Souillac

The rock that cries is a little further east along coast from Gris Gris and resembles a crying man. In fact it looks like the profile of Robert Edward Hart. Two pictures in the Robert Edward hart museum show the comparison in case you cant’t find the actual or black magic.

A 5km walk from Souillac, past the Terracine sugar mill and through the cane fields along a well- marked route, brings you to this gushing little number. The falls are not so much high as wide a sort of pocket-sized Niagara. A car can just about make it along the potholed cane field tracks; this is some thing a new tax won’t risk, but an old one might for around Rs 300 return from Souillac.

Robert Edward hart (1891-1954) was a renowned Mauritius poet, appreciated by the French and English alike. He wrote in French and translations of his poetry are hard to find. He lived out the last 13years of his life at Le Nef, a coral beach cottage about 500m east along the shore from the Souillac Bus Park. It was taken over by public in 1967 the bedroom and kitchens have been maintained. On display are copies and originals of Hart’s letters, plays, speeches and poetry, as well as his spectacles, pith helmet and fiddle.

More like a small municipal park than actual gardens, the Telfair Gardens are hardly an outstanding sight. But they are conveniently opposite the Bus Park in Soullic, on the road to the Robert Edward Hart Museum and Gris Gris. The gardens were named after Sir Charles Telfair, secretary to the English governor, sugar baron and superintendent of Sir Seewoosagur Ramgoolan Botanical Gardens. You get a good view across the bay from Telfair to the graveyard at Cemetery Point, where Hart is buried.

The reef, which nearly surrounds Mauritius, has a major break in it on the south-east coast. Instead of beach and calm lagoon, the sea rushes up against lava rocks and cliffs, carving out a variety of stacks and other coastline sculptures, the best known of which is Le Souffleur. If you walk for about 20 minutes along the cliffs east from Le Souffleur, you will come to a spectacular natural bridge formed when the roof of a sea cave collapsed. To get there take the Plaine Mahebourg to Souillac.