Ryan's Journal

The Madagasar trip is primarily a nature trip, but I also acquiesced to Audrey’s request to include some of the craft workshops along the way. This morning we started out in a rock shop, with one of the salesmen hounding us about a good price he could offer on a pendant that Audrey had made eye contact with for more than six seconds. We left there in a bit of a rush and moved on to a workshop where they were making items out of zebu (oxen) horns. The process of boiling and cooking the zebu horn in order to make it pliable was a stinky one that had me questioning what we had gotten ourselves into, but as the artisan started cutting and polishing it into a spoon I actually moved from being mildly nauseous to fully impressed – the final product rivaled anything you would find in an art gallery in the US.

Our last stop was my favorite – the artist at the workshop cut up cans and bits of scrap metal to make finely-detailed miniatures. He demonstrated the process for making a miniature bike tire, which involved a tiny piece of a tin can to act as the wheel frame, a tiny piece of a spring to act as the hub, fishing wire as the spokes, and medical tubing as the tube. Bending, threading, and soldering those parts together into a tire that was barely two inches across took him a couple of minutes, and the fully-assembled bike showed an equal amount of attention to detail for the handlebars, frame, chain, etc. Final price for this tiny piece of art was less than $10 US. I bought two little cars from him (one of which is pictured below) that are actually fridge magnets – my first real souvenirs in more than nine weeks of travel – setting me back a grand total of $2 each.

From the magical toy emporium our route was south, and we spent the vast majority of the day driving to Ranomafana National Park. We stopped briefly in the afternoon for a coffee and a bathroom break – when we asked to use the bathroom we were led out of the back of the restaurant, down a flight of stairs, past a cage containing two chickens, a duck, and a goose, and up to two open doors. Madagascar is renowned in the guidebooks for its dirty bathrooms, and while we have been spared that horror thus far, Audrey’s first words upon entry were “Oh my God, it’s a hole in the ground”. And that’s what it was, quite literally a messy hole in the ground. In a very gross way, we have now been informally certified as genuine Madagascar travellers.

Today was the first day without lemurs in quite some time, but we’re meeting our guide at 7 AM tomorrow morning for a hike through some of Madagascar’s most pristine rain forest, so a new streak of lemur sightings should begin shortly.

After we said goodbye to Anjajavy and our plane returned to Tana, our always-smiling driver Desiree was waiting to meet us outside of the airline’s offices. Shameless plug for Faniry Rent-Car: we got a great car and a better driver.

The plan for the next eight days is to drive south along National Route 7, which goes from the capital past several national parks, ending 570 miles later at the town of Toliara along the coast. The start of that journey today took us about 100 miles, past rice paddies, small markets, many cows, people on bike/foot/rickshaw/anything-that-moved, and at one point to the town of Ambatolampy, which is known for its metal casting. We paid the equivalent of $2 to see a group of men in a hut melting scrap aluminum and casting it into cooking pots. They made fifty pots per day, retail for each pot about $8, barefoot and in shorts while molten metal was poured inches from their toes. I’ve probably spent too much time in this journal writing about how lucky everyone in the US should feel to have the benefits that we don’t even realize we have, but seeing these guys slaving over their cooking pots was the millionth reminder that being born in America was a very, very lucky occurrence.

After leaving the metal casting, the trip continued through pretty scenery until we reached our hotel for the evening. Much merriment was had when we attempted to order off of the French menu, with each of us getting a meal that was completely unexpected – French lessons will need to continue. Audrey also ordered a margarita from the menu, and the waiter had to check the drink list to figure out what was in it – never a good sign, although whatever it was that he ended up making was a strong pour, and she fell asleep quickly after we returned to the room.

Audrey has taken to calling Anjajavy “Fantasy Island”, which is about as apt a desription as one could want (aside from the fact that it isn’t an island, but work with us on this one). During our time at the resort we were surrounded by dancing lemurs, tropical birds, and beautiful beaches, a staff that prepared incredible meals for us, and our accommodation was truly special. Karma continues to be good.

