Today is the last day of our two week adventure to the Indian ocean as part of SWMBO birthday celebrations. In tune with previous 2018 holidays, today has given us rain and high winds, but we have compensated for the lack of sunshine by having a full English at the golf club and extending our room until this evening to allow us somewhere to chill away from the busy common areas which are full of families playing Scrabble and backgammon.
The back nine on the golf course is closed and there are no buggies today so I clearly picked the best days for a thrash. Yesterday I played with a chap from Durban who was born in Liverpool but moved to SA at an early age. He has his millions filched away here in Mauritius and in the Isle of Man, and is now looking to move as the infrastructure in Africa continues to be more corrupt and fragile than Europe. The only problem he has is that the cost of living differential is not in his favour as the Rand is so weak.
We have certainly been treated like royalty here since our little challenge with the initial room allocation, and daily massages, dinner and breakfast on the beach as well as the premium all inclusive have all added to the pleasure of the stay.
Even with my surname I can't do much about the climate but I suspect it will start raining as soon as we get home.
Showing posts with label Mauritius. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Mauritius. Show all posts
Tuesday, 17 July 2018
Wednesday, 11 July 2018
Change the light bulbs.....
So the Seychelles leg of the tour has finished. The 15th hole got the the better of me over three rounds so l will watch with interest as the PGA Senior tour play the course in December. It will be an interesting logistical exercise as the hotel only holds 210 guests. They are expecting 450 players and hangers on. The De Havilland Otter only holds 17 people, and for the note of Wallasey golf club members, the course has no practise facilities.
We have now flown to Mauritius. Things have deteriorated. For a Country which has tourism as its major industry, a two hour queue to get through immigration was totally unacceptable. Half the desks were unmanned and it took an age to process people entering the island.
The Heritage Awali where we are staying then did not live up to its 5 star rating. Our sea view room looked out onto some brown worn ground which was once lawn. Behind that was the children's pool, then some beach umbrellas behind which was the sea. Not what was expected. The hotel were not overly co-operative, so I was forced to call Trailfinders at home. Even they could not get any change from the hotel.
I think it is all because their sister hotel next door is closed for a four day private Asian wedding and many guests are staying here. So we had a meal at the beach restaurant resigned to our lot. We drank wine and watched Les Bleu qualify for the World Cup final.
This morning we explored the hotel. We now have a daily massage plan in the Spa, tee times at the golf course and a meal schedule at all the restaurants. This was still a struggle even with a Premier all inclusive package.
Our day just got better though as we have just been upgraded to a beach front room. It is actually a suite so thank you to the hotel and Trailfinders for sorting that. So now all need to do is see England do the business tonight, and nobody will need to come home early.
We have now flown to Mauritius. Things have deteriorated. For a Country which has tourism as its major industry, a two hour queue to get through immigration was totally unacceptable. Half the desks were unmanned and it took an age to process people entering the island.
The Heritage Awali where we are staying then did not live up to its 5 star rating. Our sea view room looked out onto some brown worn ground which was once lawn. Behind that was the children's pool, then some beach umbrellas behind which was the sea. Not what was expected. The hotel were not overly co-operative, so I was forced to call Trailfinders at home. Even they could not get any change from the hotel.
I think it is all because their sister hotel next door is closed for a four day private Asian wedding and many guests are staying here. So we had a meal at the beach restaurant resigned to our lot. We drank wine and watched Les Bleu qualify for the World Cup final.
This morning we explored the hotel. We now have a daily massage plan in the Spa, tee times at the golf course and a meal schedule at all the restaurants. This was still a struggle even with a Premier all inclusive package.
Our day just got better though as we have just been upgraded to a beach front room. It is actually a suite so thank you to the hotel and Trailfinders for sorting that. So now all need to do is see England do the business tonight, and nobody will need to come home early.
Sunday, 8 July 2018
Here we go here we go here we go
I had parrot fish for supper last night, I had parrot fish for supper last night. Before that, of course, we watched the England football with a few other footie supporters. Beer was on offer so a few were taken. This is Winter here in the Seychelles and boy did we know it last night as the heavens opened. Just the sort of rain that's needed at home, but not here as it wiped out the TV feed for the Russia v Croatia game just as Russia went 1-0 up.
