Madagascar, the diving begins - blog 4

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We’re now two days into the diving part of the trip. Well it’s been pretty special so far! Manta Dive Centre are looking after us very well. We’re collected by boat from the hotel beach in the morning and taken to the dive sitesbefore being dropped off again on the beach. A great service!

Yesterday we did three dives from Nosy Tanikely, a national park which opened specially for us and another dive boat. We were based on the beautiful beach for drinks, snacks, and a picnic at lunchtime.

The first dive was a site called Aquarium in crystal clear water just offshore. There were loads of different corals, small reef fish, a grouper, an octopus and a turtle. What a fabulous start! The other two dives at Smurfland and West Point were equally as special, although the visibility was slightly reduced. White tip reef sharks, huge table coral, cushion stars, boxer shrimps, more turtles, loads and loads of reef fish, butterfly fish, sea cucumbers, trumpet fish, blue spotted rays, black surgeon fish nudibranchs; I’m sure there was more! We also spotted a couple of frigate birds in the sky 😁

The non-divers snorkeled and saw lots of marine life too, so all were happy!

We arrived back at the hotel, all a little weary and had a drink to celebrate. We then had to do a bit of first aid as poor Louise managed to spray Deet into her left eye; very painful and inflammatory. Luckily a couple of us had eye wash in our first aid kits so were able to administer to her, which helped a little.

Dinner was yummy. We have two vegetarians on the trip, and they’ve struggled at times to get enough to eat and enough variety, so Collette has actually eaten some meat. The one gluten intolerant person has struggled too, and is mainly living off rice, vegetables and fruit. There doesn’t seem to be huge availability of foods for people with dietary requirements, but as it’s a very poor country with lots of people living in poverty that’s understandable. There are no Sainsbury, Tesco or Co Op here!

This morning we dived the wreck of the Mitsio, a small trawler sunk as an artificial reef. It's covered in life! I have never seen so many lion fish in such a small area. There was a grouper, stone fish, crocodile fish, other colourful reef fish, scorpion fish and salps.

As I ascended with John, Jessica and Jance I noticed Sean, Jance’s buddy wasn’t with us. Jance didn’t know where he was, but the guide didn’t seem bothered. Once back on the boat we were greeted by Sean who had problems with his mask and baled out right at the start of the dive. The dive guide knew but Jance didn’t, and hadn’t looked for him for the whole dive! Shocking! We’ve been teasing him every since 😉

The second dive was on the Rosario Bench, a coral garden a fair way offshore. It was absolutely stunning with lots of massive coral fans along with a variety of other corals and sponges, a cute little puffer fish, cushion stars, squirrelfish, pipefish.

We came back to the hotel for lunch, and were very happy that the pizza oven had been fired up! As we weren’t diving anymore today I indulged in a couple of tequila sunrises.

This afternoon we were a group of two halves. Some decided to chill out at the hotel, while the rest of us were taken to the Sacred Tree of Nosy Be. It’s a huge Bayen fig tree planted by the Queen of the Saklava Tribe in 1836. It now covers around 5000 square meters, and is very impressive. We had to wear traditional Malagasy clothing, walk barefoot and step into the tree area with our right foot. People go to the tree to pray and ask the spirits for help, or as it was explained to us, to make wishes. They have to leave money or other gifts. The money apparently goes to the village elders, so eventually gets into the local community. A couple of us left, some ariary and made a wish; let’s see whether it works!

We were then given a tour of the local museum, bought some souvenirs, were given some coffee rum and challenged to solve some stick puzzles before heading back to the hotel.

I’m planning dinner, an earlyish night and looking forward to diving tomorrow 😊

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Photos

Ready to.emter the Sacred Tree area
We did have to take our shoes off after the photo.