Rodrigues: First Impressions

June 26, 2016

There are places in the world that feel like home from the outset. These are the places where you feel yourself exhaling in long comforting sighs; where you recognize people whom you’ve never met, and they greet you as friend; where there is a familiar smell (chill in this case) to the air, and a landscape that seems ancestral, though your predecessors may never have come within 10,000 miles of the place.

Rodrigues is one of these places. When the officials asked us (within our first hour on island) how long we would be staying, I replied with a question. “What is the longest Visa you offer?”  When our neighbor answered the same question with “4 or 5 days,” the officer chuckled and said, “no, you’ll be wanting to stay much longer.”

On Friday night we (all the yachts in the harbor) were invited to a potluck BBQ. They played us their traditional music, and begged us to play ours. I sang “The Fox,” (my favorite, dark, children’s song) to a bewildered audience. Their music, accordion and guitar with judicious triangle, is lively,

lovely and heart captivating.

Today, I joined some other cruisers for a hike around the island. It’s topography is as lovely as it’s people, as the photo’s will attest.

We have no plans to leave, and all the boats in the harbor seem to nod and agree when I say “You know, I think I could live here.”

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