Seychelles Islands
in the Indian Ocean, Africa
Copyright © 2007-2020 Seychellen.com All rights reserved. | Contact: [email protected] | Imprint
The Republic of Seychelles consists of 115 islands covering a land area of 455 km² and an exclusive economic zone of 1.4 million km².
The Seychelles are an archipelago of legendary beauty, which extends between the 4th and 10th latitude south of the equator and is located between 480 and 1,600 km off the east coast of Africa.
Of the 115 islands in total, 41 are among the oldest mid-ocean granite islands on earth (Inner Islands), while 74 form the deeper coral atolls and reef islands of the "Outer Islands".
The granite islands of the Seychelles archipelago cluster around the main island Mahé. Here you can find the capital Victoria, the international AirportThe islands Praslin and La Digue are in the immediate vicinity.
These so-called "Inner Islands" form the cultural and economic centre of the nation and also offer the most important tourist infrastructure and the most beautiful dream beaches.
The other archipelagos, commonly known as the Outer Islands, are: the Amirantes Group (about 230 km from Mahé) with the hotel island Desroches, the Southern Coral Group (about 280 km) with the island Coëtivy (shrimp farming), the Alphonse Group (about 400 km) with the main island Alphonse, the Farquhar Group (about 750 km) and the Aldabra Group (about 1.200 km), which is part of the UNESCO World Heritage and is home to a huge colony of Aldabra turtles. All the Outer Islands - with the exception of Desroches and Alphonse - can only be reached by chartered or own small aircraft or ships and are of little interest for general tourism. Therefore we want to concentrate on the main islands in this training.
The main island of the Seychelles is Mahé with an area of 154 km² - almost exactly one third of the total land area of all islands. Mahé has grown by several square kilometres in recent years through land reclamation on the east coast. New settlements for the population have been built here and even a new artificial island, Eden Island, connected by bridges, on which condominiums have been built that can be purchased by foreigners. Of Mahé's 73,000 inhabitants, a third live in the capital Victoria or its suburbs.
The second largest island is Praslin. The name is pronounced in French: with a nasal at the end, while the "s" is silent ... for example: pra-LENG. This island is mainly famous as the home of the coco de mer or Seychelles coconut.
The third largest island, Silhouette, is less important for the average tourist. You can visit it, but there is only one hotel here, and the very largest part of the island is a nature reserve, part of which consists of an almost impenetrable jungle.
La Digue, the fourth largest island (pronounced: la-DIEG, named after a ship of discovery), which is close to Praslin, is of greater importance for tourism. So many "typical" Seychelles photos, film and advertising shots were taken on it that one knows its unique granite formations even if one has never heard the island name before.
On all other islands (with the exception of the small island Cerf off the coast of Mahé) there is at most one accommodation, so that the hotel guests are mostly among themselves - some hotel islands are only shared with a handful of other holidaymakers and the staff.
You can obtain more detailed information by clicking the submenu items.
