Seychelles Island Jewels in an Azure Sea The 115 islands of the Seychelles Archipelago lie scattered across their secret corner of the western Indian Ocean like precious gemstones set in a universe of azure water – stepping stones to the east coast of Africa, some thousand miles away, and natural gateway to the many treasures of the continent.
T
hese islands were first discovered by the brave Arab mariners of the 9th century B.C. who first began to chart the unknown waters of an ocean they called the ‘bahr al zanj’’ or ‘sea of the blacks’, leaving traces of their presence in the names they gave to certain of the islands such as Aldabra which is sometimes appropriately translated from Arabic as ‘the rock.’ With nothing in the way of historical records to fall back on, we are left with little more than conjecture to fathom the precise history of these spectacularly beautiful islands which may also have received visits from the Phoenicians; from a people who once sailed from the other side of the planet to eventually settle the island of Madagascar and from the famous 1472 Chinese treasure fleet of Admiral Zheng. Whatever their past, the waves have long since washed away all trace of those early settlers and explorers. After having served as a hideout for the pirates of the 17th and 18th century, one of whom, Olivier Le Vasseur, also known as La Buse, is believed to have buried a massive and as yet undiscovered treasure hoard on the main island, Mahé, the islands were finally settled by the French in 1756. They remained a French colony until they passed to the English after the defeat of Napoleon in 1814 and it was they who administrated the islands until their independence as a sovereign republic within the Commonwealth in 1976. The islands’ legendary loveliness has long acted as a magnet to travellers in search of the Holy Grail of pristine tropical beauty and many famous travellers have beaten a path to its shores including the likes of Ian Fleming, author of James Bond, who visited the islands to receive inspiration for one of his Bond books.
98
