Results for "Tulle+|+127"

Nous sommes en pleine interrogation.

Nous partons en octobre 2006 pour 12 à 18 mois et nous hésitons dans les projets de maison.

Faut-il faire construire avant et louer meublé pour la période du voyage et est-ce que c'est envisageable ? Est-ce que parmi vous cela vous est-il arrivé de louer une maison meublée pour une telle durée ? Est-il préférable que la maison soit vide ?

Ou attendre et tout préparer pour le retour ?

Bonjour a tous,

Je recherche un sejour en Egypte d'une semaine, combinant une croisiere sur le Nil avec la visite du Caire.

Quelqu'un peut-il m'indiquer sur quel site je peux trouver une telle formule ?

Merci d'avance!!!!

Bonjour vous tous,

Je suis à la recherche d'une école afin de faire un séjour linguistique à Puerto Plata.

Est-ce que quelqu'un serait au courant s'il existe une telle école dans cette région. Je voudrais y aller pour une immersion d'un mois.

Merci pour votre aide,

Krystale 😛😛😛

je pars 6 mois taffer a pretoria que me conseillez vous de faire la bas xet quelles precautions me donnez vous pour ce pays un peu plus dangereux que dautres ...

merci

bon voyage a tous

Bonjour,

nous avons en projet de partir a deux pour un tour du monde d'environ 4 ans. Nous avons déjà le voilier (c'est deja pas mal!) mais nous comptons bosser encore quelques années avant de partir afin de réunir l'argent nécessaire.

Je recherche des informations concernant le BUDGET d'une telle aventure, on m'a parlé de 15 000€ / an, est-ce dans la moyenne, sur-estimé ou pas ? le travail aux escales (quel type de job peut-on esperer trouver, est-ce facile de bosser dans un pays étranger...)?

Merci de me faire part de vos expériences.

Eglantine

Les frais d'améliorations aéroportuaires

Pour quitter l'aéroport Jean-Lesage (à bord d'un avion, s'entend !), il faut payer, depuis septembre 2001, les frais d'améliorations aéroportuaires (FAA) qui sont de 10 $

cette taxe est telle comprise dans le forfait vacance

Salut tout le monde,

Voila fin avril je pars 5 mois à Sydney et je ne sais toujours pas quelle compagnie aérienne choisir. De plus j'ai une grande phobie des avions donc c'est pas gagné :). SVP aidez moi à choisir selon ceux qui y sont déjà parti et qui ont trouver telle ou telle companie super. J'arrête pas d'aller sur des sites pour comparer les tarifs mais y je n'arrive pas à me décider car je sais pas si c'est mieux de choisir une avec 1 ou 2 escale; car ça doit être crevant non??

Je vous en remercie d'avance!!!

Joyeuses fêtes de fin d'anne 2005😉

Clara.

Ah qu'il est bon de se refaire une toile ...Vue il y a de cela plus de 20 ans ... Mais dont les souvenirs imagés ont toujours gardé une telle vivacité!😊

La Griffe et la Dent, documentaire animalier(de 1976) de F.Bel & G.Vienne.

Dans l'Est africain, des espèces animales d'une extraordinaire variété se côtoient, se melent, s'observent ...

A la nuit tombée (A noter que c'est la 1ère fois que des images nocturnes de la savane avaient pu être tournées), un autre monde apparait qui s'organise par la chasse, le sang et la mort. Tout est désormais lutte ou esquive. Les mouvements deviennent fuites, poursuites, bonds, écroulements ...tandis que les immobilités sont attentes, guets, inquiétudes.

Sans sensibilisation, ni fausse pudeur ... La vie du bush sauvage est ainsi révélée en images, sur une terre qu'il s'agit de voir mais aussi d'accepter.

Qu'il fut bon aussi de voir ces guépards encore grimper dans les arbres pour s'en servir de promontoire naturel de chasse ...Loin des toits des 4 x 4, sur lesquels les Guépards du Serengeti et du Masaï Mara, montent actuellement pour en faire un point d'observation (déviance que le tourisme de masse à inexorablement provoqué)

Bonjour a tous

J ai achete pendant mes vacances un appareil photo a Bangkok et je crois l on peut le faire detaxer le jour de son depart a l aeroport,

a qui s adresser a l aeroport et une simple facture est telle sufisante ??

