Surf And Turf

Africa is home to some of the most diverse flora and fauna in the world. Mark Hedges jets off on a holiday of a lifetime, to the contrasting landscapes and resident animals in the Seychelles and Tanzania

- Mark Hedges

THE twin-engine Otter plane skimmed across the shimmering turquoise sea, banked to the left and dropped down over the foaming reef to the grass runway. In moments, we had landed on Denis Island, one of the outermost outcrops in the Seychelles, a speck in the Indian Ocean.

You can walk around the island in a morning, barefoot and totally unplugged from the rest of the world, admire the resident giant tortoises, including Toby—who, at 122 years old, is exactly the same age as COUNTRY LIFE —or sit and watch waves from the front of your cottage. But I am a fisherman, so first up was a boat trip into the deep sea beyond the atoll’s reaches in search of tuna and sailfish.

Before long, I had caught a 35lb yellowfin tuna and was battling with another when the water exploded and a silvertip shark grabbed the tuna and hooked itself. After a muscle sapping tussle, we met briefly, before the 8ft shark was released. That evening, the tuna was served as sushi and sashimi by the chef, who had trained in the Hyatt Regency in Tokyo. It was sensational; the other guests were almost as pleased as me.

Denis Island boasts a remarkable farm, set in the shadow of a disused lighthouse, which is full of vegetables, chickens, cows, pigs, and quail. The island is almost entirely self-sufficient and is even able to export some of its production back to the mainland. Produce to plate involves no air miles, merely a few hundred yards down the sandy track to the kitchen.

Rachel fell in love with turtles that grazed the seagrass in the lagoons and allowed us to snorkel alongside them—often, we could see a dozen or more poking their prehistoric heads above the water. It was a privilege, the like of which I may never see again.