Until 1980 Mauritius depended nearly completely on sugar export. Today the sugar industry is third place of GROS DOMESTIC PRODUCT after the textile industry and tourist industry. Nevertheless today still 70 % the agricultural used land is planted with sugar cane. It is possible by the fact that Mauritius has unhindered entrance to the European market as a member of the Commonwealth and can export sugar at high European Union prices. By fixed ratios it leads in bad years of harvest to the pervers situation that the "sugar country" even must import sugar. In order to stop this insanity, at present World Trade Organization negotiations run to lower the sugar cane prices on world market level. This might have fatal consequences for Mauritius as well as for other sugar-cane exporting countries, because so far no incentive existed for the diversification of agriculture. In addition nearly 80 % of the crops are harvested by hand and thus many jobs may be omitted.
Goodlands is the largest city of the north and groups itself along a main street, on which there was hectic activity. We looked for a parking lot, which turned out as very difficult, and went the along the road. As everywhere in the tropics there were open businesses and stands on the sidewalk. The population, who consisted obviously almost exclusively of ethnical Indians, was completely remarkable. Altogether 70 % of the Mauritian population are of Indian decent, as remarkably as in Goodlands this is however rare. After the release of the slaves starting from 1836 the British shipped Indians in large quantities on the island in order to harvest the sugar cane. The subpopulations, black Africans kidnapped by the French as slaves, Madegassians as well as Indians have hardly mixed and still today one can read off clearly the origin of individual humans. An indegenous population did not exist on Mauritius. Anyhow, the saris of the women dominated the streets of Goodlands.
In Poudre d'Or I did not trust my eyes: at the
edge of a sugar cane field between palm trees stood a typically English church
inclusive a square tower. What for a
sight! Unusual for us was also the visit of a large
Hindutemple at Mon Loisir. Actually we wanted to drive
differently, but due to miserably sign-posting (variants:
none, showing into the wrong direction, closed up or only
attached by one direction) missed the way. Anyhow we saw the large
temple, on whose entrance we had to take off the shoes for religious
reasons. 
In the temple we were welcomed by a priest, who
originated from southern India and had been sent for two years to
Mauritius. Unfortunately he spoke only very few English, tried
however to describe to us the pictures in the temple. After he had held a
ceremony for us, we were allowed also to take photographs.
The travel to Mapou was annoying. In the travel guide it was referred to "one of the most beautiful colonial houses of the island", the Château de Villebague of the governor Mahé de Labourdonnias. The house turned out as private property and not to visit. In addition it was totally closed up and nothing at all could be seen.
We used one day to a travel to the east coast. Passing endless sugar cane fields, where we saw the chimneys of the old abandoned sugar mills again and again, we reached Poste de Flacq.
On a promontory beside different other hotels also the St. Géran is located . We used the
opportunity to visit it. It turned out as much
larger and more impersonal than the Royal Palm. Along the coast with pinetree grown beach parks was far to the south Trou d'Eau
Douce. Here we wanted to visit the Touessrok hotel, belonging also to the chain "Leading Hotels of the World", but we were not let in.
It was booked out and no rooms to be shown etc...
We used the won time for the visit of the city Bel Air, where also along the main street the life pulsated. Like
already in Poudre d'Or there was a typically English church in the city centre. Over a narrow road we drove along the Montagne
Blanche direction to Camp de Masque. To our surprise beside the
pervasive sugar cane even in larger quantities pineapples were
cultivated here! Far in the north at Bon Accueil we needed
some time until we should find the narrow road, in order to reach the water reservoir La Nicolière. The route was beautiful, because one drove in the mountains through beautiful
forests - better than the sugar cane! After a right bent the road
wound itself in adventurous hairpin curves down to the water
reservoir, above whose some locals had a picknick. We were immediately very
friendly addressed and entangled into a discussion.
The reservoir was only filled to 45 % in the Mauritian
high summer. It serves, beside numerous others on the island,
not only for the potable water supply, but also substantially for the irrigation of many sugar cane fields.
20% of the agricultural area of the island are watered. From a lookout point near the reservoir we
had a fantastic view over the east of the island up to the coast.
The northwest of the island
The most well-known touristic attraction of the island
is the botanical garden of Pamplemousses, which I visited one day on my own.
Governor Pierre Poivre had the idea to break the spice trade monopoly
of the dutchmen and cultivated all spices and plants attainable for him in
Pamplemousses. It was so successful that
indeed end of the 18. century the monopoly of the dutchmen cracked.
Today the botanical garden is one is the most well-known around the world. One
gets only here an impression of the original vegetation of the island, before the gigantic ebony trees were sacrificed for the building of ships and houses. Most photographed is probably the water lily Victoria Regia with its enormous sheets.
The entrance to the garden is surprisingly free of charge, at the
entrance however is a stand, under which licenced guides waite for
customers. Since the description of the plants is bad, one
should engage such a guide to a fixed tariff.
I had however no desire and entered the garden alone.
Promptly I was addressed several times by unlicensed guides (which is strictly forbidden). In order to
control the adherence to the rule, numerous policemen patrol the garden. Thus it lasted not for a long time until I was
addressed by a policeman on a mountainbike - in order to
warn me of unlicensend guides. Actually he used however
the chance to converse with the alone going female tourist. It took on
a friendly discussion over the history of the island, world
politics generally and special. Anyhow the nice policeman of
Indian origin and Muslim faith offered himself then to show me the
garden personally. As "payment" he requested my address!
That was very funny!