Si quelqu un a des infos a ce sujet, merci d avance

Bon voyage a tous

JP

Bonjour, je prépare un tour du monde et dans mon tour du monde, je souhaite faire la traversée du Sahara à dos de Dromadaire / Chameau.

1. Est-ce possible ?

Si oui 1.1 Existe-t-il des caravanes régulières ?

2. Est-ce possible physiquement ? (je suis jeune et assez sportif: 6 à 7 heures de sport / semaine)

3. Comment organiser une telle traversée à distance ? je suis en France, je ne sais pas comment me renseigner sur les possibilités sur place.

Merci à tous.

Salut a Tous

Un conseil EVITER la compagnie de bus PANASUR pour aller a UYUNI de La Paz Bus pourri de chez pourri!!!!!!!!!!!!! et en plus quand vous prennez une autre Compagnie eviter les 10 places arrieres Car apres Ururo c est de la piste comme en Afrique Tolle ondullee.......eclatement de pneu etc....... mais le Salr et le circuit traditionnel SSSSSSSuper JE VEUX Y RETOURNER!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Récemment, j'ai lu des textes sur le Ghost Traveling, c'est-à-dire voyager comme un fantôme, sans passer par les douanes, sans papiers d'identité, etc. Je trouvais ça intéressant, et ce qui était écrit avait l'air réalisable. Je suis donc tenté d'essayer. Je voudrais savoir si quelqu'un parmi vous a déjà vécu une telle aventure, ou si vous envisagez d'essayer. Il faut sans doute une très grande résistance et une excellente capacité d'adaptation, et j'ai les deux. Je voulais donc connaître votre avis là-dessus...

Bonjour,

je voudrais partie 2 mois en Asie et je pensais faire Pékin-Chengdu-Lhassa-Katmandu-Dehli. J'ai cru comprendre qu'il vaut mieux prendrer des vols internes plutôt que se déplacer en voiture ou bus ou autre. En fait je me pose plusieures questions telle que est-ce que 2 mois ça suffit? Je voudrais relier Lhassa à Katmandu en voiture, combien de temps faut il et combien cela peut il couter? Les vols internes en Chine sont ils très cher ( dans le sens prix explosifs!!) si vous avez un ordre de grandeur ce serait sympa de m'en faire part. Je voudrais également savoir si voyager toute seule en temps que fille c'est prendre des risques ou il n'y a rien à craindre?

Voilà en fait je prépare mon premier voyage et je suis un peu perdue alors si vous pouver me donner des conseil ce serait vraiment sympa

merci d'avance

J'ai lu que même avec une réservation de camping, il est préférable d'arriver tôt dans certains parcs comme Etosha ou Sesriem, sinon la place peut être attribuée à quelqu'un d'autre... Ca tomberait mal car, pour Sesriem en particulier, j'aurai une longue route à faire et je n'y arriverai probablement pas de bonne heure !!!

Une telle mésaventure vous est-elle déjà arrivée ?

Je souhaite me rendre a NYC très prochainement et les tarifs de Air India sont très inférieurs au mérché: que pensez-vous de cette compagnie sur une telle destination?

Holà......

Quelqu'un a t-il en mémoire quelque part le nom d 'un site sur la météo "historique"...c'est-à-dire où l'on peut prévoir approximativement, par exemple pour le mois d'avril, la température qu'il fera à Varadero, à telle ou telle période, basée sur les archives des années précédentes....

J'avais le lien pour ce site, mais j'ai dû l'effacer accidentellement ...alors si quelqu'un l'a, prière de me répondre...merci beaucoup!🙂

P.S.: ...... plus que 27 dodos avant le grand départ!😎

Diama.

Un autre 50 cm...et dire qu, il y en a qui paient des fortunes pour voir ça....!!!

Désolé on ne rie plus...face à une telle situation il y a 5 solutions...

1-On démarre la souffleuse(mais la mienne est encore en panne....)

2-On répond a l, appel de la pelle. Ce que je fis...

3-On trouve un voisin compatissant qui LUI a une bonne souffleuse..

4-On prend l'avion pour le Sud (bientôt....bientôt...)

5-On attend que tout fonde au printemps....

Je pense a celui qui vient nous visiter au Qc en janvier pour voir jouer les Canadiens, il va être servi !

