Due to the scarcity and unreliability of wifi in this otherwise amazing country, we have not blogged for some time. But here it is:
Update: we never seem to have enough wifi to put the pictures in so we will attempt that seperately to the text.
MADAGASCAR DAY 2
We started the day with a pleasant brekkie out on our sunny private verandah overlooking Antananarivo (or Tana as the locals call it). Unfortunately the Malagasy brekkie was a bit short for a couple of starving Aussies – particularly when I selfishly but unwittingly hogged all the milk in my coffee so that the poor long suffering Georgie had to have her morning cup of tea black! Oh my goodness gracious me!
Once in the car we wove through the crowded and fascinating streets of Tana, spotting only a couple of other Vassars (foreigners, or “Wazzah!” as the kids call out at us) along the way, until we reached the rural areas where every gully is planted with rice and the buildings are mainly made of crumbling mud brick or wattle and daub. Tiny roadside stalls abounded selling produce like bananas, persimmons, guavas and other tropical fruits. There the roads are narrow and filled with pot holes that would swallow a school bus. Sometimes young fellas would stand next to the bigger pot holes holding shovels with their other hand out asking for money.
We travelled over a high mountain range that was blanketed with eucalyptus trees. These Australian icons are regularly cut and allowed to resprout at the base so that the locals can make charcoal from the stems. Gas for cooking is too expensive for most Malagasies so big bags of charcoal can be bought from numerous roadside stalls. Driving through seemingly endless forests of bushy gum trees is quite surreal in this otherwise totally exotic environment.
Our driver stopped at a private park where we were led up into the hills in search of wild lemurs. Georgie uncomplainingly endured a climb of (seemingly) thousands of meters to the high forests where we eventually came across a family group of those wonderfully endearing creatures. Aching legs and tight chests were forgotten as we hand fed a group of these gorgeous animals. We encountered two different species of lemurs – the white, black and brown ones in the photo below (name unfortunately forgotten) endemic to this region only, and the common brown lemurs, found across the country.
Then we descended the mountain to visit the breeding enclosures of chameleons where they are multiplied in preparation for release into the wild again. Chameleons have to be the most beautiful reptiles I have ever come across, so slow moving, so colourful and so inoffensive. Gorgeous creatures.
After that we drove to Andasibe National Park where we visited an island where lemurs abound. Our guide managed to call them down by mimicking their call, so that we could hand feed them pieces of banana. Having a fluffy warm lemur leap onto your shoulders and feed from your palm is a wonderful thing. Sometimes two of them were perched up there. There were three species of diurnal lemurs that we encountered on the island, making four species for the day.
MADAGASCAR DAY 3
We started very early in preparation for being whisked away to the bank to withdraw further MILLIONS to pay for all of the exciting activities we have planned for the next couple of days. ATMs are few and far between (hundreds of kilometers) and credit cards unheard of, so we need to keep our wallets full of paper money – which is usually so well used and grubby and so frankly disgusting that it is almost a pleasure to hand it over to an eager hand awaiting payment.
It had rained solidly all night so there was even more mud over the road from land slips (the recent cyclone had caused a lot of slips) so the ride to town was even more scary than normal.
Our next little adventure involved a walk through Andasibe National Park in search of wildlife. Despite the continual drenching rain and totally sodden shoes and clothes (guess who forgot to pack rain coats!) plus the arduous nature of the mostly undeveloped trails and the uppy-downy terrain, Georgie still did not utter a single complaint or whinge.
We located two family groups of Indri lemurs (a species we had not previously seen), plus several tree crabs (most unusual), a sleepy little ground boa with a bulging belly indicative of a recent feed, and a solitary brown lemur. The forest echoed with the sounds of lemur calls and a variety of frog songs.
We each managed to remove solitary leeches before they could properly attach themselves. The leeches here are weensy little things.
MADAGASCAR DAY 4
Our driver Mizo took us for an exhilarating journey on the crazy Madagascan roads, across the country towards our destination of the very famous Avenue of Baobabs (some 9 hours of driving). The distances are not so phenomenal but the roads certainly are. Heaps of big trucks spewing clouds of diesel fumes as they chug along slowly and swerve erratically to avoid potholes, pedestrians, human and zebu-drawn wooden carts and other crazy drivers. I had to train myself not to look out through the windscreen for fear of giving myself heart attacks everytime we passed millimetres from anything, but instead to keep a firm eye out the side window at the fascinating countryside.