The way back to Grand Baie I did not want to drive again the motorway but the road along the coast. According to my very good map there was a connecting road from Pamplemousses to the west - for me it remained untraceable. I reached again and again the area of a sugar factory and/or the areas of the employees. Losing my nerves I drove on the motorway to the south until I found the crossing to Arsenal. There I drove through sugar cane fields to the bay of Balaclava, allegedly a creol version of "black lava". Here I wanted to look at the (according to travel guide) "pictorial ruins" of the former powder camp of the colony above the aestuary. They remained untraceable hidden between the Maritime and Oberoi hotels. Here, too, my map of 2001 no more did agree with the conditions locally, besides, nowhere was a sign of this allegedly so important object of interest to find. A pity.... I was compensated by the large public beachpark next to the Oberoi, from which I could watch the high waves at the reef near by. I did not see anybody surf. Perhaps it was not so harmless....
Thus I continued to drive to well-known resort Trou aux Biches to the north. At the beach road were numerous
beachparks and only at Trou aux to Biches the view
of the sea was blocked. I used my still remaining time for an excursion to
Triolet, above all known by its large Hindutempel. The place stretched itself in already well-known manners along a main street with
very busy life. In order not to go back directly to the
hotel, I decided to a detour over Pointe aux Canonniers, opposite our hotel at the other side of Grand Baie. Houses stood very closely, partly mansion-like, only in one place interrupted by a beachpark. One felt reminded of the situation at the Côte d'Azur.
The road became ever closer and worse and dragged on. I
was nearly already tried to turn, then drove on nevertheless.
Then I reached suddenly again a small vacant beach section -
exactly at the bay entrance opposite our hotel.
Interested I stopped and looked over the water. Then I was
addressed by a local, his car also stood at the beach park. He introduced himself as Paul, who works for the MBC
(Mauritian Broadcasting service). A tremendously
interesting discussion developed, in which Paul turned out as a most competent
interlocutor. He had just returned from China ("we will be still
surprised all at") had been to Madagascar ("inconceivable poverty") and the French Réunion ("all live of subsidies
- noone works"). He tried to make additional money on the wholesale sales of batteries. As Hindu he grumbled
about the Muslims, who formed allegedly a "battery sales cartel".
So problem-free living together of the religions did not happen it seemed....
We talked and talked, so that Paul invited me to a beverage. In his car we went to a road tavern of
acquaintances of it and I got many informations on the island. Begun with the fall of the textile industry (many
designer companies such as Boss had settled because of the low
wages on Mauritius and to go now to nearby Madagascar, because the
wages are still lower there), of the power production by Bagasse (the
plant waste from the sugar industry) and solar energy, we spoke about
the increasing tourism on the island and the many imported goods
necessary for it. Paul confirmed fully and completely the
impression, which I had so far won from the local people: very
communicative without being importunately, very friendly and interesting
- briefly: most pleasantly. I returned back to the hotel late in
the afternoon because of this nice meeting.
As very worth seeing turned out the colonial mansion Eureka. The mansion lies not far from the
motorway near Moka (south of Port Louis) in the midst of a 47
hectar large tropical garden. After payment of a big
admission fee we entered the 1830 manor-house,
which obtained a breath of colonial flair. The house
consisting of hardwood had been built by Englishmen in the French
style and is one of the few buildings of the island, which resisted
cyklones and other imponderables. Characteristic of the house
are the 109 doors, which provided in times of no air conditioning systems
pleasant temperatures. In the house still is original furniture from the time, a small restaurant and in
the neighbouring formerly officials houses arts and crafts are sold.
In the heat we undertook the excursion on the steep trampling path along the by-flowing river with waterfalls and a
garden pavillion.
Because of these positive impressions we decided to visit the Domaine of Les Pailles, praised highly in the travel guide. It lies directly south of Port Louis and should be a kind of copied open air museum. We however did not catch the idea. One could drive on the enormous dimensioned parking lot, was however nowhere requested to pay an entrance fee. We saw on the enormous area scattered several restaurants as well as a large (meeting -?) hall. From the allegedly railway we saw only the rails, under a coping a horse was sleeping in front of a buggy. Finally we reached "the" attraction, because of which I had wanted to go there: a copied sugarmill. There was an ox and some sugar cane lay around. The ox driver asked us for our tickets, which we did not have. Where should the sales have been? We had seen nothing. No, without ticket he could not demonstrate us the mill. I was very annoyed, because back to the entrance, where there should be allegedly a ticket booth, it was in the glowing heat surely 15 minutes to go - one way. We did not look for the allegedly existing rum destillery and the mask museum at all. According to the the large parking lots at some time there must be something going on. When we were there, no tourist was to be seen and the visit an enormous flop.
Very informatively was the visit of the sugar factory l'Aventure de Sucre in Beau Plan near
Pamplemousses, directly near of the motorway. Strangely it was
mentioned in no travel guide and we got to know of it only through a road sign.
Actually we had expected only an exhibition on the history of sugar production
and were surprised at the admission fee of 250 Rupees (approx. 8 Euro), however we learned better. In an enormous exposition the whole history of the island including the history of slavery and immigration was presented. The history of the sugar and
the sugar production was only one component of the exposition.
Besides old machines even a shipping punt was shown.
In front of and in the factory old steam locomotives were located,
which had pulled the sugar cane railroad cars off the fields.
A large sign told: manufactured in Berlin!
For the attendance of the multimedia exhibition one should take
sufficiently time into account. Sugar is still the main economical factor and lent the island its face. After the attendance of
the exhibition one understands many conditions on Mauritius, of social or economic kind, much better.