En attendant les départs de Dorval et Mirabel sont reportés...ayons une pensée charitable pour celui qui a payé le gros prix pour un 7 jours dans un all-inclusive ( comme vs dites à Paris...) son 7 qui devient un 6 puis un 5....

apres longue reflexion, mon voyagiste ma vendu la classe galaxi de la star airlines en lieu et placee de la bataillaire amelioré de la classe alize de chez air france.aucun site web de star airlines.

qui a déja voyagé en classe galaxie et est telle une petite classe affaire oubien une fois de plus une betaille amelioré!.

merci de vos réactions si vous avez deja voyagé en classe galaxie!

j'ai l'intention d'aller à Cuba en avril 2004, mais auparavant je voudrais quelques renseignements sur l'Hôtel Sol Sirenas Coral Resort. Est-ce que cet hôtel est convenable pour y emmener des enfants, la nourriture est telle bonne, et comment est l'animation du jour ?

Merci pour une prompte réponse

... si je veux trouver une raison à l'abondance de réponses à ma demande d'infos sur ce pays. Zéro de chez Zéro ! Personne n'y est allé...

Serait-ce un pays dangereux ? N'y aurait-il aucun habitant avec qui partager, aucune particularité culturelle à découvrir ? La situation politique est telle qu'il ne faudrait pas la cautionner (argument peu fréquemment utilisé par les touristes) ?

Ou alors, et je pense que j'ai trouvé ici la raison de ce silence, le Paraguay a tellement à offrir au voyageur que les petits malins qui l'ont déjà visité voudraient le garder pour eux ?

Vraiment, rien ? Allons, un petit effort. Non ?

Dommage,

Jacques

Nos billet d'avion sont acheté depuis mai dernier. Il s'agit de notre 3e périples en Asie du Sud - Est, le 2e en Thailande. Puis, à 1, 5 mois du départ voila la tuile, je me brise la jambe gauche en trois (ouch!) pendant un trek en foret ici au Québec. Diagnostic: Fracture du tibia et du péroné. Rapidement on me place une tige de métal pour sodifié l'os. Je supplie le Doc !!! Je doit partir en voyage, OK finit le pleurnichage.

JE PART !!!!

De toute facon la Thailande est sans doute le pays du coin ou il est le plus facile de voyager easy non ? Ma chance c'est que ce ne soit pas arriver l'an passé, nous avons été au Philippines !

On ajustera que je me dit. Au diable (pour cette fois) les treks du nord et du Laos (Je salivait à l'idée de faire Vientiane-Vang Vien-Luang Phrabang) mais bon.

Nous partons (ma copine et moi) pour 40 jours, et rassurer vous je n'aurais pas la jambe dans le platre. J'aurais le droit de macher depuis 1 semaine lors de notre départ.

Vous avez des Sug ?

J'ai eu bon vent de:

Ko Chang + Sud Cambodge (Shianoukville) Ko Samet (pour la fin du voyage - près de BKK) Ko Lanta + Phi Phi + Krabi (un triangle accessible en bateau à mois de 2 heures chancunes)

Nous avons déjà été à Phuket et à Ray Lei + Phranang

Merci d'avance

Hi,

To save time, we sometimes take long-distance taxis for certain trips in Asia.

We're considering doing the PP - Sen Monorom route by private taxi. Does anyone have an idea of the price for such a distance (380 km)?

Thanks in advance for your tips.

Hi everyone!

New to this forum, I’m planning a pretty big project for 2028. I’m heading to Nepal to do a trek from Kathmandu all the way to Everest Base Camp (a cool 5,300 m 😄). This trek is a bit special because even though I’ll be part of a group, I’m going solo (so far, no problem—I’m used to it). But it’s my first real trek, and it’s also a humanitarian one: once I reach base camp, I’ll stay an extra week to help clean up the waste left by tens of thousands of climbers! Since I’m originally from South America, from two countries that share the Andes, I have a deep respect for mountains—they fascinate me. So Everest… it’s kind of the trip of a lifetime!

So, a little question for those who’ve done treks to Everest before… any tips for good mental preparation (I’m already working on the physical side)?

Thanks in advance for your advice! 🙂

hey everyone,

I’m landing in Madagascar with a buddy before the end of April 2026. We’re planning to bike around for about twenty days or so. We don’t have a specific goal other than exploring the country and meeting the locals.

