Keep the Car Runnin

La Reunion

So it would be after a second final meal, that we finally set off for the airport in Sydney. The last few weeks have been a massive, exciting adventure and now we’re at the departure lounge with the foreseeable future set to be totally different.

Sydney has renovated its departure lounge somewhat, and it was pretty amazing to walk around, compared to how dodgy the old layout used to be! The airline we travelled with Air-Austral, hurried us to the gate a fair while before the plane was due to depart... only for us to sit on the run way for well over an hour delaying us even further - a total of 8hours on our original booking document. The cramped 777-200er finally groaned off and was soon cruising nearly 6000miles from Sydney, to La Reunion.

A rare occurrence for me, I actually managed to get a decent sleep in on a flight, probably about 6hrs before touching down at a local time of around 4am. We cabbed it in to town and then after hassling the sleepy concierge, he gave in and let us check in to our room very early (compared to the 11am on our booking info!). This was perfect, we grabbed some coffee and croissants and then dozed, internetted and chilled before the rest of the world came back to life.

We spent day 1 mainly arranging details for the next 3-4days and trying our hardest to stay awake to beat the incoming jet-lag. The morning sun had given way to rain clouds a

nd our first day made us think that we were in for some pretty lousy weather...

On day 2, I awoke and pretty much headed out to the lure of Pauls cafe just over the road (I’d recommend avoiding the St Denis Best Western other than the fact it is located next to Pauls - awesome cafe). Once our gear was packed, I ran down the road to pick up our wagon for the next few days. Once we were out on the road, the spirit andexcitement of the trip started multiplying by the second. We soon got away from the normal capital city and out to some more interesting places... well at least there was whitesand! St Gilles Les Bains was very euro holiday resort, but the roads on the way there made up for it. The freeway which affords some totally amazing views of the coast and of the inland geographical wonders.Once we’d jumped out and eaten some lunch at a random beach spot we found, we pointed the car inland; toward the town Cilaos. Here we would be based to do some walking around the Cirques; some amazingly crafted (by nature) rocks/mountains. The drive there was pretty cool, with about 4000 hairpin turns and even a few tunnels that looked much like they were dug by hand, just a few weeks ago!

On arrival we spent some time getting used to the town, and working out what we’d do over the next few days...The jetlag still hadn’t worn from us and we managed to get up at about 5am without even trying. Breakfast and drinks done, we headed off out of town and into the valleys. What followed was nearly 5hours of awesome walking. The usual physical stuff, with lots of waterfalls and seriously amazing views thrown in for good measure... end of the day, we were smashed and fell asleep as soon as the sun did.

Up again at silly o clock, we embarked on a long drive out of the centre of the island, back around some coast past a place called Le Tampon and up towards Reunions major tourist draw card... Le Piton de Fournaise; one of the worlds most active volcanos (last went off in April 2007).

As we drove up, the landscape changed from tropical island, through a man made forrest, to lush New Zealand style lush grassy valleys, finally giving way to red igneous rock as far as the eye could see. The Volcano was smouldering away, and we were lucky to be there this early as, not long after, the clouds would roll in a spoil the views.

We took a walk around the outter rim of the volcano, since the inner rim had been closed due to the eruption 2years earlier. It was still impressive, and even things like the rock we were walking on, were obviously quite different to any other country trail. Once we were unable to see much more, we turned back on ourselves and headed for our cruddy little white hire car. Back down around the windy roads, the brakes were squealing like a piggy on market day. The heat soon returned once the altitude was gone too... back up past 30degrees, we found our way to some light refreshments before thinking about where we would stay for our final night.

Tired, we found a room in St Gilles Les Ba

ins for the night without too much hassle... it turned out that this could be one of the nicest highlights of the trip so far. Two pools, AC, bars, beach within 20metres and lots of lovely sunshine. Our tired feet got some much needed relaxation with many a chilled out beach walks.
To Do:
Pauls Cafe - St Denis
Cilaos and its walks
The Volcano (leave early before the clouds creep in)

Avoid:
Best Western St Denis (Overpriced and not particularly clean or modern inside).