Bird Island – Schätze this earth
“No television, no telephones, no air-condition, just masses of birds, turtle and palpitatingly beautiful beaches.”
– Bird Island Lodge, Seychelles
Die Seychelles comprise 115 unique and wonderful Islands. Bird Island is one of the northernmost. So to the North, about five kilometres further on, the sea floor drops 1000 meters steep in the deep. This end of the Seychelles archipelago, is a fantastic place for sea creatures of all kinds – countless fish species, sea turtles, crustaceans, dolphins, and October and November can even passing whales from here, may be observed. But also on Land, Bird Island has a lot to offer. So the island from may to October, is the home of over 1.5 million sooty terns on the island to nest, but also many other birds have – sometimes only temporarily – your home. Also Bird Island is an important sanctuary for sea turtles that come in the high season several daily for oviposition. Also living on the island for 18 happy Aldabra giant tortoises. Only about 3 degrees from the Equator, visitors will find a tropical warm climate that you expect from a travel destination such as this.
Bird Island, the fulfillment of a dream
When we take on a Friday morning, the single daily flight to Bird Island, I can't believe the view from the small propeller machine shortly after the Start. This insanely beautiful sight of the Sainte Anne Marine Park with the Islands of Moyenne, Cerf, Round and Sainte Anne in front of the main island of Mahé, from the bird's perspective, you don't has normally. 30 minutes of the flight to Bird Island takes. And the view through the Cockpit on the 1.4 km 800 m small, flat coral island in front of us tells me this will be a fantastic stay. For three nights we may stay on this wonderful island.
After landing on the Grass runway at the “Coconut”-Terminal and a 1-minute walk to the Lodge, we are given a brief introduction of Robby, the natural protection of the island's Ombudsman. When is low tide, when tide is when the sunrise is, when the sunset is, where good snorkeling or kayaking, and when the next Nature Tour – all you need to know here on the island. Because Bird Island is all about nature just turns. For over 35 years, this island is family-run and has established since then an intensive protection program for the many animals to life.
Beautiful, beautiful, Bird Island Lodge Seychelles
On the island there is a single accommodation, the Bird Island Eco-Lodge Seychelles, with 24 simple, open and typical Seychellois Bungalows made of wood. If you are looking for the Bungalows, refrigerators, televisions, phones, or other unnecessary bells and whistles, which is on the island is wrong, because the power consumption is reduced deliberately to a Minimum, and the sake of the environment.
The Bird Island Lodge is proud to Act on their sustainable. The buildings were almost completely created from local products and by the open Design can be dispensed with air-conditioning systems. The water is heated with solar panels. In the North the only 0.84 km2 large island there is a small farm for the Restaurant as much fresh vegetables as possible are grown. Cucumbers, lettuce, tomato, pumpkin, cabbage, eggplant, and much more can be found here. Also pigs and chickens are bred for own use, and the fish of course comes fresh catch directly from the sea. The company philosophy States that only the Locals, the Seychellois, are allowed to work on Bird Island.
5 km of white beaches – so beautiful Bird Island is
Who would have thought that me on Bird Island the whitest, most isolated, and perhaps also most beautiful beaches of the Seychelles expect? As I set my foot for the first Time in this almost snow-white Sand and my eyes on the turquoise blue sea teach, I get goosebumps. Snorkeling, kayaking, or just walking? We can't decide for this first day on the beach and walk the perimeter of the island once under the hot Equatorial sun. Almost five hours we need for the 5 km, because again and again we stop, take photos, go for a swim or just enjoy the solitude, because of other people we meet on the beaches today.
The Restaurant of the Lodge – Mamma Mia!
With a stay on Bird Island Breakfast, lunch and dinner is included, because even you can't supply on this island, of course. The food was, in retrospect, the Best that I have had in my previous Seychelles. Creole cuisine out of a picture book. For lunch and dinner, there are typical national dishes from fresh fish (e.g. Red Snapper), curries, Creole casseroles, rice, Mango salad, and a dessert that leaves me now – three weeks later – still dreaming.
Nature reserve on Bird Island
No matter what it is that makes the island or the Lodge also, everything happens in harmony with nature and the protection thereof is always in focus. On Bird Island it has been recognized how important it is to protect our environment.
The colony of sooty terns , as well as the Guarding of the highly endangered soups- (green turtles) and hawksbill turtles (Hawksbill turtles) are particularly in the foreground. These programmes have contributed to the impressive success story of Bird Island – for the you already one or the other won, and even as the first Eco-project in the world.
Bird Island is the Mecca for bird watching. And also if you need somewhere else a pair of binoculars to watch the normally very shy birds, so you can get as close up to less than a Meter. Why, I ask Robby, in one of his tours through the nature of the island. “The birds here on the island, no enemies, and over the many decades they've gotten used to the people,” he tells me. Robby has to tell from his over 20 years of activity as a natural person responsible on Bird Island a lot. He knows the island and all the animals is second to none and has exciting stories to tell. On Bird Island, the Name is program, because birds can be seen everywhere: On the ground, on the sea, in the air, on the private Veranda, Breakfast, lunch or dinner, and sometimes also in its own Bungalow – namely, when you turn on at night, the light and the open Design at any time can fly. White-tailed Tropicbirds breed in the stumps, Noddiseeschwalben and Schlankschnabelnoddis in the trees, and the beautiful white Fairy Terns without the Nest on Branches.
We were in may there, the best month for bird watching. Every afternoon at 16 o'clock, you can then watch over a Million sooty terns as they return from fishing from the sea and in the specially created nature reserve in the North of the island to land. This is something I've experienced yet – and this is a spectacle you should not miss. With a blanket we lay down on the reserve the view in the sky – and to us, the language of the natural wonders of this devious.
The birds will land starting in April for about one hour until they remain, finally, by the end of may completely on the ground and breed.
- More about sustainability on Bird Island
- A year on Bird Island you can experience in each of the months
