Vallée de Mai (Seychelles)

Praslin is the second largest of the Seychelles inner islands, a beautiful sleepy isle fringed with white sandy beaches and turquoise waters. What Praslin is most famous for however, is not its award-winning beaches, but the Vallee de Mai.

Situated in the heart of Praslin National Park, the Valle de Mai is one of the smallest natural UNESCO World Heritage sites. As the Seychelles are some of the oldest and most isolated islands in ...
...the primeval palm forest which once covered the ancient continent of Gondwanaland. Many plants here are endemic, and the area remained completely virgin forest until the 1930s, when the land was bought and "beautified", and many ornamental trees were added. These were thankfully removed when the government purchased the land in 1948, and the area was made into a nature reserve and gradually rehabilitated.

When I visited here ... more

Praslin is the second largest of the Seychelles inner islands, a beautiful sleepy isle fringed with white sandy beaches and turquoise waters. What Praslin is most famous for however, is not its award-winning beaches, but the Vallee de Mai.

Situated in the heart of Praslin National Park, the Valle de Mai is one of the smallest natural UNESCO World Heritage sites. As the Seychelles are some of the oldest and most isolated islands in the world, the Vallee has remained a unique remnant of the primeval palm forest which once covered the ancient continent of Gondwanaland. Many plants here are endemic, and the area remained completely virgin forest until the 1930s, when the land was bought and "beautified", and many ornamental trees were added. These were thankfully removed when the government purchased the land in 1948, and the area was made into a nature reserve and gradually rehabilitated.

When I visited here I was taking a break from a work placement on Mahe, which is a pretty laid back island. Praslin in comparison is fast asleep, and yet when I entered the Vallee de Mai, I was taken back by the sudden peacefulness. There was dead silence, the air was still and absolute serenity. Indeed, I walked for a good half hour before I came across another human being, with only a few babbling brooks interrupting the silence. There are several paths through the jungle-like valley. I started with the circular path which takes around 2 hours, and was certainly my favourite, as it included traversing several streams, which are the source of drinking water for most of the island, passing giant granite boulders and a climb up to a shelter which gave a wonderful view over the valley as far as the sea. I then cut down the Cedar Path and along the Central Path, which is where I stumbled across hoards of shouting European coach parties. The silence was completely shattered, and I had to battle my way through the masses, which did rather spoil the atmosphere. Still, these groups only seem to stick very near to the entrance, so for independent visitors, and any coach members with sense enough to break away, the best way to appreciate the Vallee is to head to the farthest reaches. At the time of my visit, May 2005, there were no paths suitable for visitors in wheelchairs, but there are plans to provide them, and the sooner the better.

The most famous inhabitant of the Vallee de Mai is the coco de mer (Lodoicea maldivica), which has become the symbol of the Seychelles, and is everywhere including the passport entry stamps. The palms live for up to 400 years and are unusual to look at to say the least. The female and male parts of the plants are shaped rather suggestively, and each palm can only be either male or female, which is an unusual characteristic in plants. The male palms grow to 30m, and produce a lengthy reproductive catkin. The female palm grows to 24m, and produces a nut which can weigh up to 22Kg, and is shaped rather like the lower regions of human female anatomy, leading it to often be referred to as the "love nut". Noone is sure how the coco de mer are actually pollinated, but the local legend goes that in the depths of stormy nights the male uproots and visits the female, and anyone who sees this drops dead on site, so unsurprisingly there are no witnesses.

Other plants to be found in the Vallee include various screwpines, latannyens, and palmiste, the very tip of which was once the sought after ingredient for millionaire's salad, alongside jackfruit, breadfruit and bwa rouz. Animal wise, bats are the only mammals native to Seychelles, and fruit bats can be seen here along with the introduced tenerec, a weird hedgehog-like shrew, geckos, skinks, tree frogs, crabs and some fantastic snails. The very lucky visitors (not me!) see black parrots (Coracopsis nigra barklyi), as well as bulbuls, blue pigeons, sunbirds, kestrels and swiftlets.

The entrance to the Vallee is near the top of the steep winding road that bisects the island. Due to the lack of pavements, and the interesting local driving tactics (I was once on a bus that met another bus on a winding mountain road, neither gave way, sparks flew, and we were jammed fast there for quite some time), I would not recommend walking. There is a bus stop right outside, and it is on one of the more regular routes (SR3 for any journey), but the buses are still quite sporadic and finish early. A hire car is the best bet (from £25/day for a jeep), and the whole island can be covered easily in two days.

Entry into the Vallee is free for Seychelles residents, but everyone else will need to pay in foreign exchange - US$10 or equivalent Euros. The Seychelles government prohibits hotels and many attractions from excepting local currency from tourists to maintain a regular flow of much needed forex into the country, so my top tip would be to bring forex and not Sey Rupees from home - I found US dollars generally get a slightly better rate than Euros, but this changes constantly and is often at the whim of the proprietor.

There is a very small shop, which doubles up as the ticket office, and really only sells the expensive tat made in China that can be bought anywhere on the islands, and a tiny café counter. At the entrance is a display of coco de mer nuts which can be handled. Love nuts can only be taken out of the country with an official government licence and a good specimen will set you back £200. I found the Vallee very humid once among all of the plants, so some water is essential, along with the map provided with the tickets, good walking shoes - the paths are well maintained but there are slippery sections of rock - and some binocs to check out the wildlife. 0.5Km down the hill from the entrance is a beautiful rushing waterfall (see photos), which is visible from your car if you don't want to risk your life walking on the road.

When General Gordon visited the Vallee de Mai he claimed it to be the long lost Garden of Eden, the coco de mer to be the Tree of Knowledge, and its nut the Forbidden Fruit. Every visitor to Praslin should see if they agree.

© 2005 V.L. Collyer
 

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