Mauritian Snacks

Yesterday I went to the grocery store and got a few different foods that I have never seen before and tried them... Here is my take on some Mauritian candy

This first thing I got was not really candy but it looked interesting, it looked like a good snack :D. So I buyed it.  They are actually pretty good, a little dry and the chocolate is weird and doesn't really taste like chocolate, I crumbled some of them up in yogurt today and it was AMAZING! I probably found my new favorite breakfast while I am here.  Also they look like weird dog treats or something which is a bonus.  

I also got a Tim Tam, which was like a really amazing Kit kat, it was awesome :D, also it was only around 30 cents so that's great.  I also kinda sorta ate it on the walk back to the house so all you get is a picture of the wrapping ;).  

 I also got some Bubbly (hee hee) just because it looked intriguing and had a cool name.   It actually weird and I am not a fan of the mint flavor, usually I love mint chocolate but this, not so much.  They had a couple different flavors so I might try another one, it is really light but I also feel slightly jipped  because there is so much air in it.  Didn't Hershey come out with something like this a while ago?  I think it was Hershey Air or something, I dunno.  This was probably my least favorite, but it does look awesome.

Here in Mauritius they have a couple different kinds of Kit Kats which is wierd since I have only ever seen chocolate.  So I got Caramel and Peanut Butter and tried a little of each.  I didn't really like them a ton, I mean it was still a Kit Kat, but like the top layer on both of them is SUPER creamy and sticky so when you take a bite the creaminess overwhelms the Kit Kat crunch.

Sorry for the acward leg in the background, my cheapy camera wouldn't focus above the bed.  

I also grabbed some of these guys which are pretty much just mini cigar cookies (not the technical term but that is the only way I know to describe them).  They are amazing, so tiny and scrumptious like the tiny version of one of my favorite things.  I am totally bringing some of these back with me to share.

 They're so CUTE!

Anyway that is my experience so far with packaged Mauritiun food :).  So far the cheapest things (Tim Tam and Stikko fingers) were my favorites by far, so that is awesome!  

BEAUTY!

Yesterday Katie and Yvan took me all around Mauritius to see the beautiful landscapes that this little island has to offer.  In the course of one afternoon we got to see all these beautiful places, it is crazy to think that these things are all just like 30min or less drive away from each other!  

The pictures are all askew and in crazy order so we actually went to the beach last but those pictures uploaded first, sorry, my laziness won out and I just decided to leave it that way. 

So this is the amazing beach, the place we went to wasn't as full of tourists as a lot of the beaches and it was STUNNING!  I love the ocean and I could have stood there all day just looking at it with my toes in the sand.   

 The sky! It's just so beautiful!

This was one of the places that we drove through, Just driving and seeing all the mountains and beautiful greenery was super cool.  

This was just a place were we pulled off on the side of the road to look out, I know, stunning!  The crazy thing is that even with my cheapo camera and bad photographing skill, God's amazing beauty still shines through.  

This place is called Black River Gorges.  Truthfully it was probably the most beautiful thing I have ever seen.  I thought it was even more amazing than the Grand Cannon.  If you looked closely you could see cool things like massive waterfalls and birds flying underneath you.  

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See what I mean! 

 This was actually the first place that we went.  There were eucalyptus trees everywhere and this was just the walk to the actually "scenery"

You could see out FOREVER!

The waterfalls were beautiful! 

A little stream that we walked over on a sweet little bridge.  

Driving through these paths of trees was just amazing!

So as you can see Mauritius is a  beautiful island!  Just the scenery looking out the window in my bedroom is awesome.  Looking out my window right now the sky is a brilliant blue and the clouds are huge and fluffy.  Being here makes it hard to imagine any of these things are an accident.  Even the clouds are singing God's praises.  

Random Observations

 I have only been in Mauritius a few days, but I have already started to notice a few things that are different here than they are in beautiful Missouri.

- Most of the women carry umbrellas everywhere they go, Katie said that is because they don't want to get anymore dark skinned than they already are and it also rains all the time.  Most of the time they have umbrellas up when the sun is out though.  It is weird because in Missouri everyone is like "Must. Get. More. Tan!" but here it is the opposite.

-  The dogs here just run around where ever and are the muttiest looking mutts I have ever seen, I thought our dog was a mutt but compared to these dogs she is like a pure bred :).

- It is generally more common to see men wearing shorts then women which is kind of the opposite from Missouri.  It is totally not uncommon to see women wearing sarongs, which I kind of want one now.

