Reunion Island

This piece of France, warmed by the sun of the southern hemisphere, doesn't lend itself well to the traditional image of tropical islands. A neighbor of Mauritius, known for its enchanting lagoons, Réunion is more enigmatic: villages lost between narrow ridges, lunar landscapes or waterfalls tumbling down from heights like a bride's veil.
Resolutely volcanic and mountainous, the island is a devilishly sporty destination: hiking, spending the night in a refuge, paragliding, canyoning and lava tunnels. Added to this breathtaking natural environment is an original culture, at the crossroads of three continents: Asia, Europe and Africa.

Reunion Island is a volcanic island, born some three million years ago with the emergence of the Piton des Neiges volcano, which today, at 3,070 m, is the highest peak in the Indian Ocean. To the east of the island lies Piton de la Fournaise, a much more recent volcano (500,000 years old), considered one of the most active on the planet. The emerged part of the island represents only a small percentage (around 3%) of the underwater mountain that forms it.

Probably spotted by the Arabs as early as the Middle Ages, Reunion wasn't inhabited until the mid-17th century, some 150 years after its appearance in the portulans of Portuguese navigators. Previously known as Mascarin Island, it became Bourbon Island, a stopover for the French East India Company on the route to India, and from the 1710s, a true colony growing coffee. After becoming a plantation company, it came under the direct control of the King of France in the 1760s, before being reallocated to the sugar cane industry at the end of the Napoleonic Wars. In 18482, slavery was abolished on the island, replaced until the 1930s by the practice of "engagisme".

In addition to its volcanic origins, the island's relief is extremely rugged due to violent erosion. The central region is home to three vast cirques carved out by erosion (Salazie, Mafate and Cilaos), and the island's slopes are criss-crossed by numerous watercourses creating gullies whose torrents cut into the mountainsides at depths of up to several hundred meters.
The ancient Piton des Neiges massif is separated from the Fournaise massif by a gap formed by the Plaine des Palmistes and the Plaine des Cafres, a passageway between the east and south of the island. Apart from the plains, the coastal areas are generally the flattest, particularly in the north and west of the island. The wild southern coastline, however, is steeper.

Weather

Resolutely tropical, Réunion has two distinct seasons: a hot, rainy, cyclonic summer (December to March) and a cool, dry "winter" (June to September). The east coast is by far the wettest. Temperatures average 21°C in the dry season and 28°C in the wet season. The presence of high mountains does, however, weigh up this overly simplistic presentation of the island's climate. Average temperatures in the mountains do not exceed 12/18°C in the dry/wet season, and the island's heights are often shrouded in fog. Cyclones sometimes threaten Réunion during the hot season