Earlier in the day SWMBO joined me in the golf buggy and took a shot at the downhill 15th featured in the last post. Her ball is somewhere in the jungle as, to be fair, is mine. Seven balls lost between us but the green staff have kept us topped up with spares as needed. One more round to try to hit the green on 15 and to improve my eclectic, then off to Mauritius for holiday part 2.
Today is a chill day and tan top-up but still a bit overcast. We have become minor resort celebs as we have had extended loan of the golf buggy for a couple of days while everybody else has to walk. Might hit the gym this afternoon though!!
I had parrot fish for supper last night.
Earlier in the day SWMBO joined me in the golf buggy and took a shot at the downhill 15th featured in the last post. Her ball is somewhere in the jungle as, to be fair, is mine. Seven balls lost between us but the green staff have kept us topped up with spares as needed. One more round to try to hit the green on 15 and to improve my eclectic, then off to Mauritius for holiday part 2.
Today is a chill day and tan top-up but still a bit overcast. We have become minor resort celebs as we have had extended loan of the golf buggy for a couple of days while everybody else has to walk. Might hit the gym this afternoon though!!
I had parrot fish for supper last night.
Monday, 29 January 2018
January monthly review
Christmas has passed and the Hillhouse occupants have eased into the New Year. Both girls, Emma and Becky have new homes to furnish and manage as they seem to have got themselves settled into other areas of the Wirral. Emma's girls have settled into Birkenhead High School Academy so SWMBO only has Emilie to look after during the day, although school pick-up duties are still required.
Wallasey golf club continues to see far more of me than I had planned, but with a relatively mild Winter, the links have stood up well, and the sandy subsoil enables ma and my fellow members to play any day we wish. Neighbouring clubs on clay bases are struggling with courses or sections of courses closed for days on end. As a result, the applications for membership has escalated and there is now a waitlist as well as a sizeable one-off joining fee when looking to become a member.
SWMBO has a significant birthday this year, so I am whisking her off to the Seychelles and Mauritius later in the year. We have never been to the Seychelles, as much because I have always felt it would be a bit too relaxed with little to do, as for any other reason. You will not be surprised when I say that the hotel I have found has the only 18 hole golf course in the Seychelles, so I thought that would be ideal. We stay there a week and then travel to Mauritius for a week for a bit of pampering and, oh yes, more golf!!
As a warm up I have again entered the Sir Gary Sobers golf festival in Barbados in April, and as way of a change we are staying on the West coast so we can sample the delights of The Cliff, Tides, Daphne's and Sandy Lane, as well as Holetown and Ape's Hill.
We might try and schedule some decorating while we are away as SWMBO thinks the paintwork is getting a bit tired!
The London branch did not make it up North for Christmas, so we are trying to fit in trips in both directions to meet up, but with term time commitments it is not easy to get them all together. Tim, though, is hoping to get to Liverpool for my 65th in a few weeks time. I am waiting to see how much the government are going to give me for getting old!!
As we move towards February, and the start of the international rugby season it will be time to meet up with a few old mate's and tell all the stories we have been telling for years. Some things never change!
Wallasey golf club continues to see far more of me than I had planned, but with a relatively mild Winter, the links have stood up well, and the sandy subsoil enables ma and my fellow members to play any day we wish. Neighbouring clubs on clay bases are struggling with courses or sections of courses closed for days on end. As a result, the applications for membership has escalated and there is now a waitlist as well as a sizeable one-off joining fee when looking to become a member.
SWMBO has a significant birthday this year, so I am whisking her off to the Seychelles and Mauritius later in the year. We have never been to the Seychelles, as much because I have always felt it would be a bit too relaxed with little to do, as for any other reason. You will not be surprised when I say that the hotel I have found has the only 18 hole golf course in the Seychelles, so I thought that would be ideal. We stay there a week and then travel to Mauritius for a week for a bit of pampering and, oh yes, more golf!!
