Blogs from Andasibe-Mantadia National Park, Madagascar, Africa

So, here I am back on my travels, accompanied once again by my regular travelling companion in remote regions, Bruce. This time we are doing the rounds of East Africa. However on this trip we are on individual tours in each region (six in all) rather than touring with a group. And as double cause for celebration, this is my 100th blog with TravelBlog, and being somewhere as unique as Madagascar, I hope you find it good reading. Our trip started with a direct flight from Sydney to Johannesburg, taking just under 14 hours in all. There is rarely anything good to report on a flight of this duration, but travelling Premium Economy with Qantas did soften the ... read more

Sunday 25 February – in the Andasibe region (central east coast) & Vacona Reserve After a leisurely breakfast we were in the 4x4 with Rivo heading for Andasibe Park. On the way, not far out of Tana, we stopped off at a Reptile Park. Well, were we in for a surprise. At the Reptile Park we saw over 20 different types of chameleons, The island is home to two-thirds of the world's chameleon species, including the smallest known which we saw, and researchers have proposed that Madagascar may be the origin of all chameleons. Our local guide firstly took us to a large enclosure and for the next 40 minutes we found over 20 different Chameleons in the trees, running on the ground and up the side of the fences. There were all sorts of colours. ... read more

After just three days here we now know it is true - Madagascar is full of wildlife. We have seen so many lovely lemurs - black and white ones, ginger ones, brown ones; big indri lemurs that scream from the tops of the trees, mouse-size pygmy lemurs that silently creep around our feet; black and white ruffed lemurs that run away and hide, bamboo lemurs that bounce from tree to tree to find us and stare back from a foot away! Finding lemurs means trekking around rainforests and we get to see all manner of flora. The forest plants range from huge hardwood trees that tower above us out of sight to tiny orchids that hang from vines, flashes of colour in a world of greens and browns. Ferns and vines are abundant, and the bamboo ... read more

Hello one and all! We are now in our placement and james is better :) we took 2 taxi-brousses from tana to Andasibe, our little muddy village on the edge of the rainforest, stopping at our nearest big-ish settlement Moramanga on the way (nearest bank:supermarket etc) which is an hour from Andasibe. Two very nice ladies from the Dodwell Trust came with us to Andasibe to settle us in here. We live in a little wooden lean-to beneath our landlady (Madame Booz)'s house, with a little kitchen, 3 bedrooms of which we have one, and a corridor type thing between them all with a table and chairs. outside is the long drop, 'shower' and the only tap, and we don't have any drains inside the house. our room is quite cosy and once you get used ... read more

The taxi clatters over the cobbled streets of Tana on its way to the eastern taxi-brousse station. This will be the second last taxi-brousse journey of my stay and in theory shouldn't be a bad one. Unfortunately I've been fed spurious information by my hotel so it's more hassle than enough. It's a ~2.5 hour trip hence Ar5,000 is a decent price, as confirmed by several hotel receptionists. My initial quote is Ar17,000, which is so high as to indicate something other than a rip-off attempt. I try several other taxi-brousse booths but it's the same story at all of them. I don't fully understand the explanations I'm given in French but an English-speaking guy helps me out. Seems like there are no taxis-brousses that terminate at Andasibe - they all continue on to Tamatave. Since ... read more