Sunday 25 August 2019

Forêt de Sainte Marguerite

The Forêt de Sainte Marguerite is a forest on the east coast of Reunion, in a highland area of Saint-Benoit known as Saint-François. 

view of the coast from Forêt de Sainte Marguerite

It's located at an elevation of 650 metres and part of it falls within the National Park of Reunion

the green spot show the location of Foret de Sainte-Marguerite 

It's roughly 700 metres wide and 2 kilometres long and to the north is limited by Ravine Saint-François, while to the south it's bordered by Ravine Sainte-Marguerite.


It's considered a 'fragile natural area' in terms of its diversity of plant species, and was created in the late 1970s and mid-80s when Reunion's Departmental Council bought three pieces of land to protect and restore the  unique fauna and flora. 


Today it's managed by the Departmental Council and the APMNEST (an association that protects natural environments in the east of Reunion).


There are over 150 indigenous species of plants as well as lots of Pandanus montanus screwpines and tree ferns.


A nature trail exists, but is no longer very well maintained. There are however several picnic tables, including one with a roof.




The forest is surrounded by agricultural land, including sugar cane, and fields of bananas and pineapple.

field of pineapples 


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Sunday 11 August 2019

Toronto & Niagara Falls

For our month-long trip to Michigan we flew in and out of Toronto as the airfare was significantly cheaper. So at the start and end of our journey we spent two and three nights respectively in Toronto.  (This was our second trip to Canada, although on the previous occasion in 2003 we'd only been to Quebec). At the start of this trip we were with my brother and his car, and as my husband and I knew we'd be coming back to Toronto by ourselves later we wanted to make the most of having transport. So on our first day we headed north out of Toronto to Georgian Bay, 'bay' being somewhat of a misnomer as this body of water located in north-east Lake Huron is almost as large as another Great Lake, Lake Ontario!

view over part of Georgian Bay and Parry Sound
from a former forest fire outlook tower

Georgian Bay has more than 1,240 miles of granite shoreline and is part of a UNESCO biosphere reserve. Its 30,000 islands make it the world's largest freshwater archipelago and seaplanes are a useful means of transport in the area.

former forest fire outlook tower at Parry Sound 

seaplane at Parry Sound

The following day it was time to head to one of the highlights of our trip, Niagara Falls. Rather than doing a boat trip to the foot of the falls we preferred to fly over them on a short helicopter ride.

our Niagara Falls helicopter 

Niagara Falls from the helicopter, Canadian side to the right

Niagara Falls from the helicopter, Canadian side to the right

Niagara Falls from the helicopter, Canadian side to the left

Niagara Falls from the helicopter, Canadian side to the left

Niagara Falls from the helicopter, Canadian side to the bottom and right

After that we headed to see the falls up close. My brother, who's been to Niagara about 7 or 8 times, said that the plume of spray rising up was one of the highest he'd ever seen.

plume of spray, Niagara Falls 


'Maid of the Mist' boat at the foot of the falls 
looking across to the American side

After admiring the Falls we had lunch at the town of Niagara-on-the-Lake, before heading to Detroit, a 4- to 5-hour drive away. We were back just over three weeks later, having been dropped off at Windsor (a Canadian town on the south bank of the Detroit river directly opposite Detroit) and then taken the train from there. During the 4-hour ride the train stopped at London (of course when you're in Windsor you're never very far from London)!

London, Ontario train station sign

Once back in Toronto we stayed in East Chinatown, which reminded us of our time spent living in Asia.

in Toronto we stayed in East Chinatown, very reminiscent of Asia

We had some time on our first day to get to grips with the (very efficient) Toronto public transport system and visited the Distillery District, a 5-hectare pedestrian only area that was once the world's largest distillery. Its 150-year-old cobblestone streets are now full of restaurants, cafés, bars, galleries, art studios, performance venues and speciality shops.

Distillery District, Detroit 

The next day we headed to the city centre.

Toronto sign at Nathan Philips Square

old City Hall seen from Nathan Philips Square

The old City Hall building was completed in 1899 and now serves as a courthouse since the new City Hall was built in 1960s.

old city hall seen from the front

 Campbell House dates from 1822 and is the oldest remaining building in the city.

Campbell House is a Georgian building

In the afternoon we went to Casa Loma, an Edwardian-style mansion completed in 1914 for a prominent financier and industrialist of the time, Sir Henry Pellatt.

