February 2006

Hello everyone,

Say it with flowers... from New Zealand or somewhere else! We have reached Kiwiland just in time to the end of the wonderful season of Pohutukawas.. No, it is not the name of the Indian tribe to which Pocahontas belonged, but an endemic species of trees that in December cover with a million fantastic scarlet flowers, rather similar to the flowering of flamboyant trees. Valentine day being near, this explosion of colours has given me the idea of sending you a flowered letter, to give you some travel ideas, to distant or closer destinations, to places where some exceptional flowering is worth the voyage !

These Pohutukawa of New Zealand, first, like in the Coromandel Peninsula or on Mercury Island; their perfume is rather discreet, yet bees gather by thousands in their pretty red feather dusters, giving a renown honey.

Even redder, the flamboyant, or Poinciana : in June-July in the Caribbean, in December-January in New Caledonia, one can hardly dream brighter colours; most are red, some are yellow.

Of comparable shape, but with a surprising mauve colour, the jacaranda that flower, from September to November on the shore of Lake Anosy, in Antananarivo, the capital of Madagascar.

As we are in the Indian Ocean, do not miss the flowering of the giant Victoria Regia water lilies in Mauritius : their virgin white flowers soon turn to a deep pink. If you're lucky, you might also catch a glimpse of the flowering of the Tallipotpalm, which flowers once in sixty years, then dies. Close by, in the Seychelles, less spectacular, but as picturesque, the flowering of the Coco-de-mer, or Coco-fesse (literally, "coco-bottom") : if their enormous fruit resembles the hips of a woman, their male flower is extremely phallic.

In the Azores, from June to August, hundreds of miles of hedges cover with the heavy flowers of blue hydrangea; in the Mediterranean, islands are covered with millions of wild field flowers in April, and their arbours are heavy with wisteria flowers.

In the Caribbean, in summer, flower the tall shafts of the agave plants, and in Polynesia, in the distant Tuamotu-Gambier islands, see the opening of the giant flowers of the pandanus, called here hinano ; during their short flowering, the whole islands bathe in their perfume, once used in perfumery.

And , to finish with a blaze of colours, although it is not precisely a "flowering", how could I miss the season of "colours", the autumn in Quebec or New England, where the leaves of maple trees take colours one could not even think possible in other parts of the world.

So, exotic or not, red, purple, yellow or blue, I wish you a wonderful month of February and, a little in advance, a great Valentine Day !