As a warm up I have again entered the Sir Gary Sobers golf festival in Barbados in April, and as way of a change we are staying on the West coast so we can sample the delights of The Cliff, Tides, Daphne's and Sandy Lane, as well as Holetown and Ape's Hill.
We might try and schedule some decorating while we are away as SWMBO thinks the paintwork is getting a bit tired!
The London branch did not make it up North for Christmas, so we are trying to fit in trips in both directions to meet up, but with term time commitments it is not easy to get them all together. Tim, though, is hoping to get to Liverpool for my 65th in a few weeks time. I am waiting to see how much the government are going to give me for getting old!!
As we move towards February, and the start of the international rugby season it will be time to meet up with a few old mate's and tell all the stories we have been telling for years. Some things never change!
Tuesday, 3 January 2012
2011 and all that
So we enter a new year, and the blog stats are telling me I must do better. I only posted 29 times during 2011 compared with a peak of 88 during 2007, a year which was only 8 months long in blog land. My posts have steadily declined year on year, so one New Year resolution is to post more blogs! I also plan to launch 'The Philanderer, the first four years' as a mobi file, but more of that later in the month.
2011 has been a year of ups and downs for us. Its memory will be dominated by the untimely death of SWMBO's brother Martin in Boston, USA. He was in his forties and having suffered a heart attack and he was unable to be resuscitated in time by the crash team. The family flew to Boston and waited by his bed for good news, but sadly none came.
Similar sad news surrounds my good friend Dave 'Cellnet' Jones who was sectioned earlier in the year and subsequently diagnosed with dementia. He is younger than me and one does wonder whether his extensive work with mobile phones was a contributing factor to his illness. His neighbour Graham Jones lost his wife Judy, after a long battle with cancer. So not a year to be keeping up with the Joneses.
There were good family events though. The wedding of Rebecca and Jon was great and it was foll0wed soon after by the engagement of Kieran and Hannah . The year was topped and tailed by the arrival of more baby girls. My cousin Mike has three girls, and his oldest now also has three girls, so quite how you get a boy to pop out is something I will have to ask my mate Dick about, as he has three of them!!!
Work on the house continued, not always as planned, and while the redesign of the bathrooms ran over estimate, it was the roof expense which was an unfortunate addition to the maintenance budget. Anyway, hopefully we are all done now for a while. The basement is the final area to be subject to a face lift and that can wait a bit longer.
We managed a few trips, most notably to Mauritius, but also to the Lake District twice and Ireland. Golf took me to Portugal twice, and we spent a few days in Christchurch, Dorset over New Year.
So what of 2012, the year of the Diamond Jubilee of QEII and the olympic games?
I have already indicated I will be blogging more (than 2011 at least), I will be taking SWMBO away more and be trying to get back into my running regime. That though will depend on my knees holding out.
I would love to get to a golf championship final, with Turnberry being one such target, however, I am still in the Daily Telegraph knock-out with my 4th round match on the horizon, and a couple more events to come up.
Other than that I will continue to work hard and play as hard as I can manage these days, so hope to have plenty to report on in the coming months.
A Happy New Year to all my readers
2011 has been a year of ups and downs for us. Its memory will be dominated by the untimely death of SWMBO's brother Martin in Boston, USA. He was in his forties and having suffered a heart attack and he was unable to be resuscitated in time by the crash team. The family flew to Boston and waited by his bed for good news, but sadly none came.
Similar sad news surrounds my good friend Dave 'Cellnet' Jones who was sectioned earlier in the year and subsequently diagnosed with dementia. He is younger than me and one does wonder whether his extensive work with mobile phones was a contributing factor to his illness. His neighbour Graham Jones lost his wife Judy, after a long battle with cancer. So not a year to be keeping up with the Joneses.
There were good family events though. The wedding of Rebecca and Jon was great and it was foll0wed soon after by the engagement of Kieran and Hannah . The year was topped and tailed by the arrival of more baby girls. My cousin Mike has three girls, and his oldest now also has three girls, so quite how you get a boy to pop out is something I will have to ask my mate Dick about, as he has three of them!!!