Casa Loma

Unfortunately financial ruin meant that he was forced to leave his 98-room home less than years after is was built.

the 'Scottish Tower', Casa Loma

view of downtown Toronto from the 'Scottish Tower', Casa Loma 

this fully-functioning basement wine cellar holds over 1500 bottles 

After walking through an 800-ft underground tunnel that connects the house to the former stables you reach the small Automotive Museum, which has a collection of early twentieth-century cars. Interestingly the tunnel features an exhibit called 'Toronto’s Dark Side', which tells the story – using archival photographs – of darker days such as Prohibition, The Depression, The Plague, The Great Toronto Fire, and Toronto’s first plane crash.

vintage car in Casa Loma's Automotive Museum 

The next day we didn't do much sight-seeing as we had lunch with a colleague, but nevertheless visited the University District and Kensington Market. The latter is more of a district than an enclosed market, with food shops and secondhand clothes shops. It used to be a Jewish enclave, but now many vendors are West Indian, Portuguese or from elsewhere. Incidentally Toronto is a very cosmopolitan city with 51% of its population having been born outside of Canada (compared with 22% for the country as a whole).

Kensington Market 

spiderman visiting Kensington Market 

We didn't go up Toronto's iconic CN Tower, but admired it from the ground. The tower has 181 storeys and is 553 metres high. It was built in 1976 by the Canadian National Railway and until 2009 was the world's tallest tower and remains the tallest free-standing structure on land in the Western Hemisphere.

CN Tower, Toronto

As our departing flight was only in the evening we had all of our final day to make the most of, and we chose to visit Toronto Islands. These are a chain of 15 small islands and islets that separate the city's Inner Harbour from the rest of Lake Ontario. To reach them you can take a quick ferry ride (10 minutes) to Ward's Island or Centre Island.

view of Toronto from the ferry to Toronto Islands

view of Toronto from the ferry to Toronto Islands

view of Toronto from the ferry to Toronto Islands

Service vehicles are the only cars allowed on the island and biking is a popular way of getting around, although we chose to walk. We particularly enjoyed strolling along the 2.5 km boardwalk from Ward's Island to Centre Island. 

view of Toronto from Centre Island

On a final note, there were a lot of murals where we were staying in East Chinatown. One of them was of the Mexican archaeological site Chichen Itza, reminding us of our trip there in January just a few months previously!

Chichen Itza mural in East Chinatown, Toronto


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Monday 5 August 2019

Michigan: Lower Peninsula



Detroit in the early morning

After arriving from Toronto and before heading to Michigan's Upper Peninsula we explored some of what Michigan's Lower Peninsula had to offer, based out of my brother's place in Plymouth. Our first trip was to the university (or college as they say in the States) town of Ann Arbor.

Ann Arbor

Ann Arbor

Ann Arbor


The Detroit area is famous for its car industry, and the next day we headed to the massive Henry Ford Museum. The museum has several sections: an outdoor living history museum called Greenfield Village, a proper museum per se called the Henry Ford Museum of American Innovation, and a third part that we didn't visit: the car factory.  Together it is the largest indoor-outdoor museum complex in the United States and is visited by over 1.7 million people each year.

American dictionary writer Noah Webster's Connecticut house
was transported, restored and rebuilt in Greenfield Village

1927 Ford Model T

1961 Lincoln in which Kennedy was shot in 1963
(continued to be used by other presidents until 1977)


On 1/12/55 in Montgomery, Alabama, Rosa Parks refused to give up her seat in
this bus to a white man, sparking the beginning of the Civil Rights Movement

Chair in which Abraham Lincoln was assassinated
 in Washington on 14 April 1865

On the following day we headed into downtown Detroit proper. 

Windsor Ontario seen from Detroit's Riverfront Park. 
Ambassador bridge connecting the two countries is to the right. 
This is one of the few places where Canada is the south of the USA


Downtown Detroit seen from Belle Isle. GM's world headquarters are
in the Renaissance Center (tallest buildings to the left of the photo)

When we visited the riverside Renaissance Center, we saw a 2019 Chevrolet Silverado Trail Boss made entirely from 334,544 lego bricks.

It took 18 "lego masters" 2000 hours to build this Chevrolet

Hart Plaza in Detroit, with Windsor (Canada) in the background

Fisher building (1927)

The next day we started heading up to the Upper Peninsula (UP) and stopped in Frankenmuth which is famous for Bronner's Christmas Wonderland, a retail store that promotes itself as the "World's Largest Christmas Store". It's open year-round so we were able to visit, even though it was July!

inside Bronner's Christmas Wonderland

The day after our return to Plymouth following our trip to the UP, Wisconsin, and Chicago we went on a 30-mile bike ride to Fair Lane, the home of Henry and Clara Ford from 1915 until their respective deaths in 1947 and 1950. The 56-room mansion was undergoing renovations at the time of our visit, but we still able to visit the grounds.

Fair Lane main residence

statue of Clara and Henry Ford

back of the main residence

The following day was also Ford-family related as we were taken to visit Edsel & Eleanor Ford's house. (Edsel was Henry Ford's only child and actually predeceased his father by four years). The Cotswold-style house was built in 1920s and faces Lake St Clair, one of the less well-known Great Lakes.

