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Heritage sites on Praslin bring back great memories

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Heritage sites on Praslin bring back great memories Empty Heritage sites on Praslin bring back great memories

Post  Sirop14 Fri May 06, 2016 9:40 am

Heritage sites on Praslin bring back great memories

06-May-2016
Thank you for your recent article on heritage sites on Praslin. I was very interested about the Isle des Palmes resort site because in the late 60s I worked and lived there in the Grann Kaz you mentioned.
The whole property was then owned by the Berlouis family who established and produced a lot of things there including copra, coconut oil, patchouli oil, cinnamon essence, cinnamon quills and bark, as well as pigs and firewood sent to Mahe. Sometimes at high tide the famous schooner Voltiger would come up to the sea wall next to the Grann Kaz to load up for Mahe.
Those boilers you mentioned at the distillery, the bigger one at the back was for cinnamon essence, the small front copper one at the front was for patchouli oil. Those boilers were handmade by Mr D'Offay of Côte d’Or, a famous and well-respected blacksmith in Praslin at the time. Part of the workshop including the billows and a huge anvil are still there and were used for maintenance work during my time there. Sometimes I would help unload the cinnamon leaves from that huge boiler using a pulley which was chained to a steel plate at the bottom before loading up. Both boilers would run for almost the whole day using coconut shell or wood for combustion. Other days, I would work on that old Takamaka oil mill with a bullock going around to crush copra, similar to the one on La Digue that is still in operation.
It was a big property and everything that was produced was sourced there. Most of the employees lived in different houses there or nearby Anse La Blague and Au Cap. It was a good place that has great memories for me.
Praslin boy Humbert Savy, Queensland Australia

http://www.nation.sc/article.html?id=249323

Sirop14

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Join date : 2008-06-02

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