but there were no beach bars or hawkers trying to sell you crap. It was just how a beach like this should be.
And it probably looked no different to how it did two hundred years ago.
Perfection.
The island itself also won me over. A mixture of Sri Lanka, Indonesia and Thailand – the landscape was lush and green – and the people were friendly as well.
Golfing abroad
Away from work and the school runs (and punting – but quietly trying to give this up) playing golf is pretty much my only outlet these days. I’ve got my handicap down to 16.5, but the reality is I’m still a social-golfer that is as likely to hit a two-hundred yard wonder shot as I am a fifty yard-chop.
I wasn’t planning on playing in Mauritius – unlike other countries I’ve played in, it’s not a place that does cheap golf or half-price twilight deals. But given as though I packed half a dozen balls, tees and even a glove, I thought it would be rude not to treat myself to a late birthday present knock round this layout, situated a five-minute drive away from our Air BnB.
Mont Choisy Le Golf hosted a DP Tour Tour Event last December () and on our third morning, it also hosted me for a 6.44am tee-off.
I arrived excited, and not as nervous as perhaps I would have been in the past. The English born-pro welcomed me warmly alongside his team that sorted out my hire clubs. The lady in the club shop showed me around the locker room, before another guy drove me to the range to hit 55 warm-up balls. The starter kindly took a picture of me before I hit one of my better shots of the day down the tenth fairway before I chugged off in my buggy which even had my name and tee-off time printed onto the front of it!
Those backpacker days are not lost on me – I felt very fortunate to be able to splurge on such a five-star luxury morning out – and even some pretty poor golf at times couldn’t stop me from smiling my way round the 7,300 yard monstrous layout.
Mont Choisy Le Golf was by far the best course I’ve ever played. It might have beaten me up at times thanks to its thick, long rough, strong crosswinds and blind shots – but when I watch the DP World Tour event there on TV next winter I’ll always be able to say “I made a par five” on the 582 yard twelfth hole! The whole place was pure, as.
Brushes with the law – the good, the bad and the ugly…..
Mauritius also gave me a couple of challenging incidents to deal with the long-arm of the local police force.
The first one was my fault – lesson number one of travel, never pick a fight with immigration – but on arrival, I probably overstepped the line with a rather obnoxious border office guy.
See, Mauritius scrapped its co(n)vid entry rules many months ago, but you still need to fill in a health declaration form alongside a visa form on arrival.
The health declaration asks several stupid questions –
“Have you had a cold in the last week” –
Well yes, I have and still did have a cold on arrival – but why does that matter to you?
“Have you come in contact with anyone who has had a cold in the past week” –
Well yes, I have just flown in a metal tube for the past twelve hours and been surrounded by three-hundred other fellow Brits, nearly all of whom were sharing their coughs, splutters and sneezes from the latest UK winter flu/cold bug that has been knocking around.
“Do you wash your hands regularly?”
Yes…..
“Please give your phone number when in Mauritius”
07785612……
“Please give a local phone number when in Mauritius”
N/A
And it turned out that N/A was not acceptable to the guy in immigration, who in turn threw our passports and forms back at us…..and so it began……..
“Sorry Sir, we don’t have a local phone number, we are not local.”
*Calmly hands passports and pointless health forms back to said officer*
“You must declare a local phone number, no questions!”
*Throws passports and pointless health forms back at us*
“Again, sorry, Sir. We don’t have a local number. We have declared our personal numbers, two of them. That will work for you”
*Calmly hands passports and pointless health forms back to said officer*
“YOU MUST LISTEN TO ME! YOU CANNOT COME IN WITHOUT A LOCAL NUMBER!!”
*Launches passports and pointless health forms back at us, twice as hard and aggressively*
“Sir, you are being rude in front of my seven year old daughter. I have been to over fifty countries and never had to declare a local phone number – one I do not have to give you……”
That really enraged him…..
“YOU COULD HAVE BEEN TO SIXTY OR SEVENTY COUNTRIES, NO PHONE NUMBER NO ENTRY HERE!!”
Before I could (calmly) question his ridiculous stance further, Naomi stepped in and managed to stop the guy from getting his rubber gloves out on me. She got out of him that the wifi was free, and we managed to get a contact number from the Air BnB lady within a few minutes.
We were called forward by his partner-in-crime at the booth next to him – passports stamped and pleasantries exchanged. You could not get two more different welcomes than the good-cop-bad-cop we encountered.
The second brush with the law came on the way back from a successful family day out to a safari park.
