La Digue, Seychelles - 1 of 3

The third most populated island of the Seychelles, La Digue was discovered in 1768 and has a population of 4,000, mostly working the copra (the white meat) from the coconuts and harvesting vanilla. With no airport, it tends to be a beautiful but quiet island. Interestingly, it is more expensive to live here than Mahe (yesterday) since it is difficult to get supplies (80% of everything is imported) here as well as expensive utilities. The island is mostly traveled by bike (we saw a lot of them) since it is only 4 square miles.

Our tour took us on a colorful ride of La Digue in an open truck to the southern end of the island. We arrived at L’Union Estate where we learned (everything about) coconuts. Here we learned about the three different types of coconuts which are green, orange and yellow but of course are called blue, red and white. Either way they look different and taste different. The copra is not easy to get to. The husk is removed (see my video on how easy it was), the actual coconut is broken open and then it’s put in wood fired heated room to dry so the copra comes out easily (or do it the hard way by cutting away the shell). From this you get the coconut milk, actual meat to eat, coconut oil and fibers for rope. We saw two mills, one which was not used any longer and was pulled by ox and the other was by machine.Read more