Mauritius: Attractions that you can skip

Mauritius Travelogues
Mauritius Aquarium

Mauritius: Attractions that you can skip

Mauritius is a superb blend of beautiful beaches, lovely hikes, varied cuisines, various kiddo activities and warm people. Its a good destination for honeymoon, family holiday or just a relaxed getaway. We spent one week in Mauritius and felt we could spend much longer time exploring this small island country. However, there were few activities we did that were not worth spending so much time/ money on.

Mauritius Aquarium

Mauritius Aquarium is situated in the north, some 5kms before Trou-aux-Biches beach if you are travelling from Port Louis towards north beaches. We had a not-so-great SCUBA diving session with Dive Dream Diving in Trou-Aux-Biches and thought we would go to Aquarium to see the fishes. Entrance fee was 300 MUR (~600 INR) for adults and 150 MUR for kids. However, this was the smallest aquarium we have been to. It had hardly dozen or so fish tanks and few fishes inside them. We were out of the place in 15 min after watching the entire exhibit.

Fishes at Mauritius Aquarium
Fishes at Mauritius Aquarium
Mauritius Aquarium
Mauritius Aquarium

Overall, I felt it was not worth going there. Unless you have enough time to kill, skip this activity.

Gros Cailloux Leisure Park

We went to Mauritius on our kiddo’s 5th birthday and I wanted to make sure he has good time on his special day. So I researched a lot for kids activities and found Gros Cailloux Park, which opened in May 2015 and had many kids activities like kiddo ziplines, kiddo quad biking, water activities etc. The place did not have many reviews on tripadvisor (which should have given me a hint); but I attributed that to few months of operation and decided to do this activity on kiddo’s birthday.

We had decided to do Dolphin watching a day earlier. However, the activity was already full for that day and we had to move that to kiddo’s birthday and decided to go to Gros Cailloux and Port Louis earlier.

We drove to the place using Google Maps. Entrance fee was 60 MUR for adults and 80 MUR for kids. Most of the activities were either not available or out of order. They have a small area for young kids where there is a bridge made of beams, animals like goats, goose, rabbits and tortoise that can be petted, a small zipline (there is a family one too but was not functional), some birds, a big lake for boating and other water activities, and a huge ground for quad biking.

Kiddo Zipline, Gros Cailloux
Kiddo Zipline at Gros Cailloux
Suspended Bridge at Gros Cailloux
Suspended Bridge at Gros Cailloux
Family Zipline
Family Zipline
Boats at Gros Cailloux
Boats at Gros Cailloux
Birds
Birds
Pea hen at Gros Cailloux
Pea hen at Gros Cailloux

 

We had to be content with kiddo zipline and the small petting area because quad biking and water activities were not happening. It was hardly 30min activity and am so glad we didn’t do this on kiddo’s birthday. Going to Benetier island and watching dolphins was so much more fun for all of us.

5 Comments

  1. That was really a Saviour.. Thanks Priyanka Great Work.

    I am Planning my honeymoon trip to Mauritius and we plan to stay there for 6 or 7 Days.
    We wish to do more of activities at Mauritius like Sky Diving,Swim with Dolphins, Lions park, Under water scooter Etc.
    Also we wish to stay at North South and Ils aux cerfs
    Is 6 Days enough for our trip or should we increase?

    1. Glad it helped Rachit 🙂

      Most of the activities you have listed will take a day. Swim with dolphins is a full day activity combined with picnic lunch at Benetier Island, lion park is again atleast 1/2 day (don’t miss the giant tortoises at crocodile park too). Curious Corner of Chamarel is also pretty good unless you have been to some illusion museum earlier. Underwater scooter would take 1/2 day if planned well in advance. Skydive is again a day depending on advance booking and weather; I have never done it so can’t advise much. Ils aux cerfs is full day island tour. Given this, 6 days will definitely not suffice.

      If you are particular about Indian food (or veg food), I would suggest staying near Flic n Flac because it has most indian restaurants .The choices are few in north/ south and the prices are higher too.

    1. Hi,
      Let me know what kind of activities you prefer to do – water sports, hiking, zoo etc. Mauritius has wide variety of things to do and your itinerary would depend a lot on what your likings are.
      Thanks,
      Priyanka

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