Ideally, we’d prefer a loop route starting from Antananarivo with a good chunk of it along the coast. On the bike side, we’re used to riding 6 to 8 hours a day, depending on the needs, encounters, and mood 😉 Any feedback or tips from trips around this length?

Thanks in advance, Jérôme

We’re currently three retirees (one man and a couple) looking for one or two people to join us on a road trip through Patagonia by car.

Starting from Concepción in Chile, we’ll head to San Carlos de Bariloche (a possible meet-up point) in Argentina to reach Cabo Vírgenes. Then we’ll return via Route 40, with detours on the Chilean side (Torres del Paine, Lake General Carrera, Coyhaique).

We’ll pass by the Perito Moreno Glacier, Laguna del Desierto, Perito Moreno Park at the foot of San Lorenzo, Jeinemeni Park, Los Alerces Park, and more. A few hikes are planned.

Dates: November 6 to December 15, from Concepción back to Concepción.

Feel free to get in touch! Marc

Hi everyone!

I’m currently a student on a gap year, and I don’t plan to go back to school right away. That said, traveling really interests me. But I’ve been wondering: does being a student come with any perks when you decide to go abroad? The real question is whether I should re-enroll in a program just to keep that status without actually attending.

Thanks in advance for your replies,

Axel

Eight months after our vacation in Croatia, Europcar took 1,611.25 € from us... yes, you read that right—1,611.25 €!! At first, we thought it was a credit card scam, but after a little investigation and the documents sent by the rental company (which had the wrong email address), it turned out the city of Dubrovnik had hit us with this huge fine. Following the GPS on June 9, 2025, we were simply heading to our accommodation with parking on Zagrebačka Street. This one-way, busy street has been off-limits to vehicles without a pass issued by local authorities since June 2, 2025. There’s a checkpoint at the entrance with license plate scanning, but the signs announcing the zone are in Croatian! Our landlord didn’t warn us and hadn’t registered our plate with the authorities, as recommended on the city’s website. The result? A prohibitive fine for both the vehicle and the driver. On top of that, the rules say you only have 8 days to appeal... super convenient when you’re on a road trip abroad and no one flags the issue when you return the car a few days later. This is a real blow for us, but more importantly, it’s a massive tourist scam set up by the city of Dubrovnik. 🙁

There exists a rare land where life expresses itself, a land where everything is destroyed, patched up, where everything is dirty and faded, yet paradoxically, each passing day is synonymous with light and joy. Seen from the sea, magnified by its translucent waters, the island is splendid; seen from inland, ochre and green dress a landscape one would wish to be pristine. As you approach the coast with the tides, countless boat wrecks never finish dying; returning from a hike, you know you’re nearing the city by the increasingly obvious proliferation of all kinds of trash. Overflowing the towns, makeshift homes made of corrugated iron stand here and there, wherever the eye lands; from a height, looking toward the horizon, you find the calm blue of the ocean and the beauty of infinity.

But where does all this corrugated iron come from? Blue, gray, red, or black, you find it pretty much everywhere—except, of course, on the island’s heights, where the heat is such that all life seems impossible. Yet, a few kilometers from the capital, more than an hour’s walk away, the corrugated iron is very much there, omnipresent, guaranteeing a land registry as hypothetical for us Europeans as it is very real for those who live there, far from civilization and comfort. I keep climbing. I’m precisely looking to meet these people who live on very little, if not nothing.

- Jéjé Mogné (Hello, sir in Shimahorais)! Where do you get water here, in this place? How do you drink, irrigate your plants?

- I wait for the rain. We have tanks that fill up well with each rainfall. But right now, it’s not raining much.

At the top of the next hill, lost in the bushes, it’s easier for me to guess the distant city, Mamoudzou, than the rest of the path, a remnant of a magnificent GR called the Island Tour, abandoned for the most part, sometimes maintained between two lost hamlets. The city, the pulse, water. Below, the ocean, running water, drinking water—despite regular interruptions; here, up high, an hour and a half’s walk away, tanks, arbitrariness. On other slopes, however, during another hike, I saw the water supply network, made of sturdy pipes tangled in the earth, right there by the path. It seems there are places where water climbs. Others not. Each to their own karma. In 2025. In a French department.

