A pretty smooth transition in to 2011 so far. Out of the thousands of people who decided to celebrate on the beach, there was only 5 complaints to the police, which is pretty good. As usual, of course, the state of the beach by the morning was disgraceful.
But we didn't go to the beach. With mum and dad we went to a restaurant for a nice little "diner dansant". We picked one that had a cheaper menu, something that sounded new to us, or not cooked easily by us and one that did not include unlimited alcohol because we did not want to pay for the other boozers. It was a smart move given mum doesn't drink and I can't handle more than 3 (indeed I was struggling to even drink my glass of champagne of the New Year).
It could have turned into a non event as dad was getting sulky at the beginning of the evening: the music was absolute crap and there was no one on the dance floor. As it turned out, the kitchen was closing at 12 so they did not start the dancing until later than we expected. When they started they did very well: with a massive whoosh the dance floor went from empty to completely full with even all the kiddies joining in.
The djs did everything by the book for an evening of dancing in Reunion Island:
played all the 80s and 90s French good tracks: tick
played a medley of ALL the Boney M: tick
played a medley of all the songs of La Compagnie Creole: tick
played zouk music, especially AT LEAST 3 kassav: tick
played soukouss: tick
played something popular on the radio at the moment: tick
played sega from BOTH Mauritius and Reunion: tick
played something arabic sounding: tick
played something latino sounding: tick
played madison: tick
played something electro or techno sounding: tick
played something african that required complicated steps that I had never seen before: ?
played something traditional russian?
played classic rock: we left at that time.
So we danced a lot and left around 1 am. At 12, when the fireworks started, all we had to do was go outside and look left. In front of us we could see all the lights of both Sainte-Marie and part of Saint-Denis and, consequently, everybody's fireworks too. Nice.
The food was nice and well portioned (although for me the dancing and heat combined made it actually hard to eat- well, in all honesty I did devour dessert, not usual for me). We ate sort of a shepherd mix of duck with a heart of foie gras or a tartar of saint jacques, then for main there was either a fish called legine or a bit of rabbit with prune sauce and wild mushrooms. Dessert was divine: iced souffle with cointreau or chesnut cream fondant. And a glass of champagne with .... a litchi in it!
I stayed up till about 2.30 expecting we would be having a slow morning at home to recover. I woke up around 7,8 to this sky:
Mum was cooking meat and dad was gone on a bike ride and it was announced we would go for a pic nic in the east, which turned out to be heavenly....
The Eastern coast of the island, from Sainte-Anne, Sainte-Rose to Saint-Philippe (very catholic around here) is a stark contrast to the burnt Savannah look of the West at the moment. Where on the West you are looking at hills of low scrubs trying to compete to become natural matchsticks, the vegetation along the road in the East looks like a green blanket trying to cover the road and swallow your car. The road is narrower and bendy, houses are more traditional, gardens are better organised, flowers more abundant and EVERYONE has at least one big litchi tree in their front yard. And at this time of year, let me tell you, they look good and well, fruitlful!
Mum meets many a person at hospital who got injured going up the tree to get more fruit.
So anyway we passed the different lava flows and I was reminded again of how much we are at the mercy of the volcano on this side of the island. The latest eruption to be pretty big (ie, the lava crossed to road to go into the sea) was in 2007 or 2008, so I was midly surprised to see this:
Which reads: Risk of intense fog (???). Apparently the sometimes 60 meters high lava underneath, is still hot, and creates fog as the vapour rises. I thought, come on, "risky" fog? My parents assured me they had come to meet some friends at a restaurant on the other side lately and they HAD to turn around because they could not even see the front of the car, it was that thick. On bad weather days, people have to go accross half of the island to go to work rather than cross the road.
Something huh? Here are some more pictures of the site:
Distracted myself during the rest of the trip by looking at names of creeks (we call them "ravines" around here), especially not pretty, plain stupid or not aptly named ones. The award goes to "Ravine before the river of the East", runners up being "Ravine bamboo arm 1", "Ravine Bamboo arm 2" and "Ravine Bamboo arm 3". A special mention for "Slippery Ravine", which was dry as.
Still, more cheery than "Widow Ravine", "Hole Ravine" and "Lice Ravine" which stand next to each other on the West Coast.
At last we made it to the picnic ground. I don't know if it is because we never lived on this side of the island but each time I arrive at "L'Anse des cascades" (The Alcove of the Waterfalls?), I feel like i am rediscovering something that was buried deep in my memory and that I had completely forgotten about. Why it would be that I keep forgetting such a place beats me as it is as close to perfect a pic nic area as you can get, provided you do not go there on a sunday (or as it turned out after 2 on the 1st january) as there is always some idiot with his boom box and parking becomes... well... tricky. Sometimes it would be people with their "jumbes" (percussions) and I don't mind that. Call me harsh but I draw the line at having Scorpio's Wind of Change blasting loudly when I am trying to nap peacefully undearneath my tropical coconut trees, gazing occasionally at the "Paille en queues" flying over in a perfect blue sky.
Better stop for now as I need to let the computer rest a while. and then, I will put pictures of the pic nic spot :)
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