Have you ever dreamed of your own paradise island? A sanctuary for the senses. The seductive delights of sun, sky and shimmering sea. No phones, no shoes, a beach without footprints. Well, yesterday I came to Bird Island, a coral cay in the Seychelles archipelago. Ringed by soft white coral sands, and lapped by crystalline turquoise waters, it is one of the Indian Ocean's great destination experiences. Unique, by a thousand miles.

So, an island for loners? Not exactly. As I write I have the company of around two million neighbours. Not for nothing does this island carry its given name of Bird. Daily life is conducted to the accompaniment of a graceful aerial ballet by pairs of pure white Fairy Terns. Magnificent Frigatebirds, like pterodactyls from another age, soar high on wings with a span of more than two metres. The aristocrat of the skies, a Tropicbird, with its distinctive elongated tail streamers, nests in a tree hollow a few steps from my verandah. A vast colony of Sooty Terns are resident from April to October, noisy yet distant at the far northern end of the island. And on the beach, I walk right up to a row of sleek Brown Noddies. Perched on driftwood, nose to nose with homo sapiens, they are utterly unafraid.

The Seychelles are, once again, justifiably fashionable. With a flight of recent luxury hotel openings, their star is in the ascendancy. The islands' isolation and the comparatively late arrival of humans - the French planters who settled in 1770 found virgin isles, untouched by the print of man - mean that nature is bountiful here, and generally well preserved. But in my view, the greatest trump card of the Seychelles is Bird Island. What seduced me is that this island is one of the few places on the planet where it is possible to get really close to beautiful birds in the wild.

"They are not afraid. There is nothing that actually threatens them. That's why they come. They feel that it is their island. That is how it was in the beginning, it was man who came afterwards," explains Marie-France Savy. Marie-France and her husband Guy have owned Bird Island since 1967, and spend most of the year in their beach home here. Tourism and nature conservation are not easy partners, but the Savys have this well covered. The gardens are not lit by night as the birds tend to fly into naked light, with disastrous consequences. Guests are firmly instructed not to disturb nesting birds. Low impact living is practised as far as feasible. Polite notices in my bathroom beseech me to use the solar heated water frugally.

I am intrigued to learn more about Marie-France's life on the island. As she takes tea with me, framed by a backdrop of flamboyant frangipani, she is a model of chic elegance. However, from the start, remote island life required considerable courage and practical capability.

"When we came here in 1969 there was nothing. There was just an island, with a few little huts where the fishermen lived. So we came, and just blended into that. We made copra."

Nothing if not resourceful, Marie France handled island life with aplomb. "There was no running water, there was no electricity, I used to get water from a well. I had three rocks, I would light a fire underneath and I'd put my pot on the rocks and cook my food."

When the price of copra fell, the Savys decided to go into tourism. "We started it with very little overheads, because I was cook, I was barmaid, I was waitress, I was cleaner, I was everything," she explains. The timing was right as the international airport had just opened on Mahe, the main island. And Marie-France and Guy had the great advantage of having lived the island experience. This is not a resort planned on paper from a desktop in Bangkok.

In fact I only have to walk into my own lodge on Bird to realise that Marie-France and Guy have perfectly understood the needs of island life. I'm not talking about simple, primitive huts. I'm talking about spacious, solidly built lodges with soaring high ceilings. Generously sized slatted windows give superb views of the birds and shimmering ocean. The lodges are not air-conditioned, they are aerated by through breezes and a ceiling fan. In more than a nod to comfort, there are thick fluffy towels and good quality bedlinen.

It does not take me long to unpack. The emphasis is on informality. Forget your Gucci and Armani, all you need for the good life here is a swimsuit for day and something in cotton for evening. Also it pays to remember the sunblock. Bird lies just 3 degree south of the Equator, the mercury holds steady at around 28 degrees C all year, and despite a few passing rainstorms, the sun is deceptively strong.

In the afternoon my son, Santini, and I go snorkelling. Before we know it we are eye to eye with Dusky Batfish, Picasso Triggerfish, Moorish Idols. My husband Dev is beachcombing, looking for cowries. There is absolutely no one else on the beach. This is no freak chance. At Bird, the probability of having a beach to yourself is high. Pristine, empty, immaculate sand. For once, the reality is better than the pictures in the holiday brochure. Not for nothing are the beaches of the Seychelles frequently ranked best in the world.