Work on the house continued, not always as planned, and while the redesign of the bathrooms ran over estimate, it was the roof expense which was an unfortunate addition to the maintenance budget. Anyway, hopefully we are all done now for a while. The basement is the final area to be subject to a face lift and that can wait a bit longer.
We managed a few trips, most notably to Mauritius, but also to the Lake District twice and Ireland. Golf took me to Portugal twice, and we spent a few days in Christchurch, Dorset over New Year.
So what of 2012, the year of the Diamond Jubilee of QEII and the olympic games?
I have already indicated I will be blogging more (than 2011 at least), I will be taking SWMBO away more and be trying to get back into my running regime. That though will depend on my knees holding out.
I would love to get to a golf championship final, with Turnberry being one such target, however, I am still in the Daily Telegraph knock-out with my 4th round match on the horizon, and a couple more events to come up.
Other than that I will continue to work hard and play as hard as I can manage these days, so hope to have plenty to report on in the coming months.
A Happy New Year to all my readers
Tuesday, 7 June 2011
Dead as a Dodo
We have just returned from our annual holiday, this year choosing Mauritius instead of our usual St Lucian resort. St Lucia suffered badly in the recent hurricanes so we thought we would give it a year to re-establish itself. Add to that the fact the golf is not now all inclusive and it was time to look around.
So, as well as some golf nearby, all inclusive was the preferred option, and swimming and spa treatments were the ideal choice for SWMBO. Now Mauritius has many luxury 5 and 5+ star hotels, but getting all inclusive options is a problem. The beer and wine at establishments which are half board, for example, can make the cost rocket.
We were delighted therefore to fall upon the Tamarina hotel. It is a new boutique hotel which opened on New Years Eve. it has 50 rooms, a spa and is attached to the Tamarina golf club. The golf club wends its way through an estate of tasteful one level villa's and is a very good test.
It also had an all inclusive option which included spa treatments, green fee's and local brand drinks, so we were sorted.
We flew overnight 12 hours both ways with Air Mauritius which was fine, although I would not have liked to do the flight during the day. Their service and on board entertainment were a bit nineties and would have struggled with the attention needed if you were awake. Still we got both ends refreshed and ready to go.
The hotel is about 45 minutes from the airport and is nestled between a deer park and the beach. when we arrived there were about 35 people booked in, and that fluctuated to a low of about 16 so it was really quiet. There were honeymooners and grey pounders mixed together and it worked well.
There were a couple of problems, one being the food selection which was pretty limited, but the staff did try to do variations on what resources they did have. The pools were not really conducive to swimming in either as they were built for looks rather than practicality, but the sea was warm and very shallow so that was fine.
Local wine was included, but we did splash out a few nights, and given the villa clientele was predominantly Saffa's and Frog's the wine list was excellent, if somewhat pricey.
One of the honeymoon couples was hit hard by the collapse of their holiday company while they were there, but the hotel did the best it could to continue to make their stay pleasant. The hotel gets paid 30 days after the holiday ends, so the collapse cost them all of the May revenue from that company. Their price was cheaper than the price we paid, but that was probably the reason why!
As well as playing the local golf course, I took a trip inland one day to play the Gymkhana Club.
It was laid out in 1844 by the Royal Navy, and having played Royal Marrakesh which was designed at about the same time by a British Army officer, I felt I needed to complete the double. The course was average and quite short, I suspect the initial 9 hole layout was better than the extended 18, as there is really insufficient land, but it was interesting to see the memorabilia in the clubhouse. It included a letter dates 1889 from General Gordon explaining the King's view of the place.....'.tell him to go to hell'....'but Sir, we have no posting there!'.....' right. then send him to Mauritius'......and also had a moustache spoon , glass mounted on the wall. I love looking at honours boards in golf clubs and here, Major this and Colonel that were listed as prize winners up until the mid-Twentieth century when more traditional Mauritian names started to appear.
But back to the hotel. The group which owns it also runs a rum distillery. They have a new product, Pink Pigeon, which they launched recently in Monte Carlo. The pink pigeon is a rare bird native to Mauritius which was in danger of going the same way as the Dodo in the mid 1970's. It was saved by the action of Gerald Durrell and his team at Jersey Zoo, and now 350 pairs are restablished in Mauritius with backups, if you like, at the zoo still.
