He quit his job to buy an island! He spent 40 years turning a deserted island into the world's smallest national park

More than 60 years ago, Brendon Grimshaw quit his job and spent his savings to buy an island.

It sounds like a wonderful retirement life, where you can lie on the white beach, enjoy the sea view, and listen to the birds singing in the tropical jungle.

But what he bought was a deserted island with no one living on it.

The island bought by Grimshaw｜Ladyredsea

There are few trees on this small island, no flying seabirds, no water, no electricity, and no signal. The whole island is overgrown with weeds and is eerily quiet. There are even two notorious pirates buried here.

Forty years later, this small island has become the world's smallest national park , with dense forests filled with bird songs and tortoises lying leisurely on the beach basking in the sun.

Grimshaw's story is not as simple as "quitting your job and buying an island".

Bought a deserted island for £8,000

Grimshaw is a native Englishman who loves writing. He dropped out of school at the age of 15 and became the youngest newspaper editor in the UK. Later, he was transferred to Africa to work , which was his long-cherished wish. There, he saw many unique and charming creatures, and his yearning for nature took root in his heart.

In the 1950s and 1960s, the anti-colonial movement in Africa was on the rise, and Tanzania and Kenya, where Grimshaw worked, also declared independence one after another. He knew that his work would soon be handed over to the locals. So, he took a boat to Seychelles, more than 1,500 kilometers away from the African continent, on the pretext of vacation.

Grimshaw went from newspaper editor to island owner | Marion Kaplan/Alamy

After living on the island for a while, he realized that this was the life he wanted.

In the next three weeks, Grimshaw asked around for islands for sale , but to no avail. Until one day when he happened to look out the window, a young man shouted to him on the street: "You want to buy an island, right?" He shouted back: "Yes!", and then followed the young man on the boat and sailed away from the main island of Seychelles.

After sailing for 5 kilometers, Grimshaw saw the island he had always dreamed of - Moyenne Island.

This is a very small island, only 400 meters long and 300 meters wide, about the size of 20 football fields, with a coastline of no more than 2 kilometers. Like other small islands in Seychelles, it has both soft and delicate sandy beaches and hard granite reefs. The difference is that this island has been uninhabited for almost half a century . The only house on the island is left with ruins, and weeds and shrubs are endless.

Grimshaw waded ashore and stood on the island for the first time. He immediately decided that this island was the destination of his life.

In 1962, 37-year-old Grimshaw bought Moye Island from its previous owner for 8,000 pounds. The 8,000 pounds at that time is about 190,000 pounds (about 1.6 million yuan) today.

However, his training had just begun.

Robinson Crusoe and Friday's Island Exploration

Since moving to this uninhabited island, Grimshaw has not had a single day of leisure. He has to catch fish to fill his stomach and build a new house from scratch... He has changed from a writer to a real-life Robinson Crusoe , just to make his life more comfortable on the island.

Grimshaw built his own island hut｜A grain of sand

During the colonial rule, Maya Island was subjected to large-scale development and all trees were cut down. In the decades since it became an uninhabited island, nothing has grown on the island except weeds , not to mention a complete ecosystem.

"No birds poop" is a true portrayal of this deserted island.

Like Robinson, Grimshaw also found his own helper, Rene Lafortune, 19 years old at the time, the son of a local fisherman. Grimshaw and him, opened a road on this deserted island covered with weeds. They each started from one end of the island, took an axe to chop the bushes, and met in the center of the island, thus building a 4-kilometer road on the island.

Grimshaw and Rene holding a giant turtle｜A grain of sand

This work is tiring for anyone, but Grimshaw enjoys the joy of “opening the map” - “ You never know what you will find on the island today .”

Sure enough, this deserted island gave him a surprise - in the weeds in the northwest, he found two pirate tombstones with the words: "Unfortunate Unknown" written on them.

Centuries ago, the Seychelles were a hideout for pirates, including the notorious Oliver Levasseur, nicknamed "The Vulture", whose pirate group plundered countless treasures in the western Indian Ocean, and passing merchant ships were terrified. In July 1730, Levasseur was hanged in Mauritius, and his treasure worth tens of millions of pounds was also missing.

Grimshaw was convinced that the treasure was buried somewhere in the Seychelles, including the island of Maya. The evidence was these two graves - they belonged to two low-ranking pirates. The pirate leader killed them so that their spirits would haunt the island and guard the treasure hidden there . He spent a lot of time studying old maps, looking for clues, but to no avail. Maybe he really did find the treasure, but he didn't reveal it.

A grain of sand: Viking cemetery discovered by Grimshaw

He brought forests, seabirds and tortoises

After removing all the weeds, Grimshaw and Rene began the big project of rebuilding the forest . They planted a total of 16,000 trees on the island , including 40 species of palm trees, mango trees and papaya trees. Under their careful care, these seedlings became more and more lush, and eventually grew into a tropical jungle covering the entire island, bearing tempting fruits, and bringing the island back to life.

