In search of... plant life in Réunion

Bixa orellana? Nastus borbonicus? Ruiza cordata? They all grow like mad in this tropical French département in the Indian Ocean. Patricia Cleveland Peck succumbs to nature

Iam walking through luxuriant tropical vegetation: huge tree ferns, orchids in shades of amber, violet, scarlet and white, rare anthuriums and begonias in frothy masses as tall as a man. Unfamiliar but delicious scents drift on the air and beside a fountain I come to a little gazebo decorated with lacy wooden fringes known locally as lambrequins. This is used, the garden's owner, M. Raphael Folio, tells me, "for sitting with friends in the evening to enjoy a drink", and I realise that what makes Réunion's Maison Folio so heavenly is not simply the glorious plants but the fact that it encapsulates a way of life - the easy creole life of the colonial bourgeoisie which has all but disappeared.

So we're not off to the beach then?

No. We are high in the once-fashionable hill station of Hell-Bourg where not only the big houses but the tiny "ti cases" with their gardens are pretty enough for the village to have been designated "one of the most beautiful villages in France".

Sitting in a French garden in the Indian Ocean? I'm confused.

Yes, we are in France. The very south of France, because La Réunion is France's overseas department in the Indian Ocean. The tropical climate and super-fertile soil (the whole island was created when a volcano rose from the sea 3 million years ago) accounts for the profusion of plants. Not only does the island have 161 plants found nowhere else on earth, but introduced crops such as coffee, sugar cane and spices grew so abundantly that they proved valuable economic resources for la Métropole.

What do they grow that's so special?

M. Folio explains that nature provides all man's needs on this island. "No one need go hungry," he says, pointing to a green climber blanketing the hillside beyond his garden. This is Sechium edule from South America, known here as chou chou, every bit of which is useful and tasty. The shoots provide an asparagus-like vegetable, the knobbly fruit turns up au gratin in most restaurants and the root is made into flour. M. Folio also tells me that local herbalists known as tisaniers still prepare medicines from plants such as vetiver, geranium and lemon verbena and that essential oils are distilled in a few remaining primitive stills.

Can I see these essential oils being made?

Yes. These rustic distilleries are found mainly on the other side of the island on the slopes of the Piton Maïdo mountain. I soon came across one - a simple wood-fired still roughly roofed over, in which quantities of the flowers, leaves and twigs of a local variety of Pelargonium graveolens or scented leaf geranium, are steamed. The steam passes first to a cooling receptacle and then the liquid to a "Florentine vase" in which the valuable oil rises and can be run off. Cryptomeria, vetiver and ylang-ylang are treated similarly and, although this cottage industry is in decline, the quality of the oil is good enough for M. Guerlain to include in his perfumes.

You must get a good view of the island from up there.

You certainly will if you continue up the mountain, passing through lichen-encrusted forests of mountain tamarind, Acacia heterophylla and a strange tufty bamboo, Nastus borbonicus, two of Réunion's endemic plants. At the top, peering down into the Cirque de Mafate, a vast amphitheatre-like crater, you can see small villages, farmsteads and shops and discover that no roads lead in or out of this valley; all necessities are transported on foot or by helicopter. Nor is electricity available, other than that generated by solar panels. Réunion's rugged terrain of high peaks and spectacular waterfalls is great for serious walkers who are well served by guides, hiking paths and gîtes de montagne.

Let's spice things up a bit.

Perhaps the best known of all the island's spices is vanilla and at the Maison de la Vanille, an old plantation house in St André, you can learn the complex techniques which are used to persuade this climbing orchid to produce its valuable seed pods. A hermaphroditic plant, it was introduced from Mexico where it is pollinated by a certain type of bee. Efforts to introduce the bee to Réunion were unsuccessful and it wasn't until a slave boy, Edmund Albius (some say in a fit of pique), gave one of the plants the squeeze which initiated the male/female contact essential for fertilisation, and that pods were produced.

Pollination is still done by hand at a rate of 1,000 to 1,500 plants a morning, using a tiny metal rod. The green pods pass through a process of heating, washing, drying, maturing and grading which takes 22 months before the now black vanilla pods are exported all over the world. It has a glorious aroma and flavour. Try canard à la vanille, an unbelievably delicious creole speciality, and you'll see what I mean.

The labour involved in producing vanilla keeps its price high. Turmeric is far more affordable. The plant's root is ground to produce a bright yellow powder; hence its local name, safran pei. I called at Mémé Rivière's shop on the Plaine des Gregues and learned that turmeric is the soleil which gilds the popular creole dish, cari, a mild stew of meat or fish which is served with rice and a fiery condiment of pimento known as rougail.

In 1642, La Réunion was settled by the French who later brought in slaves from Madagascar and the African continent to work the coffee and sugar plantations. Eventually, when slavery was abolished, indentured labour came over from Asia. This rich racial mix has resulted in a unique culture which uses plants not only for food, construction and medicine but also in rituals.

You mean magic, don't you?

At the Jardin d'Eden at Hermitage-les-Bains, some 700 species are grown and some are considered magical and sacred. Here I was lent a pamphlet which contained fascinating snippets of plant lore. Did you know, for example, that the fruit of the lipstick tree Bixa orellana not only provides the body paint used by Amazon tribes to symbolise blood but also features as E160 in the production of cakes, chocolate and the rind of Dutch cheese? I didn't learn any magic spells but I was introduced to a tree, Ruiza cordata, which has featured so largely in local magic that it is now almost extinct.

Are there any other gardens to see while I'm on the island?

You can also visit the Spice and Fragrance Garden in St-Philippe, in which I found myself dwarfed by giant examples of the plants we grow here on our window sills: Swiss cheese plants 80ft tall bearing massive phallic fruits, and whopping Heliconias in zingy colours. The Conservatoire de Mascarin is the island's most important botanical garden. Here, in a charming old creole domain, attempts are made to protect Réunion's fragile endemic plants from the competition of the over-enthusiastic newcomers - even the tree bearing the delicious guava fruit is considered a pernicious weed here.

Children will enjoy Park Exotica which combines a wonderfully colourful plant collection with Disneyesque grottoes, crocodiles and black swans.

This island paradise must have a downside.

It does involve a long journey via Paris; a knowledge of French is almost essential; it is isn't cheap and the hotels are not as sophisticated as those on nearby Mauritius. That being said, you won't find scenery or plant life like it anywhere else on earth.

So how do I get there?

I travelled with Onyx International Travel (0118-947 2830; www.onyxtravel.co.uk), which specialises in the French overseas départements of Réunion, Guadeloupe and Martinique. A nine-day tour to Réunion on a b&b basis, including flights and transfers, costs from £850.