Yesterday we had a couple of activities planned, the first of which was a boat ride to Moramba Bay. The bay was scenic, with baobabs perched on the edges of uplifted coral islands, turquoise blue water, and flocks of birds roosting in the mangroves. The end of the boat trip provided time for snorkeling among colorful corals and with more than enough fish to keep us occupied in the warm waters, and I swear I heard a whale singing during a few of the many free dives along the reef bottom.

After our return from the boat trip, lunch, napping, and lemur photographs were followed by a late-afternoon exploration of one of the two caves in the reserve. The cave was located beneath massive uplifted corals and filled with big stalactites and stalagmites, and much to Audrey’s liking was also home to big spiders and tiny bats.

We returned from our hike in time to catch the end of lemur tea, and then to see a pre-dinner dance performance from members of the local village. Normally a dance wouldn’t be my type of thing, but in Africa anything musical tends to be both impressive and one of the opportunities to interact with the local folks in a less touristy way, and this performance was no exception. The lodge manager’s kids joined in the dancing, after which we went for dinner and were informed that a special meal had been set for us in the garden. We were led to a single table surrounded by candles and hanging lanterns, and for once this non-romantic guy managed to treat his girlfriend to a romantic meal.

Prior to our departure this morning I was asking Cedric (the manager) for help in identifying a couple of birds I had photographed, and he actually asked if he could purchase two of my photos for use in promotional material for the resort. Whether he really wanted the photos or was just trying to do a nice thing for a guest, it was a neat gesture that made me feel good, and knocked the cost of a few drinks off of our bill. Now I’m writing this entry from a four-person plane 6500 feet above the ground – my brother would not be a fan of all of the shaking and bouncing, but it’s a super-fun way to see Madagascar from above. When we land we’ll again meet our driver Desiree to begin our land journey south, over what will hopefully be decent roads through more of the land of lemurs.

For reasons that no one seems to understand, the Anjajavy Resort operates in a time zone different from the rest of Madagascar, so we either got up at six or seven in the morning, depending on whether you reset your watch on arrival or if you refuse to partake in their cunning mind games. Audrey’s one rule is that she must have coffee before I can rush her off to start the day’s activities, but as soon as her cup of Nescafe was gone I got her out of the door and off on the “Five Coves” trail, which is along an amazing coast and past five secluded and beautiful beaches. The return loop went through mangroves filled with dinner plate-sized crabs that mostly hid in tiny mud holes, and thankfully today not a single one of them chose to attack me.

Following the hike we got back to the resort in time to enjoy a late breakfast on a patio overlooking the sea – Madagascar now rivals South Africa for my favorite bacon. A nap, some snorkeling, another hike under the blazing sun (Audrey wisely opted out of that one), tea with the lemurs, and a night hike completed our schedule for the day. All of the day’s activities were good ones, but the lemur tea in particular is one that everyone should find a way to enjoy at some point in their life – sitting in a garden with juice and cookies while little furry animals leap Evel Kinievel-style through the trees above you is an experience that even the grumpiest of sourpusses would have to admit is a pretty cool way to spend an hour.

4:30 wake up yesterday to fly on a private plane to visit a destination on the northwest coast called Anjajavy. This resort sits on the beach with a 550 hectare private reserve surrounding it, and was called out in our guidebook as being a “best of” spot in Madgascar (something the resort apparently realizes, based on their prices – ouch). The plane ride here was scenic, with the mountains of Madagascar rolling along below us until we arrived at the “Anjajavy International Airport”, an open air hut with a thatched roof and room for perhaps twenty people to stand inside. The resort itself is beautiful – the water is turquoise blue, the sand is bright white, the villas are all on raised platforms and made of rosewood, and the animals also show up in large numbers to enjoy the scenery and amenities.