Edsel & Eleanor Ford house

a playhouse, built to scale for Josephine (the only daughter of the couple's 4
children) when she was 7. As she was a tomboy she didn't use it very much!

Monarch butterfly

In the afternoon we visited Cranbrook, a 315-acre art and educational complex in Bloomfield Hills, built in the 1920s by Detroit newspaper magnate Georges Booth. It comprises an Academy of Art, a contemporary Art Museum, house & gardens, Natural History Museum and preparatory schools.

The main house, built in the 1920s, is Tudor style

part of Cranbrook gardens

Japanese Garden

in the grounds of Cranbrook Art Museum 

We then set off for a second, shorter road trip just to the north-west and west of Michigan's Lower Peninsula. Our first stop was at Lake Superior where we had a quick dip in the chilly water (probably 10-15°C).

turkey vultures eating a dead fish on the shore of Lake Superior

path to the shore of Lake Superior; note the "no snowmobiles" sign

dragonfly near Lake Superior

Our next stop was at Sleeping Bear Dunes, the largest freshwater dunes in the world. The Native American legend says that they are a sleeping mother bear who swam across Lake Michigan with her two cubs. The cubs drowned but resurfaced as two nearby islands so the heartbroken mother still lies there, looking after her children.

running down one of the dunes

Sleeping Bear Dunes seen from further south

We stayed in nearby Traverse City, and our trip coincided with the town's annual Film Festival. It was co-founded by Michigan native Michael Moore in 2005.

State Theatre, Traverse City

North of Traverse City and Sleeping Bear Dunes is Mission Point Peninsula, at the top of which you can stand on the 45th Parallel, i.e. halfway between the North Pole and the Equator.

Mission Point lighthosue

Mission Point lighthouse and 45th parallel sign

The area is also (locally) famous for lavender, cherry-growing and wine, so of course we had to do some wine-tasting!

Brys Estate Vineyard & Winery

wine-tasting at Shady Lane Cellars

lavender fields at Brys Estates 

panoramic view of Lake Michigan from Arcadia Scenic Turnout 

Our next overnight stop was inland at Grand Rapids, Michigan's second-largest city, which owes its name to the rapids of the Grand River.

part of Grand Rapids seen from the river

in Grand Rapids

Alexander Calder sculpture in Grand Rapids called "La Grande Vitesse"

Our hotel was opposite the Grand Rapids Public Museum, and an Apollo capsule used for training astronauts sits outside. It was sealed as a time capsule on the last day of America's bicentennial year (1976) and is due to be opened on July 4th, 2076, as part of tricentennial celebrations.

Apollo (time) capsule outside Grand Rapids Public Museum

We then headed back towards the lakeside, occasionally stopping in small towns that used to be thriving a century ago but became virtual ghost towns once the supply of timber that made their fortune had disappeared.

Bustling downtown Manistee, so busy that you can
stand in the middle of the main street to take a photo 

We also stopped in colourful Saugatuck and the adjacent town of Douglas. Saugatuck developed into a noted art colony and has now become a tourist destination, especially popular with gay and lesbian tourists from Midwestern urban areas.

in Saugatuck

Saugatuck Village Hall

Outside the village hall is the following sign about the 'ghost town' of Singapore: 

"Beneath the sands near the mouth of the Kalamazoo River lies the site of Singapore, one of Michigan's most famous ghost towns. Founded in 1830s by New York land speculators, who hoped it would rival Chicago or Milwaukee as a lake port, Singapore was in fact, until 1870s, a busy lumbering town. With three mills, two hotels, several general stores, and a renowned "Wild-cat" bank, it outshone its neighbor to the south, "The Flats," as Saugatauk was then called. When the supply of timber was exhausted the mills closed, the once bustling waterfront grew quiet. The people left, most of them settling here in Saugatauk. Gradually, Lake Michigan's shifting sand buried Singapore."
chain ferry, Saugatuck

On our final day in Michigan before heading back to Reunion via Toronto, we explored some of the area south of Detroit, venturing as far south as Toledo in Ohio. We also stopped by the shore of Lake Erie, the only Great Lake we hadn't visited.

downtown Toldeo skyline

looking across Lake Erie to Canada

One of our final stops was at Cabela's, a chain of massive hunting, fishing, camping, shooting and outdoor gear shops. This one in Dundee is 21,000m3 and has its own walk-through aquarium, gun library, restaurant and fudge shop. 

Cabela's in Dundee, Michigan

Some miscellaneous Michigan pictures to finish with.

Michigan is nicknamed the "Mitten State" due to its shape

Michigan: four seasons in one day


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