As we left the wetter regions and progressed towards the drier west coast not only did the countryside change, but so did the buildings and roadside stalls. The crumbling single storey wattle and daub houses transitioned to narrow two and three storey mud brick buildings of a much more substantial nature. The guava, persimmon and banana stalls transitioned to lots of craft stalls selling baskets, religious icons, toy trucks and vast numbers of vegetable stands. Huge areas of arable land, planted with a variety of veges and rice, filled the valleys whilst the almost bare rocky hills jutted up between them.
Some forests of pine trees were tapped like rubber trees so that resin could be gathered and sold as fire lighters, something we had never seen before.
All the creeks and rivers were running brim-full after the recent cyclones and the countryside appeared very green from the recent rains. Despite its apparent fertility you could see that the denuded hills would be very dry and harsh for most of the year.
At Antsirabe, where we spent the night, we first took a stroll down the wide main drag before dark where lots of families were spending a warm Sunday afternoon in the public gardens. Little kids were being pushed around in little pedal cars and people were hiring horses to trot up and down whilst others had little bbqs going. Many beautiful smiley children greeted us with “Bonjour!” It was lovely.
MADAGASCAR DAY 5
After spending the night on the third floor of a hotel in Antsirabe (all those steps!) and discovering that they didn’t do breakfast, Mizo took us in search of a boulangerie where we consumed French-ish pastries before heading off further west.
We passed through fertile volcanic valleys with remnant volcanoes rearing up out of this intensively cultivated landscape. Although rice was the most common crop (Malagasies eat rice three times a day, Mizo tells us) there was also a variety of veges produced there. Mounds of carrots lay along side the road with families sorting through them, and brassicas, cassava, papayas and a heap of other stuff was in cultivation all around.
The road then wound through much higher and drier grassy mountains with spectacular scenery and scattered villages perched atop lofty ridges. Mostly the mountains were too harsh to grow food on, but many of the valleys were planted out with rice and mango trees. In the villages the road became quite narrow because people used the tarred surface to spread out their rice to dry. Luckily there was little traffic to run over it out this far in the boondocks.
The road at this stage could probably be described as abominable. A long time ago there had been great effort and great expense made to put in a two lane tarred road that traversed this huge island. Unfortunately the effort appears to have stopped there. Now it is a long black stretch that is pock marked with craters and crevasses. The ride was somewhat bumpy at times with Mizo slamming on his breaks and swerving wildly to avoid plummeting into these numerous abysses.
Eventually we descended into a wide river valley where the temperatures climbed to almost uncomfortable levels. Stopping for a hot (!) lunch at a restaurant with a wonderful view of the river, we chewed on rubbery zebu and Malagasy poulet which had obviously been a sinewy athlete of a chook before arriving on our plates. We perspired our way through this very tasty and very chewy lunch before heading off along wonderfully scenic dry country with palms (livistonias I think) and other attractive and exotic native vegetation.
Soon we began spotting baobabs jutting out amongst the other stunted trees. Their distinctive forms projecting high above the regular vegetation. Hurrah! We were almost there!
We rolled into the intensely busy seaside town of Morondava and moved into what could have been a nice little seaside resort with cabins, but was actually a shabby run down joint that endured regular power failures. We demanded another bungalow when we saw that the toilet seat had only a few centimetres of pee-splattered plastic remaining attached to it. The second bungalow’s dunny seat was broken but we managed to tape that together with some duct tape we had in our backpack so that it was at least usable.
Our disgruntlement with all this shabbiness was eased by the lovely open deck restaurant atop the dunes with a pleasant sea breeze and Madagascar’s most fabulous product: Three Horses Beer, or THB. A bloody top drop indeed. The meals were a delight and we retiired to our sweatbox feeling quite sated. Unfortunately the power failure meant that the fan stopped blowing and the water cut out – so no showers or flushing toilets.
MADAGASCAR DAY 6
A bone-jarring ride along hours of never graded dirt roads to the totally awe-inspiring Avenue of Baobabs was our next adventure. It is impossible to describe how wonderful those stately behemoths are, scattered in their hundreds over that stark and beautiful landscape. Truly majestic. Fabulous. There are not enough superlatives to describe these amazing trees and the vista they create. Well worth the bad back from the bumps.
We then progressed further along that atrocious road to the dry forests of Kirindi Nat Park. A local guide took us for a meandering wander through the dense dry vine scrubs in search of more lemurs. Lots of lovely lizards scattered before our feet as we marvelled at the unusual plant life tangled beneath the huge scattered baobabs. We stumbled across a family of pretty black and white sifaka lemurs that leaped with fabulous grace between the trees. Then we located another group of the more common brown lemurs who were endearingly sprawled sleepily over branches in the midday heat. Click go the cameras, click, click, click. The walk back through the scrub revealed masses of colourful butterflies of many varieties lapping at the damp patches of mud in the earthen tracks. This was almost an overload of beauty in a strange and tangled forest in an exotic land.