A path of misfortune, lost and regained, thanks to a sign, an inscription, or the compass’s directions. No one walks here anymore, except those who live here or come to harvest their crops. I remember that breathtaking hike in 2013, when I connected Bandrélé to Mamoudzou, passing by the peaks of Bénara (660m) and Bépilipili (643m), barely pausing at Tsararano and Vahibé: 34 km of intense effort on a rollercoaster path, along a trail that was still discernible. Today, it’s as if everything had disappeared. By also destroying the paths and vegetation, Chido* broke the last momentum of these cautious hikers: insecurity has made its way across the archipelago, and Sunday strolls are no longer the norm. Me, I keep going. I will have walked here and there during these three weeks to get an idea of the places, the people, the landscapes, and the superhuman effort required to move forward in over 40°C. To tell the truth, during my last hike, I cut my plans short and let myself be carried by a group of young people heading back to the city. The path is now just an inextricable network of small trails, the specter of Providence** comes to mind. True wisdom is knowing when to give up. I leave.

* A cyclone named "desire" (in Shona), which ravaged the island of Mayotte on December 14, 2024. ** June 2023, a very poorly prepared hike on Providence Island (Caribbean) from which I miraculously escaped.

On Petite-Terre, Marie takes me to visit some locals, white people who have lived there for a long time and make a living from their art; jewelry for her, all kinds of objects for him. We love this little shop, this oasis amid the chaos that embodies Dostoevsky’s phrase: "Beauty will save the world." It’s clean and tidy, beautiful, well-kept. Invariably, the question of insecurity resurfaces in the middle of the conversation. The woman says:

- I know someone who slipped in their bathtub. Still, I keep taking baths…

So, is this insecurity a myth or reality? I hear stories that are often true but sometimes seemingly exaggerated through the lens of misunderstanding and one-upmanship. Like that of this midwife assaulted one evening (it gets dark early) on her way home from work. Sometimes she was attacked on the path, dragged by the hair for several meters, sometimes she made it home, but it was her roommate who let the two men in. One version talks about a snatched phone and gratuitous violence, another about violence outright. In short, one thing is certain: walking around at night flaunting your phone isn’t a good idea, no more in Mamoudzou than in the rough neighborhoods of Nantes. Also, I played it safe: nothing flashy, nothing bling-bling, and always something to give if needed. I was never approached. It’s not easy to get a sense of the realities, between the hazy reports from journalists sensationalizing everything and the real lives of real people. But I know I can’t rely on these few ideas I’ve formed: I’m nobody, and above all, I don’t live here. What I do know, however, is that since my last visit to the island in 2017, over 80,000 babies have been born, and tens of thousands of immigrants have reached the archipelago’s shores. What’s also obvious is that poverty, hunger, and—let’s say it—indignity foster delinquency and insecurity. So, without taking journalists’ alarmist speeches at face value, we’ll try to keep in mind that a young person rendered orphaned by circumstances (parents expelled), poor and often hungry, involved more or less against their will in village wars and fueled by synthetic drugs*, will readily turn to violence when they truly have nothing to lose. We can trace the origin of this despair to the fact that in Mayotte, those without legal existence have virtually no hope of accessing anything.

* "Chimique" is a series of synthetic cannabinoids

Meanwhile, in the evening, it’s good to go home before the time of stone-throwing. From time to time, along the roads, gangs throw stones at vehicles and school buses, but mostly at police cars—almost all the white Dusters on the island! In front of the Mamoudzou police station, all parked vehicles—mostly Dusters—bear the scars of these attacks. Maybe it’s only at night that gangs unleash and all the burglaries happen? I saw nothing, heard nothing. I lived three weeks in a sort of bunker with no real access to outside light, protected by a fake wooden door doubled with a real metal door, both locked at all times. You don’t tempt fate. You endure it differently.

