Awesome Red Island!

[Atravelynn]

"We discussed about it already with our TO the day we left." Wasting no time I see.

 

Your comment on 3 weeks for the north tells most of us that tradeoffs must be made or more than one visit must be planned for Madagascar. Most visitors have about 3 weeks (or less) for the entire trip.

 

Now for you malaria comment--is it a worse threat in N. Madagascar than other parts of Afica.

 

Aye aye is a sought after species but seems to require a commitment that might undermine the other parts of the trip.

 

Your thoughts are appreciated, along with all those photos! Thanks!

[Abena]

@@Guidoriccio11 - what an interesting trip report! I'm enjoying both the photos and descriptions of the animals you saw, and also the commentary on Madagascar and its people and places. The decaying colonial structures - I'm guessing this is common across Africa, certainly here in Ghana it is the same. The people just don't have the money to keep these wooden buildings in good condition. They must have been rather lovely in their time, all negative elements of colonialism aside. Your photos of the lemurs and chameleons are great! How interesting that the one species can't be kept in captivity. Also enjoying the flora shots. Thanks for your post!

[Guidoriccio11]

Sorry for the delay. I had a busy period last 2 weeks. Anyway:

- DAY 4 and 5 -

The next 2 days were quite oriented on the visit of the main cities of the highlands. So, defenetly no wildlife in this period, since the fields around the city destroy all the old forests. Anyway it was interesting to explore how the malgasy people lives and, from a photographic point of view, the central markets are a gold mine, since you can find thousends of facts and situations worth of a pic.

So, we left Andasibe and we followed the road back towards Antananarivo, where we finally turned south meeting the famous RN7. The road starts to get up and the landscape changes a lot. Trees are more sparse and we start to find the red dust. Obviously also the weather suddently changed, and we left the wet rainy clouds for a dry clean sun. We start to meet more and more people on the road (this area is the most dense populated) using every kind of vehicles to move. Beyond foot and some kind of woody cart (working only downhill) the most popular transport is the "Taxi Brousse". It is actually a some kind of collective taxi but is often a private car/van/truck filled completely (and often Beyond since you see people plugged outside) of people who wants to go somewhere. 90% of the time they are old old old Renault or Citroen stuff who broke several time during the way. If this happens, all the people go down and everyone, with his own knowledge, helps to fix the problem. The incredible thing is that they fix it most of the time, and the car still goes. The point is that you know when you start, but not when the trip is ending. Beyond this my opinion is that, if a tourist has A LOT of time and is used not to plan anything, it would be a great occasion to understand the malgasy way of life and in only one trip you will find dozens of new friends!

On the highlands we crossed several villages, often made by 10 or 12 houses whith their peculiar architecture. Our guide described us that every ethnic group in Madagascar can be recognized by the way they build the house. For the materials, they use bricks. And on the way we found several "brick factories": obviously they are NOT like European ones. Each brick is handmade and then is burnd with the others in big furnaces (which simply is made by the bricks themselves with a fire setted).

Highlands architecture

Brick factory

If there is something I will remember forever of the highlands is the smell of the burned bricks. It is something which is everywhere.

Little digression: Everything in Madagascar is handmade! With the exclusion of what the French left behind, every new stuff is created by who need that stuff. Examples: if you need a sickle, you MAKE a sickle; if you need a sieve, you MAKE it (usually with a plate pierced); if you need a table, you build a table. There are no factories at all. And everything is used until is broken, then fixed and used again until is not possible to fix it again. If you brake a radio, you'll never buy a new one: just find at the market a similar circuit and sobtitute a component. This 2 habits have several consequence including 1: NO TRASH. Well, obviously you have trash, but the Madagascar trash is REAL TRASH: is made of objects you can never use again/fix. Also the big cities have little dump areas. This is something different!

First stop is the little town of Ambatolampy. This city is famous because there are 3/4 "factories" of aluminium. Basically it is used to create pots and pans: every pan of Madagascar come from here! And, as I said also these are handmade in real terrible work conditions. People works for 12 hours in contact of hot sand and with no protections for the liquid aluminium. Beyond this the dust is everywhere. When I went out (after 30 minutes) I had my camera covered of thin black dust. I don't want to imagine the lungs of these people. And they do this for a very basic salary (which is probably better than stay all the day in the fields).

