RajeevS801
For interested persons visiting Seychelles with a longer time frame and with legs conditioned for long forest walks, it may be time fit for a different sort of a challenge called Casse Dent, a longer trail in the middle of Morne Seychellois National Park, which if done completely leads a hiker from one starting point to the exact other side of the forest and hills. But, our target was kept to a waterfall which resides in-between the forest. The Casse Dent trail in itself keeps on going further though.Picking up the members on our way, driving through Chemin Sans Souci, we reached our starting point in the morning and parked our car on the roadside. A green board stating clearing Casse Dent is found on the right side of the road, after one passes by the Mission Point and drives a little further down the road.It requires an arduous walk between two and three hours depending upon the fitness before one reaches the target (the waterfall). It’s a hike up and down on the sides of the mountains. Once or twice we also came to plateau-type openings where one could view the ocean and the islands. We came across several different types of trees, carpet grass, brown mesh-type see-through leaves, snails, slugs, wooden platforms, fallen trees, etc., etc. The hike added an element of challenge when participants were required to navigate through fallen trees, huge tree-trunks lying horizontal, small water streams as well. Although not easy to find, some yellow paint labels were actually found on trees to guide people towards the path.It is said “one man’s meat is another man’s poison”. In this sense, looking at the trail from a tourist’s point of view, the trail could not be called maintained. But for avid walkers, the same situation endorses an element of surprise. In fact, the waterfall also was not that which one usually imagines. To me at least, it was an entirely different sort of a step-water-fall in the middle of the forest. Well, I could see the origin of the water through a small cave, but the interesting quiz was which path the water was following to reach its destination. When I look at the map of that region, it seems that it may be this waterfall only which ends near Port Glaud, about which some texts say that there is a way up from that side also if people wish to see the origin of the waterfall.After starting the hike at 8 am, we reached the waterfall at 10.30 am. The water, although not gushing forcefully, did disseminate its property of pushing. Half an hour to forty minutes rest was enough to get much-needed relief. We prepared for return and started walking at about 11.15 am after having food and ‘water’. Crossing all the hills, we reached our base in two hours by about 1.15 pm. One peculiar aspect worth mentioning was that weather prediction proved accurate. One needs to go on this trip either on a sunny or a cloudy day, but not on a rainy day. In any case, rain or no rain, this hike is to be rated at ‘4’ on the scale of 1-10.