Today, extraordinarily, it’s raining. Yet, it’s the rainy season! But with my karma helping (what selfishness to want to walk dry when so many souls live off the rain) or is it climate change? The rain only falls once I’ve put on my horrible green pajamas. In front of the board outlining the program, I’m told that out of the six scheduled C-sections today (sic), they’ll probably only do two, maybe three. Because it’s raining. And when it rains, people don’t move around. Not for lack of will. Rather, for lack of means. And that ties into those sad days when the police patrol around the hospital: patients don’t come. They’ll come back tomorrow. To compensate, I’m happy at the thought of tackling the abscess program, but the sterilization unit is acting up and blocking the instrument trays. When it’s not the rain, it’s the unions. And when both finally quiet down, there’s always someone to find fault with the order of operations. You have to imagine an operating room where the question of urgency reigns supreme. Here, no surgery is scheduled more than 24 hours in advance—only emergencies, nothing but emergencies. So, following that reasonable adage that what’s done is no longer to be done, it’s sheer madness when the rain meets the interests of Force Ouvrière and the bad will of some combines with the laziness of others. To tell the truth, I’ve never seen so much energy expended to… do nothing. Hallucinating. But who am I, a small-time striver, an islander in my spare time, a temporary worker at the end of the world? I came, I saw, I was disappointed? Not really. Here again, I can’t judge a system in so little time. I can barely utter a few bitter words in front of obvious facts. But nothing will take away my joy of being here for three weeks. Here, they heal with somewhat outdated but still functional means. You do what you can with what you have, 8,000 km from the Métropole. Yes, the operating room doors hesitate, and the operating tables stutter, but in this blessed period, we lack neither medicines nor supplies. So we examine, anesthetize, and repair, far more undocumented people than French—if I may play with somewhat borderline statistics here; we deliver babies, dress wounds, and relieve pain in this hospital at the end of the world where neither white women nor Mahorais women would ever consider giving birth or getting treated.

What’s the solution? The obstetrician talks to the woman during a C-section under spinal anesthesia:

- Bouéni! (Madame, in Shimahorais) You need to think about tubal ligation. This is your fourth C-section. Your uterus is like tissue paper. Your next pregnancy will be very risky.

No answer. Culture. It’s all about culture. The funniest thing is that France also gets bogged down with the idea of other cultures’… cultures. The woman in question arrived illegally a few years ago to give birth to her first child. Since then, rejecting the very idea of contraception—her husband, for his part, will invoke God or Allah to refuse a vasectomy—she comes back every 12-14 months. And the obstetrician explains to me how his idea of making information about permanent contraception mandatory was deemed racist by associations. It’s always the same story. I suggest to the associations that they take charge of all these extra births, not only the medical costs but also the entire education, not just financial, of all these children doomed to live a life of misery on this forsaken archipelago. The probability that one of these offspring will emerge as a gifted, sensitive, and fiercely happy individual must truly be weighed against the degradation and abandonment that will invariably afflict the thousands of others living around him. In reality, simply mentioning a very real danger to the mother should be enough to impose sterilization. But we are a country whose greatness of soul is measured by the number of heads cut off to uphold the famous rights of man... Already a proponent at home of ending family allowances after the third child—you can’t subscribe to a certain idea of society and, at the same time, accept that tens of thousands of children are sacrificed on the altar of thoughtlessness and financial interest*—I will weakly advocate here for a controlled right to have children. Well, what will they say about me when I express the idea of imposing sterilization on women in irregular situations after the birth of their third child? National solidarity funds the noblest ideals? In Mayotte? Let’s be serious. It’s so much easier to hide behind the inalienable right of women to control their bodies than to acknowledge one’s own powerlessness to assume the consequences of such a policy. Because after 18 years of struggles as a second-class citizen, the young stateless person will have no choice but to live in hiding: faced with the impossibility of claiming birthright citizenship**, they will be deportable. In Mayotte, there aren’t enough schools, not enough housing, not enough projects for youth, not enough jobs, not enough money, not enough future… In Mayotte, an average of 5 children are born per woman. In reality, we never ask about the right of children to control their own lives.

* Single parent with 4 children: RSA at 1937 € + family allowances… ** Law of May 12, 2025 aiming to strengthen the conditions for accessing French nationality in Mayotte.

I live in the city in a clean apartment where air conditioning eases my aches and sweat, and where water flows abundantly, thanks to huge tanks that fill up between water cuts. On the hills of Koungou, I was struck by this image: there, women (a matriarchal society?) do the dishes in a miserable stream. Upstream of the same stream, the same image as downstream: disgusting water with bits of foam floating on it. A little further, however, there are taps with running water that children play with. Strange. In any case, water is a question. They tell me it’s drinkable; I doubt it. A system that’s regularly cut doesn’t seem reliable to me. In any case, I can’t help but think of the Canary Islands and their chronic water shortage, especially in Lanzarote. Without entering the debate on desalination plants—I’m quite ignorant about environmental repercussions—I’ll just say that in the Canary Islands, you can buy 8 L jugs of purified water for less than 2 €. Here, in Mayotte, the price of water—as is the price of gasoline—is the same everywhere: 0.65 € for a bottle of Cristaline (1 €/L)*. While I was walking up there with a couple of farmers shuttling between two remote spots, I know I hit the mark by offering them one of my two bottles I’d brought for the occasion.

