A week in the east, day by day

Here is what we would do with a week, a car, and no wish to spend the holiday on the road. The order is not sacred — it depends on the forecast, which we check the evening before — but the logic is: keep the early-start days for midweek, and never do two long drives back to back.

Day 1 — arrive and do nothing

The flight from Paris lands in the morning, after eleven hours and a two- or three-hour time difference depending on the season. You pick up the car, shop in Saint-Benoît, and stop there. Bassin Bleu is eight minutes away if the urge to get in the water beats the tiredness.

Day 2 — Grand Étang

First real outing, and the easiest. Leave around seven, the loop around the lake in two hours, four if you push on to the Biberon waterfall. Back for lunch, free afternoon. This is the walk that sets the rhythm of the stay without using up your legs.

Day 3 — Salazie and the forest

A big day, but without a brutal alarm. Leave at seven for Bélouve and the Trou de Fer trail — three to four hours of walking — then drop down to Hell-Bourg for lunch and an afternoon among the Creole houses.

If the weather is poor at altitude, reverse it: the village in the morning, and keep the forest for another day. The houses stay handsome under cloud.

Day 4 — the volcano

The only four-in-the-morning start of the stay, and it is earned. Piton de la Fournaise takes one hour fifty of driving and five hours of walking to the Dolomieu crater. You leave with the terrace coffee in a flask, you are at the Pas de Bellecombe at first light, and you are back for lunch.

Check the evening before that the enclosure is open: access closes during an eruption or an alert, and that is decided overnight. In the afternoon, you do nothing.

Day 5 — the south coast and the lava

A driving day, but a good one. You go down the coast to Anse des Cascades for the morning, picnic under the palms, then carry on along the Route des Laves and the Grand Brûlé as far as Saint-Philippe.

On the way back, the church of Notre-Dame des Laves at Piton Sainte-Rose, which the 1977 flow went around. Allow the whole day, but with no walking.

Day 6 — the day in the west

Once in the week it is worth the drive: you cross by the Plaines, spend the afternoon at the L'Hermitage lagoon, dine in Saint-Gilles and come back. An hour and a half to two hours each way — which is precisely why you only do it once.

A variant for those who prefer mountains to beaches: Cilaos by the road of four hundred bends, same duration, another world.

Day 7 — the pools, and leaving

A last morning close to home: Bassin La Paix, fifteen minutes away, or Takamaka if the sky is clear. Return flights leave late in the day or in the evening: there is plenty of time for a final swim.

What we deliberately left out

The full coastal loop of the island, which is two hundred and ten kilometres and shows you nothing. Days with three distant sites. And daily changes of accommodation: on this island two bases are enough, and more is paid for in tiredness.

• Everything above except day 6 is within a two-hour radius of Saint-Benoît — most of it within thirty minutes.
• A car is essential: none of these trailheads is served by public transport.
• Allow a spare day if you are staying ten: the weather will cost you one, almost certainly.
• Two nights per stop elsewhere on the island is the minimum for the move to be worth it. Below that, stay put.
• For the whole island, see the highlights region by region.

Frequently asked questions

Written in Saint-Benoît, where we rent the bungalow, and updated on September 13, 2026. Access and swimming rules change: we always point to the authority in charge rather than speaking for it.