Standards of cuisine, whether French, Creole, Indian, Chinese or English, are generally very high, but fruit, meat, vegetables and even fresh seafood are often imported.

Things to know: Waiter service is normal in restaurants and bars.

National specialities:
• Venison (in season).
• Camarons (freshwater prawns) in hot sauces.
• Octopus.
• Dholl purri (a wheat pancake stuffed with ground peas and served with curry).
• Gateaux piments (chilli cakes).

National drinks:
• Rum.
• Beer.
• Alouda (almond-flavoured ice milk drink). 
• Fresh coconut milk.

Legal drinking age: 18.

Tipping: 10% is usual in most hotels and restaurants.

Grand Baie is the centre of the island's nightlife, with bars with live music, restaurants and nightclubs. Port Louis has mainly restaurants and bars. Rivière Noire is a Creole fishermen's district where sega dancing is especially lively on Saturday nights. Sega troupes give performances at most hotels. Gamblers are lavishly catered for; casinos are among the island's attractions.

This ranges from sophisticated shopping for designer clothing, jewellery and handicrafts in Port Louis' Caudan Waterfront to rooting around for T-shirts and souvenirs upstairs in the capital's bustling Central Market, while locals bargain hard over tea and other essentials while catching up on the gossip. Island crafts, found at the craft market at The Caudan include jewellery, Chinese and Indian jade, silks, basketry, glass and model ships. Cashmere is a particularly good buy.

Duty-free shopping is popular here with around a 40% saving on textiles, jewellery, perfume and electrical goods. Mauritius is to be turned into a tax-free shopping haven by 2010, with 80% tax taken off around 2,000 goods. Tourist shopping centres are located around the island, with a good selection of designer shops at Grand Baie, but the locals shop at Curepipe, Quatre-Bornes and Rose-Hill.

Shopping hours: Mon-Sat 0930-1800. Some shops are open until 1200 on Sundays and public holidays. Markets usually close around 1600. Shops in Rose-Hill, Curepipe and Quatre-Bornes close on Thursday afternoons.