We’d hired a car for five days and having been driven from the airport by a taxi driver who had warned me about a certain stretch of road, I made sure I kept well below the 80km p/h speed limit.
As we came down the hill, I saw some men in hi-vis in the middle of the road some half a mile away.
Instantly I said to Naomi, “We are going to get stopped!”
“But you aren’t speeding?!” she replied.
“Not sure that matters round here!” I laughed.
Our white faces and labelled hire car stuck out like the proverbial sore thumb. Sure enough as we approached, a guy in police uniform was waving frantically at us to pull over.
“Here we bloody go again” I thought to myself, keen to avoid a second confrontation of the trip with a local law enforcement officer.
“Sir, welcome to Mauritius, Sir! How are you, Sir?” said the excitable officer. Before I could reply he went on, “What is your name, what country are you from? Where are your papers? Is the car a hire car? Where have you been and where are you going? Do you like Mauritius?!”
I handed my license over, he took a quick glance before calling me repeatedly by middle name. As I tried to correct him on my name, he nervously dropped the license on the floor of the hire car, before apologising for his clumsy actions!
“You drive at 85, here in Mauritius the limit is 80! I should fine you 2,500 rupees! But as a gift to you and your beautiful family, Mr Richard, I let you off at 500 rupees!”
We had not been speeding, but given what had happened at the airport, and the fact we’d had such a great day out watching lions, tigers, zebras and such ilk a the safrari park, we didn’t want to sour the experience for ourselves or the slightly bewildered Mila in the back seat.
Naomi and I quickly did the maths and smiled at each other – the fine was about £8.73!
“No worries at all!” we said in unison, as I handed the young policeman a crisp 500 note from wallet.
He stuffed the note into his back pocket quicker than I had handed it to him. Looking round to check his superiors had not seen, he lowered his face mask and took off his sunglasses. He looked at the three of us –
“Thank you Sir, Madam and Baby! I hope England win the soccer world cup next time!”
We’d played our part supporting light African corruption by handing over the guy his beer money for the night.
And it was fucking hilarious!
a travel first
Let us be honest, most trips through an airport are identical. No matter how hard you try, you always arrive earlier than you should – people faff around at security with laptops, coats and fluids – and a pint at an airport always tastes great, no matter what time of the day it is.
But coming home on the Saturday morning I had an airport travel first.
Just before it was time to board, Mila and I went for a walk round duty free to try and use up the last of our rupees on some pointless gifts. As we looked for some cheap rum and maybe some snacks for the long flight home, the airport tannoy went off –
“DONG DONG DONG!! WOULD THE FOLLOWING PASSENGERS PLEASE REPORT TO GATE 22 IMMEDIATELY!”
Sure as anything our three names were then read out.
Mila heard it, so did I!
We raced back to the coffee shop to find Naomi scrolling on her phone, completing the online ASDA shop we’d hope to get delivered the following morning (again – it’s not all glamour!)
What had we forgotten to do?
Had we dropped a passport or a wallet? Were we about to get upgraded? Were we on the wrong rescheduled flight home? Had we made an error paying the corrupt policeman an illegal fine? Was the obnoxious weed of an immigration official we encountered in arrival keen to rubber glove me before I left the country!?
No.
They just wanted to check we were through airport security as we’d checked in online and were only travelling with hand luggage.
Travel – no matter how much you do, there will always be a first!
Ljubljana is a hidden gem
The capital of Slovenia has been on my radar for several years, but not living close to Luton or Stansted airports, it is just not an easy place to fly to for me.
A new customer in northern Italy gave the chance to visit county number 56, situated a simple ninety minutes away across the border. We lucked out at Venice airport – straight off the plane, through security and into the Alpha Romeo hire car within half an hour of landing. Two hours later and I was soon tucking into beers and burgers at the number #1 rated burger-eatery on TripAdvisor, “Pops Place”
Ljubljana was stereotypically pretty – its old town had busy pubs and eateries hugging either side of the river and being a University City, it was buzzing – even on a random March Tuesday night. It was a very youthful crowd (or maybe I’m simply heading towards middle age faster than I like to admit!)
In the morning there was just enough time to go up to the cities Castle which overlooked the city, giving some pretty cool panoramic views of the capital and the surrounding mountains – which still had decent levels of snow atop.
It seemed a really positive place to be, no doubt boosted by EU funded opportunities for its people and associated infrastructure.
I mean, just imagine Slovenia having better highways than the UK?
Brexit benefits on show again……
Hereford Rich 