So where is everyone? Well, it has to be said that at 1 km x 2 km, Bird is small but not tiny, so with only 24 well-spaced guest lodges, the island never feels crowded. This can be an important issue on island holidays; it is all too easy to arrive at a tiny atoll and find it overcrowded for its size. You can walk around Bird in an hour or two, but my guess is that the other guests are indulging in something far less energetic. This island is deeply relaxing. Bamboozled by natural beauty, and cut off from the office by the absence of a phone in the room, it is easy to get seduced into a slow, relaxing pace of life. Don't go without a camera, most visitors end up photographing or even sketching the birds. Kayaking, deep sea fishing are options.

Come nightfall, torch in hand I trek over to the bar. Surprisingly sophisticated, it is a hub of activity. Over my fruit cocktail I chat with couples from Switzerland, Japan, Italy. It is an impressive fact that around 40 per cent of the Bird clientele are return visitors. Most fly in on the daily 30-minute flight by Twin Otter from the international airport at Mahe. Very few arrive by yacht, but this was not always the case. Marie-France explains, "In the early days there were many more yachts which came to Seychelles, we met a lot of interesting people. We still do now. My friends used to tell me that I'd miss out. I had to leave my schoolfriends behind on the main island. They all used to get in touch with me over the radio and say, 'Ah, we're having parties and you are not part of it.' I never regretted it."

Marie-France and Guy invite me to join them at their table for dinner. Creating a gastronomic banquet, nightly, on a remote island is never going to be an easy task. Of course, fresh fish is not a problem. But the superb scope of choice that is offered nightly owes much to Guy's organisational wizardry -some salads and vegetables do grow in the island's sandy soil, but much has to be brought in by supply ship or in the hold of the Twin Otter. The food is good, nudging excellent. We dine on Red Snapper, chargrilled Creole style. Also Chinese pork ribs, Tuna with coconut milk and saffron, and purslane salad are offered, as a buffet. France, the head chef, prepares a plate of raw Dorado, accompanied with soy sauce, for our table. Very fresh, it tastes superb.

After dinner, I find myself sleepy, but one more encounter lies ahead. Walking back to my lodge, I come nose to nose with Esmeralda, a resident example of the Giant Tortoise species. These beautiful creatures proliferate in the wild on the Aldabra islands further south. Aged around 175, and weighing in at around 304 kg, Esmeralda is huge, and harmless.

So, at last to bed. Now, Bird is not the place to be if you require silence in order to slumber peacefully. The birdsong does quieten down at night, but not completely. The open design that lets in cooling air also lets in the notes of a noisy nest of Noddles nearby. But, as I slide off into sleep I remind myself that I am just a guest. The birds were there first. So who deserves to rule this roost? I have to side with the birds.

In the morning, after breakfast, Marionette comes hurrying over to the lodges. Marionette is a waitress on Bird, but she is particularly well clued up on wildlife, having worked as a nature warden on the Aldabra Island Reserve. She tells us that a female Hawksbill Turtle has come up out of the ocean to lay eggs. We watch, enthralled, but at a distance, concerned not to disturb her. She lays a vast number of eggs, around 100, then camouflages the nest by casting sand over it with her front flippers. She then returns to the sea. The young will hatch around 60 days later, usually at night. They run towards the brightest point on the horizon. On an undisturbed beach lit only by moonlight, this will take them directly to the sea.

Marie-France is delighted that turtles come to nest at Bird. "It always amazes me to see these creatures. They look so at ease, so graceful in the water. Then you see them going up a deserted beach, there is something very lonely about it. They make all this effort - sometimes the beach is very steep. They lay their eggs, and then contrary to everything else in nature, they leave them, and never come back for them again."

Both Hawksbill and Green Turtles nest on Bird, from October to March. The other half of the year, is the time to witness the huge colony of around 700,000 pairs of Sooty Terns. Remarkable for sea birds, they do not have good waterproofing on their plumage, so they rely on shoals of Tuna to chase small fish like Flying Fish or Sardines out of the water. The Terns then catch these small fish while airborne, a feat of great agility, and quite a spectacle for the onlooker.

So, Marie-France and Guy Savy seem to have got it right across the board: the birds, the white sands, the beach house, the successful ecotourism resort. Marie France smiles, "We didn't really plan this, and as it happened we said, right, we are going to make the most of it and enjoy every minute. I work because I enjoy working and this is the kind of work that I enjoy. It's a way of looking after people."

Air Seychelles flies weekly to Mahe from Bombay. Flight reservations, Tel: 022-22823205, E-mail:[email protected] Reservations for daily connecting flight from Mahe to Bird, and to book at Bird, Tel: 00248 224925; Fax: 00248 225074, E-mail: [email protected]