- Mosquitoes are the devil..... But then, I already knew that.

- People eat a LOT more bread, you have bread with pretty much every meal.  I am not complaining though bread is amazing!

- The windows don't have screens on them and you can't get screened doors, which is very frustrating because there is no AC and without leaving the windows and doors open we would die, but in the evenings when it starts to cool off even more the mosquitoes so you have to close the windows at night which is the best time to try and cool the place down.  Katie said that you can get screens but they are SUPER expensive, she gave me an example, but I don't remember the specifics I just remember that it was a LOT.

- While we are on the subject of cooling implements... fans... they are amazing wonderful inventions.  It might just be that Katie and Yvan have a lot nicer fans that I have at home but they are wonderful, strong, majestic, creatures. Like my fan at home is super dusty (my fault) and you have to turn it on the highest speed to get much noise out of it and it often rattles and you have to smack it to get it to chill, and it doesn't shoot out any breeze anymore unless you set it on the highest speed and stick your face right up to it your hair might sway the tinniest bit.    The fan that I have in my room here is so magical, you turn it on it's lowest setting and it blows you with a cool strong breeze and makes a beautiful sound canceling purr, that is the LOWEST SETTING!  It also has all these magical lights and settings that would probably be really cool if I knew how to work them :D.

- Also probably one of the weirdest things to me is their cars, all the cars are kept beautifully cleaned and polished and shinning,  like just a regular parking lot looks like a car lot.  All the cars are beautiful.  Even the older ones are just glowing.  But the roads are terrible, you just kind of weave around the parked cars and get into other people's ways and squeeze your way between the tiniest gaps, and there are potholes and mud and stuff.  Everyone's cars just stay magically clean and dent free though.

- Another weird thing is everyone has cars, like in Missouri a lot of people have min vans, Suburbans, trucks ect, but here people have cars and motorcycle/scooter things.  It probably has something to do with the fact that the roads are so narrow, but it is still weird.  Coming from a ton full of families it is strange to not see any minivans, like anywhere.

- This one was expected but still sad and weird.  There are no cows :(, I love beef and cheese and ice cream but there isn't very much of that here and it brings tears into my heart, and it is just slightly weird to drive for 30 min and not see a single cow field.  

That is all I can think of for now but I am sure that there are a lot more things that I will notice as I am here longer.

Crocodile Park!

I got to go to a crocodile park today!  As promised I took a lot of pictures, I have only seen a few crocodiles in my time at the zoo (or maybe those were alligators, who knows).  It was pretty cool to see all of them, there were little babies and also big old crocs.  In reality they look kind of fat and lazy, I only saw one of them moving and when he moved it looked like an old fat guy lugging himself out of a recliner after watching a whole NASCAR race :).  If Discovery Channel can be trusted though, those things can move, and fast.  I am personally glad they were behind a chain fence, because even though their bodies were fat looking and lazy there is nothing they can do to disguise the powerful jaws and sharp teeth,  

Even though it was called a crocodile park, there were a lot of different kinds of animals as well and I would say it was more like a zoo, but what do I know.  They had a TON of tortoises, and you got to walk around with them and get all up close to them.  They also had different areas where you could see all the different ages of tortoises, and you would walk along and see them from like a year old, then all the way up, which was neat to see how fast they grew and such.  Also I never knew that tortoises had a noise that they make but apparently it was matting day because everywhere you looked there was another tortoise couple getting all up close and personal.  The noises the dudes made was absolutely hilarious, a loud, guttural grunt is the only way I can describe it.  

Random pretty tree/flower/thingy

They had a bunch of cool crocodile jaws, even though it is the smallest I thought the one on the top actually looks the creepiest.  

See what I mean?  They just look fat and lazy. 

They also had an insect house which was AMAZING!  They had TONS AND TONS of insects in the collection, you could have spent HOURS looking through all the different kinds.  It was also air conditioned which made me want to find a corner and just breath in the coolness.  

Look at how beautiful all these butterflys are! 

I was amazed at how ittybitty some of these bugs were.  

Some of the butterflys had the most beautiful iridescent wings ever.  

 This just looks like an awesome flower but it is actually a bunch of insects!

 They had a pretty cool gift shop but I was full of food and ready for a nap by the time we got there, but I did get these beautiful dolls that I think a few girls will love.

We had lunch at the park and I got to try an alligator burger (Or maybe it was a crocodile burger, no idea) anywho it was actually really delish!  

Well that's all for now I still love it here and getting to drive through different parts of Mauritius was pretty awesome!