Now, let's talk a bit about drinking in Réunion.

First, let's talk Beer. First of all, while much of the world has been undergoing the Craft Beer Revolution[tm], it's definitely not happening in Réunion. When it comes down to it, there are basically four different beer brewers doing business in Réunion:

1. Brasserie Bourbon (Saint-Denis)
2. Fischer (Alsace, mainland France)
3. Picaro (Saint-Pierre)
4. Phoenix ("The Beer that Made Mauritius Famous")

So you don't go to Réunion for beer tourism.

You can also occasionally track down a few other niche beers, like Guinness or various Belgian beers (Leffe wasn't uncommon). and I never actually tracked down a Picaro when I was thirsty for a beer, but I did try the others. Of these, I actually enjoyed Bourbon, aka, "La Dodo" (note that their logo is a white dodo[1]). This wasn't a fancy craft beer, but being basically your standard Budweiser-style lager. But it, and some of their secondary varieties (like their darker "Heritage" beer), were pretty good. Here we are enjoying two Dodo's at Cafe Edouard, one of Saint-Denis' more popular watering holes:



But what "La Dodo" has is a fanatical following on the Island, to the extent I've seen with few other beers (Jamaica's Red Stripe is the only one I've seen even close). The brand is truly iconic, in that most any restaurant, cafe, or "snack bar"[3] will have the the distinctive dodo logo advertised in red, green and yellow in murals (often taking up an entire exterior wall of the joint), outside cafés, table umbrellas, shop windows, signposts, coasters, and the like, all proclaiming "La Dodo Lé La!" ("The Dodo is here!")[4]. I'll try and post some examples as they come up, since it was really impressive how often you'd see the dodo around.

Also, that table above is worth commenting on. Some artist made it for Cafe Edouard, and it's basically a boardgame showing all of the iconic toursit activities of Réunion. I would have taken more pictures if I had fully realized how funny, sarcastic, or stereoptypical some of them were:

1. Getting attacked by sharks
2. Trail-running across the mountains
3. Buying vanilla beans
4. Cutting yourself accidentally with a machete
5. Getting chikungunya disease
6. Eating too much "piment"
7. Not seeing anything because of the cloud layer....



[1] Note that Reunion is not thought to ever have actually had dodos, those being native to nearby Mauritius[2]

[2] However, there were erroneous reports early in the exploration of the region claiming white dodos were on Réunion

[3] One of those odd English phrases that has somehow defied the French tendency to avoid loanwords.

[4] My French coworker informs me there's also a double-entendre here, in that "dodo" is also French baby-speak for "naptime".