We elected to not wait the remaining two hours in the stifling heat until sunset to catch the evening light through the baobabs, deciding instead to jolt our way back to the ‘resort’ and catch the evening seabreeze on the restaurant deck and enjoy a few cool THBs.
MADAGASCAR DAY 7
The next morning was particularly unique because not only did Georgie wake me, but she also saw the sunrise. Our ingrained habits are changing.
We re-traversed the very scenic mountains and volcanic agricultural land on our way back towards the eastern side of Madagascar. The clear blue skies were replaced by massive storm clouds and tropical downpours in the distance. All very dramatic.
En route we tried our first street food – some deep fried battered bananas and some small sweet buns. After about 5 hours we still didn’t have the gallops, which was something of a relief.
Passing through Antsirabe again we veered off to the south to folow a deep river that had narrow 2 storey buildings perched high amongst the rocks as the roaring river foamed over vast granite boulders and snaked between the paddy fields. The views just got better and better as we climbed higher into the mountains and the air chilled off. The road twisted and turned, following the very scenic river until we came across some fruit stalls selling late season mangoes for-goodness-sake (which were expensive by Malagasy standards because they were the last to be had, but we were happy to pay the equivalent price of 5 for $1 – and they were delicious indeed).
Eventually, with Mizo driving like Jack Brabham incarnate, we arrived at the poshest accommodation thus far in a unique bustling mountain town. The next day we were to go in search of yet more lemurs in the Ranomafana Nat Park.
MADAGASCAR DAY 8
We departed fairly early and climbed up into some high mountains, the road twisting through trimmed eucalyptus forests until we finally entered the native forests. The Ranomafana Nat Park is an extensive protected area that encompasses beautiful lush native rainforest that has wonderful bubbling and cascading creeks and rivers roaring through it. There is still some primary forest there, but the vast majority is rapidly regrowing – and stunningly beautiful – secondary forest. It was explained to us the reason why the primary forests were so scarce, the forest tribes used to engage in slash and burn agriculture, regularly moving on to clear new patches. These tribes are now permanently settled in villages so as to protect the areas of remaining bushland. Due to the clear felling of enormous areas for eucalypt plantations there is just not enough left for them.
The Ranomafana Nat Park is the most visited of all the rainforest parks, and rightly so, it is gorgeous and wonderfully scenic and photogenic. Dodging the bus loads of French tourists, our guide led us through these mossy cloud forests, he and his spotter finding all sorts of beautiful creatures for us. Chameleons, a leaf-tailed gecko, a streaked tenric (look that one up!) and a wonderful array of lemurs. The critically endangered golden bamboo lemur was a highlight, but we also saw a greater bamboo lemur, a black and white ruffed lemur and, of course, the common brown lemur, and a number of different birds and insects as well as the wonderful plant life. The walk was stunning and absolutely worth it, but extremely arduous as we ascended up into the steep mountains with Georgie once again uncomplainingly enduring several million steps and lots of very steep climbs.
When we later arrived at our accommodation for the night there were some groans emitted as we looked at the 62 steps and long steep paths that led up to our little bungalow on the mountain side. And then to descend and reascend for the night spotting walk was a further challenge. The night spotting in the pouring rain was fruitful, we saw lots of chameleons (mostly tiny wee things – how did he ever manage to locate them?) and a few frogs and resting birds.
After all that Georgie and I are now ready to tackle the race up and down Walsh’s Pyramid in Cairns. Our leg muscles are absolutely rippling!
MADAGSCAR DAY 9
We returned to Tana, enduring perhaps the most terrifying drive of my life as Mizo hot-footed it along those crazy Madagascan roads. As footpaths are virtually non-existant in this country we shared the road with chickens, goats, zebu-drawn wooden carts, human-drawn wooden carts and rickshaws, enormous black-smoke-billowing trucks, pedestrians (many of whom were small children), pushbikes, and of course other crazy Malagasy drivers, all of whom were intent on driving as fast, aggressively and dangerously as possible with their horns blaring.
But we arrived, safe and without killing anyone, at our initial wonderful B&B in Tana once again. There we enjoyed another sumptuous meal (Eliane is surely the best cook in all Madagascar) and I drank my final THB (sigh). Eliane is also the only one in this country who knows how to make a proper cuppa tea, so both of us managed to de-stress after our bone-rattling, teeth-chattering, sphincter-clenching horrendous drive.
The next morning included a tour of the city and then off to the airport to fly to Cape Town in South Africa. With some relief we realised that this would be the last scary drive in Mizo’s car. Phew! Never again will we complain about Australian drivers.
Photo: Rod Tricky fiddly stuff: Mim