The night we left they were having a big 'do' at the hotel so we missed that unfortunately, but we have brought some back from Duty Free. It's interesting that the island is still covered in sugar cane plantations. You expect Al Pacino to burst out of one of the fields any moment. These days it is used in the rum making business as very little sugar is now exported. That gap in the economy has been filled by tourism.
So all in all a good run ashore. We would go back, particularly for the golf, but maybe as part of a two centre holiday and stay at one of the more lively resorts as well. We have been back over a week now and it seems like we have never been way, ho hum!
So, as well as some golf nearby, all inclusive was the preferred option, and swimming and spa treatments were the ideal choice for SWMBO. Now Mauritius has many luxury 5 and 5+ star hotels, but getting all inclusive options is a problem. The beer and wine at establishments which are half board, for example, can make the cost rocket.
We were delighted therefore to fall upon the Tamarina hotel. It is a new boutique hotel which opened on New Years Eve. it has 50 rooms, a spa and is attached to the Tamarina golf club. The golf club wends its way through an estate of tasteful one level villa's and is a very good test.
It also had an all inclusive option which included spa treatments, green fee's and local brand drinks, so we were sorted.
We flew overnight 12 hours both ways with Air Mauritius which was fine, although I would not have liked to do the flight during the day. Their service and on board entertainment were a bit nineties and would have struggled with the attention needed if you were awake. Still we got both ends refreshed and ready to go.
The hotel is about 45 minutes from the airport and is nestled between a deer park and the beach. when we arrived there were about 35 people booked in, and that fluctuated to a low of about 16 so it was really quiet. There were honeymooners and grey pounders mixed together and it worked well.
There were a couple of problems, one being the food selection which was pretty limited, but the staff did try to do variations on what resources they did have. The pools were not really conducive to swimming in either as they were built for looks rather than practicality, but the sea was warm and very shallow so that was fine.
Local wine was included, but we did splash out a few nights, and given the villa clientele was predominantly Saffa's and Frog's the wine list was excellent, if somewhat pricey.
One of the honeymoon couples was hit hard by the collapse of their holiday company while they were there, but the hotel did the best it could to continue to make their stay pleasant. The hotel gets paid 30 days after the holiday ends, so the collapse cost them all of the May revenue from that company. Their price was cheaper than the price we paid, but that was probably the reason why!
As well as playing the local golf course, I took a trip inland one day to play the Gymkhana Club.
It was laid out in 1844 by the Royal Navy, and having played Royal Marrakesh which was designed at about the same time by a British Army officer, I felt I needed to complete the double. The course was average and quite short, I suspect the initial 9 hole layout was better than the extended 18, as there is really insufficient land, but it was interesting to see the memorabilia in the clubhouse. It included a letter dates 1889 from General Gordon explaining the King's view of the place.....'.tell him to go to hell'....'but Sir, we have no posting there!'.....' right. then send him to Mauritius'......and also had a moustache spoon , glass mounted on the wall. I love looking at honours boards in golf clubs and here, Major this and Colonel that were listed as prize winners up until the mid-Twentieth century when more traditional Mauritian names started to appear.
But back to the hotel. The group which owns it also runs a rum distillery. They have a new product, Pink Pigeon, which they launched recently in Monte Carlo. The pink pigeon is a rare bird native to Mauritius which was in danger of going the same way as the Dodo in the mid 1970's. It was saved by the action of Gerald Durrell and his team at Jersey Zoo, and now 350 pairs are restablished in Mauritius with backups, if you like, at the zoo still.
The night we left they were having a big 'do' at the hotel so we missed that unfortunately, but we have brought some back from Duty Free. It's interesting that the island is still covered in sugar cane plantations. You expect Al Pacino to burst out of one of the fields any moment. These days it is used in the rum making business as very little sugar is now exported. That gap in the economy has been filled by tourism.
So all in all a good run ashore. We would go back, particularly for the golf, but maybe as part of a two centre holiday and stay at one of the more lively resorts as well. We have been back over a week now and it seems like we have never been way, ho hum!
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