The Vegas Motor Show and the Crocodile Park

Over the past week I have had ample evidence that Mauritius has no OSHA (Occupational Safety and Health Agency) department, and apparently liability lawsuits are not a big issue.  Last Sunday we went to the Vegas Motor Show, which has been held in a sectioned off part of the parking lot of our local shopping center - the Trianon Shopping Park.  This is the one we walk to about every other day, so attending this 'Major Event' was easy.  Because it is so expensive to ship over the cars, monster trucks and other vehicles for this show it arrived on the island on October 15th, and will be here through November 30th.  It was hilarious, and fairly lame by US standards.  The best part was that no one thinks about safety - they actually went and got people out of the audience (the prettiest girls), put them in the cars, and then drove them around on two wheels with these members of the audience inside.  Never would one see this in the US!

While we were there Sam had to go to the bathroom.  So - we walked to the entrance tent and asked the policeman where it was.  He looked at me and asked who had to go.  When I said it was Sam he told Sam to follow him, and they went around the tent.  Sam said he simply pointed to a spot and had him pee!  Awesome.  They people who ran the show also had audience members get into that big yellow truck you see in the above picture.

Car on two wheels.  They did this over and over and over and ......

So, on Friday of this week (a holiday - Divali, which will be the next post) we went to another non-OSHA non-approved location.  The Crocodile Park!  This was a very neat park that also had tortoises, bats and other assorted reptiles.  An excellent insect collection, too.  The best part was the tortoises, because you could just wander around amongst them, climb (!) on them and feed them.  Then, for a real treat, Sam got to hold a baby crocodile.  This park actually had some excellent educational exhibits, and it is amazing to realize that man managed to completely exterminate the tortoises from the neighboring island of Rodrigues in 80 years.  That species of tortoise is completely gone, and the ones in the breeding program at the park are from Madagascar. 

Riding the tortoise.  Poor things.

The biggest thrill was that the crocodile peed on Sam.   While he held it about fourteen French and German  tourists took pictures of him.

This is one of the old sugar cane train engines that were used on the estates to bring cane to the processing plants.  It had been moved to the crocodile park.

Sam in front of the fruit bat cage.  These bats are huge and are day flyers, and are pretty dang creepy.  They are spotted frequently in the Tamarin area, on the coast.