* At home, we find Cristaline at 1.14 € for a 9 L pack, i.e., 0.13 € per liter.

Outside, everything is broken, abandoned, old, worn, torn, faded, heavy, dirty, forsaken. But life goes on. And that’s fascinating. At home, at 5:45 PM, people close their shutters and watch cable TV, sometimes late into the night, emptying the streets of any salutary clamor, unwittingly extinguishing the necessary pulse of life. At home, we die of boredom. In Mamoudzou, between two dying trash cans, metal frames laid on the ground are covered by the elements of a broken garden set. A bare concrete staircase, without railings, provides access to the upper floor of a dwelling. On the steps, you can read: Private space - Please take your trash with you. Metal rods protrude from the said dwelling. On the ground, it’s a festival of screws and nails… A cat passes by. It doesn’t look great. A madwoman crosses the street dancing. A slightly hurried driver brakes. A six- or seven-year-old boy comes out in his underwear from his low house made of corrugated iron. He smiles. He’s having fun doing acrobatic figures over an old mattress on the sidewalk. Forward roll, backward roll. You wonder if he eats enough. Different culture. Different customs.

I will remember for a long time this blinding morning light, a raw, vital, striking light. I almost forgot where I came from, the grayness and boredom of that continental European country where nothing really happens anymore. Here, I could join Camus, contemplating these people placed halfway between misery and the sun, resigned for the most part and, for the other part, not too unhappy with their lot. But the Mahorais discourse is unanimous: "France really screwed us over!" Today, more than half of the island’s inhabitants are undocumented; a tremendous amount of energy is spent expelling 20,000 to 25,000 of them each year; colossal sums are swallowed up to care for all these people, and the island is drifting. I talk with some gendarmes. One of them tells me:

- They intercept one kwassa* out of three… Can you explain to me why they can’t catch everyone? It’s 2025! Can’t they put the necessary boats in place?

Clearly, and this is also my opinion, this whole mess serves interests beyond us. For who can believe for a second that this glaring incompetence isn’t orchestrated? Shared interests between secret France and the Union of the Comoros? A desire to bring insecurity to its peak, either by the Comoros to eventually take back control of Mayotte, or by our own government, in a deliberate effort to see all the white people leave the archipelago and let the Mahorais fend for themselves? At one point, I’m even told about an extraordinary deposit beneath Mayotte’s soil, a promise of infinite wealth**. Not to infringe on human rights, to do some cleaning from time to time, to calm things down to avoid implosion, while waiting to go after this providential bounty? Decidedly, Mayotte hasn’t said its last word!

*What’s paradoxical is that in the early 2010s, to revive traditional fishing activity, the UN financed in Anjouan the construction of a factory to produce these light boats, 7-10m long and 1m wide, which largely served the interests of smugglers. This skiff owes its name to a Congolese dance known for being as rhythmic as it is jerky, much like the navigation experience offered during a crossing to Mayotte. ** A 2025 study revealed the existence of a gigantic magmatic reservoir located 23km beneath the archipelago. If the Icelandic experiment succeeds (Project KMT, see here), Mayotte will then possess almost unlimited energy.

Hell on earth. Paradise at sea. The world’s largest lagoon offering spectacular marine depths, Mayotte’s coral reef suffers less from the abundance of tourists* than from tropical storms**. So, let’s admit that Mayotte is best appreciated when approached from the lagoon. The heights are for old hands like me. The sea spray is rather for the snobs who shun the sun god Ra, risking too much exposure and ending up on sick leave for sunstroke! But I’m not exclusive: I twice don my snob attire and head out to tackle the waves, the seabeds, and the elusive. Because yes, underwater, we leave our landlubber reflexes behind, and flying over corals and other magnificent drop-offs, it’s as if we’re soaring, keeping in memory only what our eyes can store. Multicolored, even phosphorescent fish, sharks, rays, the immensity of the blue, and then, there, dolphins, just a few meters from me, underwater. Incredible.

* 70,000 tourists annually, mostly affinity tourism (links with family or an expatriate). ** Present almost at the water’s surface, the reefs were largely destroyed by Chido.