The highlight of the place is the five o’clock tea, which is served outside and coincides with the time that the brown and sifaka lemurs apparently like to visit the garden. Just prior to tea time Audrey made a sound best described as a yelp and ran outside, where a sifaka was leaping and dancing across our balcony. Having now seen them do the sexy dance, both of the girl’s trip requests have officially been fulfilled. During tea a steady stream of lemurs came through the garden, with lines of brown lemurs walking along the ground with their tails high, sifakas leaping kamikaze-style through the branches, and a few baby lemurs making short practice jumps before returning to their spots hanging onto their mom’s bellies.

In addition to the dancing lemur tea time, I also got in an afternoon hike under the blistering sun where a huge bat flew out from an overhang, just missing my head, and parrots, lizards and lemurs made less distressing appearances. After dinner Audrey and I went on our own night hike, finding one lemur and many more bats, before we got to the crab-covered beach. The crabs froze like deer when the flashlight was on them, except for one little brown one who took offence and proceeded to chase me along the beach for perhaps twenty or thirty yards – the “Jaws” theme was playing in my head as the angry little bugger zig-zagged at me repeatedly out of the pitch blackness before eventually moving off to find other victims to terrorize with his vengeful little claws.

Another day, more lemurs; like the elephants in Africa, I don’t think it will be possible to tire of these furry little creatures. Today’s stop was the Mitsinjo Private Reserve, which borders the national park and is a joint effort between someone and someone else (both of whom are probably very important, but I was distracted by singing lemurs) to, among other goals, plant three million native trees and create connections between currently-isolated stands of forest, thus allowing the animals more freedom to move around. In 2013 they replanted something like 500,000 trees on 7500 acres, so the effort seems to be making real progress.

Our hike today started with the indri lemurs singing in the forest nearby, and we stumbled upon the talented lemurs munching leaves in the trees above us. The guides went to great lengths to tempt them with some local plants – wildlife etiquette is a work-in-progress here – and finally found one willing lemur who climbed down and put on a brief show of close-up leaf eating for the assembled group before disappearing into the trees with a few powerful leaps. While the guides were trying to lure them lower, Audrey and I very much enjoyed craning our necks up to watch the panda-like lemurs feeding in the tree tops, and occasionally launching themselves from tree-to-tree-to-tree in massive leaps. As noted previously, it’s not a sight (or sound, since their songs are so haunting) that I would soon get bored of seeing.

After a morning of lemurs we asked the driver to take us back to the capital, partly to get ready for our early flight on a tiny private plane tomorrow, and also because driving on the highways at night in Madagascar is an activity that is almost universally described as a terrifying ordeal that will lead to death in the worst case, and brown shorts in the best case. Since we were interested in neither of those things, we made sure our departure from the park got us back into Antananarivo well before sunset.

Every animal has a distance that it will allow people to approach before it gets uncomfortable, and it’s both good etiquette and better for wildlife viewing when that limit isn’t exceeded. The first lemurs today were the uber-pretty sifakas, and based on our experience they require about four feet of personal space. Maybe less. While moving slowly to photograph one from thirty feet away, two more climbed down the tree next to me and started eating leaves; I am going to like Madagascar a lot.

The good karma on this trip continues. The haunting call of the indri lemur (best comparison: imagine a humpback whale’s song, but in a forest) was echoing through the trees when we picked up our park entry permit, and we then embarked on a bone-rattling drive into Mantadia National Park. The drive was followed by a hike, which began with a significant amount of time walking around while the animals hid, but then the long dry spell was abruptly ended with a magical moment. The sifakas suddenly appeared right next to the trail, with a black-and-white ruffed lemur above, and a group of indris leaping through the trees a short time later. Audrey was spellbound as the tiny beasts sprang thirty feet through the air from tree to tree to tree – given the dense brush and uneven ground, had they wanted to they could have left us completely in about five jumps, but instead they chose to munch leaves next to us. Happiness was abounding.

All told we found five species of lemur today during a morning hike in Mantadia and an afternoon hike in Andasibe (bamboo, black-and-white ruffed, sifaka, indri, wooly). Not bad for the first full day in Madagascar – 27 more to go.