Ambatolampy factory

Ambatolampy factory

Ambatolampy factory

Ambatolampy factory

We ate also here the usual Zebu steak, then we moved to the main city of the area: Antsirabe. The impact of the city is quite gloomy. In fact the central area kept the French heritage, including the big colonial hotel, the main square and the railway station. Our guide said us that this during the French period was a prosper city, where french VIPs come for the thermal baths. But now everything is in decline. There are no more train, so the station is abandoned. The square and the main road are dirty and ruined, while the Grand Hotel is still in activity, but so bad maintained and managed which our guide decided to let us sleep in another hotel...

Antsirabe main station

Antsirabe Grand Hotel

In parallel, outside the center, a "new" town rised. And it is here now the center of the activity. We visited a "factoriy" where there are products made by Zebu horns.

Zebu Horn factory

For dinner we had a pizza (!!!!) then we went to sleep in this new made hotel. Temperature got really low in the night, so the morning after we had breakfast close to the fireplace...

The day after we moved in another important city: Ambositra. Here there is the production of everything made by wood. So also here we visited a "factory" of hand carved wood. We made some shopping, because the quality is really high!!!

We could also visit the center city where was a market taking place.

Wood carving

Butchery

City Center

Then we arrived in the last (and biggest) city of the highlands: Finarantsoa. Here we met a political rally, since in this period there were municipal elections.

Political little digression: one of the main problems of Madagascar is the political situation. After the French, they never had a real "dictator" like in middle east, but a series of corrupted prime ministers who stole as much money the could, ruining almost all the economy of the nation. This is happening also now, with the whole political arch which is more or less corrupted, and defenetly not interested in solve the enormous problems of Madagascar. Beyond this, since the overwhelming majority of the people is poor and not-educated, also these kind of "elections" are a farce. Local politicians litterally BUY the vote just giving the people a t-shirt or some food. Or maybe giving promises they can never respect. Our guide said that the most used "trick" is that the politician just say that he will put asphalt, and transports and give finally electricity to the village. If someone ask "where you take the money?" he answer: "I'm in contact with rich people of Europe who want invest here!". But then, magically, these "investors", who never existed, disappeard.

So we witnessed these loud buses with the propaganda come in the village with all the people happy because they will receive food, drink or something to wear (or they are just happy because something "new" is happening in the monotonous village life).

In Finarantsoa we visited the central market wich was huge and full of photographic opportunities:

Then, at the end of the day we left the highlands, heading again in the (wet) rainforest coast: Ranomafana NP...

[Atravelynn]

The Antsirabe Grand Hotel looks very grand indeed from the exterior. What a shame it is crumbling from within, to the point of having to change your lodging plans.

 

Love the smile on the lady with the sewing machine.

 

"If there is something I will remember forever of the highlands is the smell of the burned bricks." Scent and memory so closely linked. Hopefully your plans to return to Madagascar will revive that memory.

[ellenhighwater]

Great photos. Especially partial to all the chameleon photos, gorgeous panthers there.

[AfricIan]

I'm really enjoying this @@Guidoriccio11, its bringing back so many memories. One word of caution if anyone is considering using a "Taxi Brousse" though - they are incredibly dangerous way to travel,especially out of town. During our trip we saw many accidents involving them, two very serious including one where the vehicle had left the road & rolled 50-80 metres down the rocky hillside - we didn't hold out much hope for the occupants!

[Atdahl]

@@Guidoriccio11, great report! The photos are fantastic and details are great for those of us thinking about a trip some day. Can't want for another installment. I am super interested in visiting Madagascar but am a bit intimidated by all the logistics. Maybe we should get a SafariTalk member trip organized .

[kittykat23uk]

@@Atdahl if you stick to the route south of Tana with the side trip to Andasibe it's pretty straightforward. I had no trouble organising a guide and car to take me, and I saw nearly all I was hoping to see. Obviously the northern part is more difficult logistically and there are some highlights further west and south that are also off the main route, so if you wanted to go to Tsingy, Kirindy and Berenty for example then you are looking at some more complicated logistics which would require internal flights.

