Mahébourg, Mauritius

A new town for an old bay

Grand Port was the first place anyone settled in Mauritius, but the settlement was at Vieux Grand Port, on the north side of the bay under the mountain, and it never grew into a town. The Dutch built their fort there in 1638, the French kept a government post and then a military post on the same ground through the eighteenth century, and in 1806 the post was moved to a new town laid out on the south-west shore, where the La Chaux river meets the lagoon. The new town was named Mahébourg after the French governor Mahé de La Bourdonnais.

The town developed around 1806 and has stayed modest ever since. The 2015 census counted 15,457 people, which makes it the main town of the south-east without making it a city. Visitors sometimes read that Grand Port is the old name of Mahébourg. That is loose. Grand Port is the bay and the district, Vieux Grand Port is the old settlement under the mountain, and Mahébourg is the town that replaced it. Keeping the three names apart saves confusion on bus boards and road signs.

What the town does have is the largest lagoon in Mauritius in front of it, a waterfront laid out for walking, a bus station on the esplanade, and a view of the mountain from almost every street that faces the water.

The waterfront and Pointe des Régates

The waterfront runs along the lagoon from the bus station on the esplanade to Pointe des Régates at the northern end of town. It is where Mahébourg gathers in the late afternoon, and it is the best place in the town to look at Lion Mountain, which sits across the water to the north-east with its back to the inland ranges and its head lifted towards the sea. In the morning the ridge is backlit from here; later in the day the slope that faces the town takes the light.

At Pointe des Régates stands the Grand Port battle memorial, erected on 30 December 1899 to mark the fight of 20 to 27 August 1810 in which four British frigates were lost or captured inside the reef. It looks straight across the bay towards the lion and the channel through the reef where the battle was fought. The waterfront complex and the esplanade beside it host the town’s annual regatta on the lagoon.

Just offshore sits Mouchoir Rouge, the islet with the red-roofed house that appears in half the photographs of the town. It is about the size of a football pitch, under 500 m from the shore, with buildings dating from the 1800s, and it is privately owned, so you look at it rather than land on it.

The market, every day and especially Monday

Mahébourg has a market every day, but Monday is the day it roughly doubles in size and spreads into the surrounding streets. The Monday fair brings textiles and clothing, fruit and vegetables, household goods and a long row of snack stalls, and it draws people from across the district. If you want the full version, come on a Monday morning. If you want to buy fruit and a bottle of water in peace, any other day will do.

The market is also the easiest place to eat cheaply after the hike. The snack stalls sell the everyday Mauritian staples, and a sit-down meal is never far away in the streets around it. The where to eat guide on this site covers the choices in more detail.

La Board, the Cavendish Bridge and the biscuit works

Follow the La Chaux river upstream from the waterfront and you reach the Cavendish Bridge, a century-old crossing where the river leaves the town. Below it is La Board, the public washing place, where people still come to wash laundry in the river. It is an everyday scene rather than an attraction, and it deserves to be treated as one. Ask before photographing anyone.

On the far side of the bridge is the Biscuiterie Rault, which has been making manioc biscuits since about 1870. One source dates the recipe to 1868 to 1870, so the exact year is uncertain, but the method is not. The cassava biscuits are cooked on hotplates fired with cane leaves, and they come in seven flavours. A short tour of about twenty minutes ends with a tasting, and the biscuits travel well.

The museum, closed for renovation

Mahébourg’s other famous building is the Château Gheude, a house of about 1772 on the La Chaux river that has been the National History Museum, usually called the Naval Museum, since 15 September 1950. It holds wreckage, cannons, swords and paintings from the Battle of Grand Port and, according to tradition, is the house where the wounded commanders of both sides were treated after the fight.

It has been closed for renovation since 15 December 2025 and the Mauritius Museums Council has not announced a reopening date. Check the council’s page or telephone (230) 631 9329 before you plan a visit around it. The museum guide on this site has the full story of the house and what to do instead.

What to see in Mahébourg

Everything in the town is within walking distance of everything else. The table runs roughly from the northern end of the waterfront south along the shore, then inland along the river.

How the town and the mountain belong together

From Mahébourg the lion is unmistakable. The long back rises from the south, the head lifts at the northern end, and the whole animal sits about 6 km away across the water, close enough to read every ridge and far enough to see the shape entire. From the summit the view is returned. Hikers on the lion’s head look down on the lagoon, the islets and the reef, and the town is laid out below them across the bay.

Practically, Mahébourg is the natural base for the hike if you do not have a car. The bus station is here, the market is here, and the trailhead is around the head of the bay at Vieux Grand Port. No route number for a Mahébourg to Vieux Grand Port bus is published online, although stops named Old Grand Port exist on the coast road and rural buses run roughly from 06:30 to 18:30. A taxi from the town is the simpler answer for a dawn start, and the getting there guide explains the options.

The bay works the other way too. A catamaran day from Mahébourg is bookable through Andeor, and so is snorkelling in the Grand Port lagoon, if you want the afternoon on the water after the morning on the mountain. Both links are in the sources at the end of this page.

Getting to Mahébourg

The airport is about 6 km away. Bus route 9 links the airport to Mahébourg in about nine minutes, and a taxi takes a matter of minutes. From Port Louis, route 198 runs to Mahébourg. From the north and west the drive is longer than the map suggests. Grand Baie to Mahébourg is roughly 64 km and about an hour by car, with no direct bus, and Flic en Flac to Mahébourg is roughly 47 km and about 40 minutes, with route 198 via Pellegrin as the public option.

Departures from the Mahébourg terminal run roughly every half hour during the day and there is nothing after about 18:00, so an evening in town without a car means arranging a taxi back to wherever you are staying.