Paradise at sea? When you think that Mayotte comes from the Arabic Jazirat al Mawet—literally, Island of Death—because of its double coral barrier where many skiffs have run aground and continue to do so… Paradise. Eldorado. The Comoros now face an unprecedented influx of immigrants from the African Great Lakes. And Mayotte, for its part, continues to attract relentlessly, thanks to the evolution of the law*. In reality, whether hidden interests exist or not, France remains bound hand and foot by international, European, and French rules: it can’t do much. Barely has it boarded a kwassa when the one who flees by swimming cries attempted murder; barely has one been sent back to the Comoros when an association will look into their detention conditions and find a loophole; barely has one told a bouéni how her next pregnancy could be fatal when so-called human voices cry scandal.

* Regarding the Métropole, the rights of squatters and other bad payers against the notion of private property, legally violated in favor of the right to housing… ** You can read about France being condemned for its illegal practices of expelling Comorian minors. Inhumane treatment, arbitrary detention, collective expulsion.

Everyone forms their own idea of justice, and no one can claim a monopoly on good thinking. So, as long as I treat without prejudice, as long as my hands are sincerely guided by the love I bear for our humanity, I’ll allow myself to think what I think, understanding that I’m rather open to dialogue and that my opinions evolve with time and events. Today, Mayotte represents for me the failure of a model, a European one in this case, where opulence quickly meets its limits. For it’s not wrong to think that our society can’t share more than it produces, nor is it wrong to think that every human being has a right to their share of the pie; in Mayotte, you’ll find the proven result of our civilization: it doesn’t work. Exclusively financed by the right, the ideas of the left jam in Mayotte more than anywhere else: national solidarity coupled with a sense of guilt creates chaos. Political courage, or true social justice, would be to offer a future to those who have no choice—the one who’s already here, the child to be born—not to offer a present to those who can choose or to whom one can give keys to understanding—the woman of childbearing age, the candidate for exile. Ultimately, the Comoros’ coup d’état over France comes at the cost of many innocent victims, starting with the children*.

* Tens of thousands of deaths by drowning between Anjouan and Mayotte, tens of thousands of children left to fend for themselves and doomed to a non-existent future.

On the evening of the 31st, I go for my usual run and notice near a roundabout a fool in rags pedaling the wrong way. A police car passes by: the guy gets stopped. A rather quick identity check. The guy is taken away. Would he still be among us if he had ridden the right way? In the evening, the line is long in front of the club near the dock. Me, I’m just passing by, greeting my friends of the season, much more inclined to savor rest than to exhaust myself on an overheated dance floor. There, a man, thirty or forty years old, clearly in a world of his own, is searching the trash for something to eat. He’s barefoot. I console myself by thinking that at least he won’t die of cold. Out of ten children born in Mayotte, I can reasonably think that only one will be able to afford an existence that minimally meets any of our criteria.

It’s time to go home. After sweating and thinking so much about this gem of the Mozambique Channel, I spend peaceful hours by the pool at a hotel next to the airport. We checked out at 8 AM, and the flight is at 7 PM. The perfect opportunity to slack off and chat a bit more. I’m happy to get to know one of the co-pilots of tonight’s flight, staying at this hotel, while one of my flight attendant friends from this airline had already recommended me to the crew. But it’s not the captain’s day, who’s in a rather gloomy mood. I’ll travel in the back, up to the vertical of Cairo. Midnight has just struck; it’s January 2nd, my name day. Concerned about solving an unsolvable problem with a passenger, the crew asks me to give up my exit row seat and takes me to the front for the last four hours of the flight. In the end, the captain gave in? I laugh to myself: if there’s one thing I mustn’t forget, it’s that God never abandons me!

Hi there, Three years ago during a trip to Java (no, I didn’t post in the wrong forum!), I came across the address of former miners who had switched to “tourism” and organized nighttime ascents of the Kawah Ijen volcano and descents into the crater. So I was thinking—maybe there are miners on the salt flats too, either former or still active, who do the same thing. If you’ve had an experience like this, I’d love any tips you can share. Thanks in advance.

Hi there,

When I run searches on Skyscanner, I see that only Lufthansa has flights to Seoul with just one stop. Air France doesn’t show up, even though I thought the French airline served Seoul? I can’t even log into the Air France website—it keeps glitching.