After our journey across the Indian Ocean, our visit to Desroches was a bit tame. Just a tortoise breeding pen to see,
The island was named L’ile des Roches in 1771 by la Billière, commander of the French vessel "L’Etoile du Matin" in honour of François Julien des Roches, the Governor of Île de France (now Mauritius). It was explored by the Chevalier de la Billiière in 1771. The British had originally named it Wood Island because of its dense tree vegetation. The island was an important producer of copra. In 1835 the first settlement was established.
Along with the remaining Amirante Islands, Desroches had been a part of the Seychelles since it became a separate colony in 1909. In 1965, the United Kingdom split Desroches from the Seychelles to become part of the newly created British Indian Ocean Territory together with Farquhar, Aldabra and the Chagos Archipelago, but later returned it to the Seychelles with Farquhar and Aldabra. The purpose was to allow the construction of a military base for the mutual benefit of the United Kingdom and the United States. In1972, a tourist lodge was built on the island, on Lodge Beach. It went through a number of owners, and is now run by Four Seasons who have over 60 rooms in their hotel.
It has a population of about 100 today
The tortoise breeding site is in the centre of the island, a short but hot walk from where we landed. It was "interesting" but did not really seem to be breeding anything other than a small number of tortoises
If you search for photos of Desroches on Google, all that comes up is the Four Season resort
Click on any of the thumbnails to get a bigger version of the picture
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Next morning we woke up in Victoria Harbour, Mahe.
Our ferry was not till 11.30, so we stayed on the Discoverer until the last allowable disembarkation time of 09.45, and then walked (Chris assures me it was almost 2 km) to the ferry to La Digue
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