Blogs from Madagascar, Africa - page 18

Allo allo! Un petit salut d’ici pour vous laisser savoir que tout va bien et que je suis belle et bien en forme. On a eu un peut peur a cause des renseignements qu’il allait avoir un cyclone mais on est chanceux et ca a l’aire comme quand ca arrive ici ca ne va pas être plus que des vents un petit peu plus vite que normale et un petit peu de pluie. Autre que ca j’adore beaucoup ca… je plonge deux fois par jour (sauf cette semaine a cause de tout le vent on ne plonge pas) et dans l’après midi on fait des études ou on apprend le malagasy ou on lit. C’est vraiment mais vraiment merveilleux ici. Je m’habitue encore à la nourriture… beaucoup de ris et encore plus de bines. Je commence ... read more

We are all very keen to spend some time snorkelling and Keith wants to take a good look at some of Madagascar's marine critters. Off the far northwest coast, Nosy Hara (island of large rocks) is at the centre of one of the country's most remote marine reserves. We are heading there for a Robinson Crusoe style visit with our trusty side kick from Montagne d'Ambre, Laudea. We bump, slip and slide our way in the taxi-brousse for hours on a track filled with deep, muddy holes which we'd normally only attempt in a four wheel drive. Surprisingly we only have to get out to push once. When we arrive in the tiny fishing village of Ampasindava it's in the heat of the day, siesta time, and we eventually locate a captain who is willing to ... read more

Diego Suarez, or 'Dago' to the locals, is the major town in the far North of Madagascar and the base for our travels for the next few weeks. Though its not particularly attractive in itself its handy to lots of beautiful beaches and some interesting National Parks. To get there from the capital you can spend two days in a taxi-brousse (bush taxi) on the bumpy roads, but an hour on the plane sounds like a pretty good option at this stage. From the plane it appears that there's far less natural forest in this country than we expected, so we hope the national parks and reserves are providing sufficient refuge for the vast array of interesting and unusual species that we'd like to see. Diego is perched on the edge of the sea and our ... read more

Madagascar is like playing tennis with a lefthanded opponent. Everything looks as usual, till you realize something is completely different. We drive across a savannah, looking for animals. But there no are antilopes staring at us, wiggling their tails to warn eachother, no wildebeasts showing their horns in defense and even no guineafowls, running in front of the wheels of the car. Madagascar is completely different from the mainland. Even the trees are different. In stead of acacia's with their flattened canopy's we see majestic Bismarck palms and the strangest trees ever: Baobabs. But why is nature so lefthanded? We have two weeks to find it out during our trip thoughout an Island as big as the countries we travelled across in East Africa. In these two weeks we will bridge a distance of more than ... read more

On our journey North we spend a night in Ambositra. We visit the restaurant with the supposedly 'best' pizza in Madagascar, awful! We are also subjected to a Nigerian evangelical TV programme too, where the women scream as the devil takes over their body and they attack another woman! The weather has turned to rain so we don't do much in this town. It is famous for crafts so I buy a silk scarf but then we continue North. We visit Lake Tritriva, this is supposed to be naturally the shape of Madagascar. There is a Malaasy legend that two love crossed lovers drowned themselves in the lake and many people come to perform sacrifices. While we are there we see a sacrifice where a couple are praying for their newborn baby, they have a live ... read more