 

I would definitely be interested in a Safaritalk group trip some time.?

[elefromoz]

@@Guidoriccio11, Im continuing to enjoy this really different report, I don't know that Ill ever get to Madagasca so its nice to see it through your eyes. I understand your sentiments about being inclusive with the driver and guide, maybe though, as you said , they just prefer their own company and peers and regular food, especially after a full day with their guests.

[Guidoriccio11]

@@Atdahl with the help of a TO you can defenetly find your perfect route for the center-south. For the north as I said before is a bit more tricky, and also as @@kittykat23uk said you need maybe several internal flights. THIS IS A PROBLEM since Air Madagascar is not reliable at all. And having 2 or more internal flights could be a real nightmare for a perfect planning.

I'll go there for sure in the future, but as a first time there, the RN7 is just perfect

[Atravelynn]

"Air Madagascar is not reliable at all. And having 2 or more internal flights could be a real nightmare for a perfect planning. I'll go there [far north] for sure in the future, but as a first time there, the RN7 is just perfect"

 

Very helpful @@Guidoriccio11. Thanks for this great and informative report.

[Guidoriccio11]

- DAY 6 -

 

We arrived to the Ranomafana NP in late evening, and we stayed in one of the several lodge/hotels of the area. Immediatly we noticed that this is the most visited park due to the density of accomodation buildings which lie in a row on the main road. Obviously is raining...

Our hotel is not the best, quite anonymous, but clean and we slept ok.

The day after we woke up early since it is planned the tour of the forest!

We met our guide who had breakfast with us and then in 10 minutes by car we arrived at the entrance of the park. Here we sow a crowd of local people: they are the park guides! Our TO already booked in advice one of this guy (another good point to have a TO) so we simply met him there. He was able to speak english.

We entered into the park and we had an easy trekking crossing the river. It was cloudy with some rain...

 

 

 

Starting in the early morning theoretically should give you more chances to see lemurs with few people around you. But what's happen is that once the lemurs are spotted, the guides (and their guests) go straight there. This is why I didn't appreciated in deep this park. After 2 hours there is a real crowd around you looking on the top of the trees, and when the lemur moves, all the people follow it (imagine a movie star with the paparazzi around it)... Said this, we spotted several lemurs even if (probably also because of the crowd) they stayed quite far on the top of the trees. So the photo opportunities were quite scarce (adding the rain on the camera, the dark of the forest and the subject always in backlight).

Anyway, this is what we sow:

 

Golden bamboo lemur

Milne-Edwards' sifaka

Milne-Edwards' sifaka

 

Plus we sow some common brown lemurs and gray bamoo lemurs.

 

The path was quite complex because the area is hilly and so you go up and down following the lemurs in the mud. I sow some people fall

So, at the end was an hard day ahahah

We got some rest from a "point of view" from where we could see the rainforest from the top:

 

 

In the early afternoon we come back closing the circle in the park (there are anyway 3 or 4 other paths).

 

 

Back to the hotel we got some rest, and since I felt really cold and a bit sick, I didn't have a tour of the "town" with my girlfriend.

 

Little digression: The town of Ranomafana is simply the houses of the people working for the park with families and children. This situation is something we sow in all the other "turistic" areas of the country. Also because transports are so complex, the workers build their home as close as possible from their workplace, creating a new village. The most evident was in the lodge of Andasibe. We were quite far from everything, so the waiters, chefs, guides etc... of the hotel built a "village" close to the lodge which grew. So we met children, dogs and even shops there! The question is: if the lodge fails? Probably they will abandon the village and move somewhere else...

The other side of the coin is that basically the touristic areas are the natural parks. So these villages, growing, erode the territory (agriculture) so, the goal in itself why the village has born. This is sad, because only a little part of the people really understand that if the park disappear, also the village will disappear. The majority is thinking how to survive at the end of the week, so they just don't consider the far (but how much far) future.

 

When my girlfriend come back we had dinner in the hotel. Not that good... And after, with another guide, we had a "night walk" in the park. Well, it was not really INTO the park because it is forbidden. So we just walked on the main street spotting things on the forest "outskirts". We sow the usual sleeping chamaleons and... A MICROCEBUS! Or mouse lemur. Of which obviously I don't have pictures

 

 

Back to the lodge I spent an hard night... in the toilet... Well, this is something that can occur here!

