A Day on Seychelles Bird Island
My First Trip Part 2

"For the best bird-watching holidays in the Seychelles
and a most amazing beach. A day on Bird Island is an adventure"

What's so special about Seychelles Bird Island? Think Treasure Island! First the beaches are spectacular. Imagine walking the length of a beautiful 5-kilometre beach and it's all deserted. I walked for hours on these amazing sands of this private island without encountering a single soul.

My only company were the birds that would fly by or occasionally alight nearby to squawk, hello. And the sea is the most amazing shade of turquoise that you can imagine.

That's how I spent my day on Bird Island. I walked along the water's edge where the sand is firmest. There were no human tracks on the soft sand except for the footprints I left behind as I made my progress. And even these would soon be erased by the incoming tide.

And you know if you carry on walking forward following the sea you'll eventually be back where you started. And that's what I did. I looked around me and marvelled at the amazing beauty of the panorama as I felt the soft white sands between my toes with every step... This is heaven!

There is just a single beach that goes right around the island. And it's one continuous stretch of white coral sand. At one end of the island it is very wide and piled high and thick and as fine as flour - one of the best beaches I've ever seen. We rank it among the 5 best beaches of Seychelles.

I started to pay more attention to the creatures around me in this paradise. The small beach-crabs would scuttle away into their holes as I approached. Another marvel of nature: you wouldn't see them until they move as they harmonize so well with the white sands.

A bird would dart here and there among the lush green bushes along the beach and perhaps stop to sing me a melody. As I approached the sooty tern colony it was unmistakeable - The squawking and screeching got louder and louder.

Ahead there were hundreds of thousands of birds milling around in the air screeching at the top of their voice. Soon they were flying around my head as I walked up the beach to look in amazement. I had found their nesting ground.

Seychelles Bird Island - 2 million sooty terns in the clearing during the breeding season

There were many hundreds of thousands of sooty terns on the ground in the clearing. Most had already laid. They were each squatting on a single egg almost half their size. They were unafraid of this new visitor and stayed put as I approached. And half the colony were circling overhead all the time screeching.

This was the highlight of my tour of Seychelles Bird Island. It was so amazing that I went back to the bird colony again the next day. A word of caution: watch from a safe distance and do not go in the colony unless you want to get drenched with droppings.

We stayed the whole day and overnight leaving in the afternoon the next day, so that was plenty of time to discover the 180-acre (70 hectares) island. This island is absolutely flat with an elevation of less than 3 metres above sea level.

It is a sand cay (key) very similar to the famed Maldives islands over 1000 miles away to the east, but with an incredible bonus - the millions of sooty terns during the breeding season. And I visited at the height of the bird-breeding season. It's so amazing.

These are the treasures - the beach and the birds. What else do you want? This is not a city unless it's "bird city". This is a place to escape civilization and the various trappings of modern-day living while you still have your meals on time - talking of which, I came back to a very late lunch that day. The reason?

On that first visit there I was walking the beautiful beach that encircles it before I even knew it. Yes I went around the island visiting the bird colony on the way. It takes a few hours but you lose sense of time when you're having so much fun in such an unusual, beautiful, serene place.

A trip to Bird Island would be worth it just for the beach but there is much more on this little island. Just behind this pretty beach is where two million birds call home. Seychelles Bird Island is their home.

Seychelles Bird Island - Land-based noddy terns on the most spectacular beach

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There are many different varieties of birds here including noddies and fairy terns but the sooty terns make up the vast majority of the population. And the latter are present from late April to September. They don't make any nest and lay right on the ground.

The sooty terns start making landfall in April and they start laying in May and by October they leave the island with their offspring. They'll be away for 6 months. But there are tens of thousands of birds of other species that stay behind.

And if you're interested in big game fishing you should also note that where there are seabirds there are also game fish. That's how your guide takes you to the best fishing ground. They look out for the birds. So it also means Bird Island is in the middle of a bountiful fishing ground.

Bird is warmer and sunnier with less clouds and it rains much less than on Mahe Island. The reason mostly is that it is completely flat and low-lying (as flat as a pancake) while the main island of Seychelles is mountainous. Yes after travelling from Mahe it does indeed feel like another world. As some say: Seychelles Bird Island is like experiencing the best of Maldives, another island country of the Indian Ocean, right inside Seychelles.

On Seychelles Bird Island you'll find the same kind of plants as on the other islands with a canopy of coconut palms and casuarinas mostly. During my stay I also crossed the island exploring the various trails. One of the first things that the present owners of Bird Island did was to initiate a tree-felling programme - especially coconut palms - to create more nesting ground for the seabirds.

Those sooty terns will not nest among trees or bushes. They seem to prefer a large space of open ground. And this tree felling seems to have paid off well as the population of terns has increased tenfold since my first visit. And Bird Island is now the foremost destination for sooty terns and bird watching holidays in the Seychelles.

 

Bird Island is small and narrow enough that in certain places you can spy, through the undergrowth, the sea on the other side of the island from the opposite side. And the one and only beach, that runs right around the island for almost 5 kilometres, is pretty long and much to enjoy for such a small island.

Seychelles Bird Island - amazing sea and one of the most beautiful beaches

In comparison, there is not even one single beach that long on Mahe, the main island of Seychelles. But several other Seychelles islands have even longer beaches.

And, just like Bird, they're all flat coral islands. Desroches pictured here, for instance, has a beach 15 km long.

Bird Island is forever etched in my memory as the most unique amazing place that it is. The huge colony of seabirds and the beautiful powder-fine, white sands make Bird one of my favourite islands.

And it surely has one of the best beaches in Seychelles. It could well become your own favourite holiday destination too. I've returned several times since and the island hasn't lost any of its charm. If anything it's been enhanced.

Now it's easier to visit and enjoy the island of birds. Access by air is easy with a grass-covered airstrip, which runs across the island at its furthest end from the bird colony's nesting ground.

You can still come by sea, which is the best way to visit the many islands of Seychelles and also see several others along the way. Then you would need to make contact with the Seychelles Marine Charter Association, or Eden Island's Marina, or the Wharf Hotel and Marina, or the Seychelles Yacht Club - all in Victoria.

I had an amazing holiday on Bird Island and I love it every time I go back. I have found my own favourite. Over the years I've been to many other islands and discovered several more since that trip, but Bird still remains my absolute favourite.

I had Bird Island for the day, or should I say? "It had me!" :). When I boarded the schooner the night before little did I know how much pleasure was in store for me there. I had such an unforgettable day on Seychelles Bird Island.

Well, now it's your turn. Go enjoy it. After you visit our favourite island then please tell us your own story on this amazing private island. Use the form below.

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