The transformed island is now covered with a tropical jungle｜A grain of sand

Grimshaw always felt that something was missing... How could there be a forest without birds? However, after he rebuilt the forest and waited for a long time, he did not see even a feather of a bird. The forest was terribly silent.

He couldn't wait any longer. If the bird didn't come, he would go find it himself.

So Grimshaw introduced many native birds to the island , such as the red-crowned blue pigeon (Alectroenas pulcherrimus), a pigeon with the same color as the Dutch flag. There is also the red weaver (Foudia madagascariensis), which belongs to the weaver bird family and is endemic to Madagascar. During the breeding season, they weave nests with grass strips, like a small bag hanging on a tree. They have a more famous distant relative, the group weaver (Philetairus socius), which usually weaves large-scale collective homes on trees.

Red-crowned Blue Pigeon and Red Weaverfinch｜Flicker

From the perspective of ecological protection, the act of releasing birds at will may have a devastating impact on local species and ecosystems. However, there are no native species on Maya Island at all, and the birds released by Grimshaw even added a new link to the ecological chain .

In order to keep these introduced birds, Grimshaw began to feed them , consuming 250 kilograms of rice every week. Later, more and more bird populations spread to Moye Island. Grimshaw's ears were no longer just the sound of the waves, but also the melodious birdsong. Today, there are about 2,000 birds living here.

Perhaps, Grimshaw's original intention was to make his own life more comfortable, but when he saw that he had turned a deserted island into an island with rich species diversity with his own hands, he decided to do something for nature .

With the rise of tourism, the development of the Seychelles has increased rapidly, the original forests have been cut down, and many wild animals have lost their homes, including the Aldabra tortoise (Aldabrachelys gigantea). It is one of the largest tortoises in the world and has now disappeared from many islands. Grimshaw wanted to restore the original appearance of Seychelles on this small island, so he transported more than 100 Aldabra tortoises and released them on the island.

Grimshaw finally returned nature to Maya Island, and he was already in his seventies.

Grimshaw and his turtles｜A grain of sand

The smallest national park in the world

The small islands near Maya Island were once used as prisons and places for lepers to be isolated, but with the rise of tourism, even they have been transformed into luxury resorts. Villas have sprung up, attracting wealthy people from all over the world to come here for vacation.

Grimshaw next door still wore shabby clothes, a pair of dispensable slippers, and led a self-sufficient life, which was really out of tune with the luxurious life around him.

His island was once coveted by others - a wealthy man in Dubai once offered tens of millions of dollars to buy Maya Island, but Grimshaw decisively refused. He spent more than 40 years transforming and protecting the island, not for money.

Grimshaw lived out the rest of his life on the island, but he hoped that Maya would be permanently protected after his death .

In 2008, Grimshaw and the Seychelles Ministry of Environment signed an agreement, and since then, the world's smallest national park was born.

The Seychelles government will help Grimshaw protect and manage the island and the various plants and animals that inhabit it, and will also open the island to tourists. Each tourist needs to pay $10 to go to the island as a maintenance fee, and they are not allowed to stay overnight.

Even during the peak tourist season, the number of tourists visiting the island at the same time rarely exceeds 50, and the number of tourists in a single day never exceeds 300.

Since there is no pier on Maya Island, tourists must wade ashore after getting off the boat, just like Grimshaw did when he first set foot on the island.

The crew members of the documentary A grain of sand waded ashore｜A grain of sand

Wading through the clear water, you can see the only restaurant on the island, the Jolly Roger , where you can enjoy local Seychelles cuisine, such as grilled fish and seafood curry cooked with Creole sauce. Follow the path laid by Grimshaw himself into the jungle, and there is a small museum dedicated to Grimshaw's life and deeds. In addition, there are two giant tortoise hatcheries . These are all the buildings on Maya Island.

Walking on the island, people will also encounter leisurely giant tortoises. But as the warning sign on the island says: "Please respect these tortoises, they are much older than you! "

As we walked, we came to the northwest corner of the island, where Grimshaw found the pirate's grave. Interestingly, Grimshaw also placed his own and his father's graves next to it.

After working hard for the island for most of his life, he was buried here in 2012. His tombstone reads: "Maya allowed him to enjoy the beautiful scenery as soon as he opened his eyes and said: Thank God."

Author: Jian Er

Edit: Small towel

The title image is from the movie "Cast Away"

References

[1]A Grain of Sand by Joseph Johnson-Cami

[2]Moyenne Island: The world's smallest national park

https://www.bbc.com/travel/article/20220119-moyenne-island-the-worlds-smallest-national-park

[3]Moyenne island declared a national park

https://www.nation.sc/archive/223843/moyenne-island-declared-a-national-park

[4] World Bird Checklist https://avibase.bsc-eoc.org/checklist.jsp?region=SCma18im

[5]It's Yorkshire's Robinson Crusoe: Brit who bought a cut-price island in the Seychelles 50 years ago... and still lives in blissful solitude with 120 giant tortoises

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2135299/Brit-bought-cut-price-island-Seychelles-50-years-ago--lives-blissful-solitude.html

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