Blogs from Antsiranana, Madagascar, Africa

As I sit in Bole Airport after the first leg of our journey everything seems to be going OK. The 13 of us are all here, and so far no disasters. FYI, we have 2 Jesses and 2 Ians. The Ians are simple Ian W ans Ian L. The two Jesses however, both have the same initial, so Jess who is a Dive Master will be known as Jess, and Jess who isn't a DM will be known as Jessica. The flight was uneventful, and for me in Cloud 9, the Ethiopian Air business class, very comfortable, with good food, fizzy champagne and a nice big screen to look at. I hear it was less comfortable in the back, and that breakfast was served at about 3am. There are a few weary faces in the group! ... read more

Friday 9 March fly to Diego Suarez then drive to Ankarana I was very excited to be flying to the northern section of Madagascar. It is known for its unusual geological structures the tsingy rough. A 3.30am start was not exciting but all went smoothly with Rivo taking us to the airport. Fortunately, at that time of the morning the single lane road going to the airport was almost deserted unlike when we arrived it was bumper to bumper traffic for several kilometres. The flight to Diego Suarez was almost 2 hours. As soon as we exited the bag collection area, we spotted our name being held up by Eric our new guide. His driver was Ahmed who handled the 4x4 very well . . . . and the roads were atrocious, even worse than ... read more

Christmas is a bit of a turn around one for us, unpacking from our last trip and organising for the next. It's very quiet on the streets of Diego with all the shops closed, the locals in their Sunday best and lots off to church. We celebrate with a restaurant lunch of chicken, mashed potatoes and green beans and even splash out on some dessert. It's great to chat on the phone with family back home and hear about their Christmas day thousands of miles away. Luckily by the time evening rolls around the market is bustling again and we stock up on supplies and pack for a few days camping in Ankarana National Park. Next morning our trusty guide, Laudea, arrives, we fill a couple of large water containers and locate a taxi-brousse heading in ... read more

We're off to a roaring start. Bags packed for four day's camping, food bought at the market, appropriate taxi-brousse stop located, all very efficiently. Then it all comes to an abrupt halt. The 'imminent' arrival of the taxi-brousse actually occurs after three hours wait in the heat. Plenty of opportunity, then, to watch the comings and goings on the busy market corner. Eventually when the aging modified Peugeot 404 ute rattles in, our bags are thrown on top of the canopy and tied down. We're allocated the vazaha seats in the front while the locals pile onto the bench seats on the back. And we're off - on a few hours circuit around the town, that is. Picking up everything from bags of fertiliser to timber to corrugated iron. The taxi-brousse is positively groaning by the ... read more

We leave for Tulear tomorrow to start our marine unit, leaving behind Fort Dauphin until the beginning of December, and I cannot honestly say that I will miss it. Sorry for the long period of time lost between posts but I will try for a recap: 1) Village stay in Faux Cap in the hamlet of Mahabibo we werre there for 5 days, Zoe and I, in a small village of people who only spoke Malagasy our day tipically looked like this: wake up with the sun (around 6) climb out of the tent and be ushered inside the house for coffee sweetened wish coco powder and condensed milk, folowed by rice mixed with zebo milk after breakfast we were off to the bageda fields with mom to dig bageda(sweet potatoes) and all of this was ... read more