 

Little health digression: If the African experience is based on Namibia or South Africa, this is defently not you will find in Madagascar. I already wrote about political issues or transport problems, but now I am speaking about hygenic standards. If in Namibia I felt safe in drink water from tap, I cannot say the same for Madagascar. The aqueduct is in the same situation of all the other infrastructure SO... always drink from bottles. Also for toothbrush!

We always slept in the Top choiche of lodge and hotel (also because it is cheap) and the standard of hygene and cleaness were perfectly ok, but be aware to choose a budget accomodation, because the gap can be high.

For eating everything was fine also because mainly you'll eat meat or anyway cooked stuff. The only time I risked was in Ranomafana. In fact the dessert was pineapple with crème Chantilly. I supposed the creme was divided from the main course, but this was not. So I decided to eat it anyway. It was not a good choice

 

[Guidoriccio11]

I just give my experience. I had just 1 flight from Tulear to Antananarivo the last day (to catch the international flight) and they cancelled it the night before (22.00) not giving even a reschedule for the next day.

I spoke with my guide and the TO and they say this happens quite often. They also said this went worse and worse in recent period. I was just considering that you cannot rely on internal flight (obviously some of them are perfectly on time), because if you have a strict schedule you can miss something.

In the north of the island where maybe you need 2 or 3 internal flight this can create a mess. I will go there for sure, but into the planning I have to include this possibility.

I cannot find similarities with strikes or weather problems in Western countries seriously. Because here you can have more flights per day, or simply choose the train or the car (with proper roads).

[kittykat23uk]

@@Guidoriccio11 Sorry to hear you were unwell. That happened to me as well. Did you see many birds when you were there?

[Treepol]

@Guidoriccio I'm really enjoying your report. That's an interesting way to break up a Madagascar itinerary by habitat and I can see how well it worked for you.

 

The photos of Madagascy life are very interesting as are the lemur and sifaka shots.

[Guidoriccio11]

@@kittykat23uk luckly it was nothing of strong. Only the evening and the day after I was fine...

For the birds, you mean in general in Madagascar or only in Ranomafana? In general I sow several nice birds. I have created a post with the (few) pics I made --> http://safaritalk.net/topic/13806-birding-madagascar/

 

In Ranomafana I don't remember important sightings. Only some eagles close to the river...

[AfricIan]

@@Guidoriccio11 Ahh, Madagascar sickness - I remember it well (and not in a good way)!! It does seem pretty much a given that you will succumb to some extent at some stage.

 

When we went we'd also heard horror stories about Air Madagascar so arranged out trip with just the one internal flight. They changed the scheduled time the day before but other than that it was absolutely fine, leaving on time for a very smooth flight to Tana. The other side to this was the experience of a couple we got talking to in the hotel about halfway through the trip – their theoretical 1hr hop from Morondava to Tana the previous day had turned into a 12hr tour of Southern Madagascar: Morondava to Tulear to Ft Dauphin to Tana with nothing to eat other than a couple of snack bags of peanuts, nor were they allowed off the plane at the stops!
I'd be reluctant to book anything will less than a couple of days gap between internal flights. I do agree with you though that the island is well worth going to.

[Guidoriccio11]

- DAY 7,8 -

 

We woke up well in Ranomafana and we prepared our stuff for leave the rainforest. We made the whole back trip until Fianarantsoa and then we started to descend the highland meeting a more familiar landacape: the savannah one...

The only "lunch stop" is in Ambavalao. This little town is well known because of a "paper manifacture" which we visit. The point of this paper are the flower insertions. The final result is quite nice, so we bought some souvenirs. The place is now also an hotel and restaurant, and we ate here.

 

 

Then the road into the plain become a bit monotonous, and we immediatly noticed that the villages become more sporadic. And also the traffic reduced a lot!

The highlight of the day is the stop at the Anja Reserve. This park is THE PLACE to meet the lemur Catta (the ones famous of the cartoon-movie Madagascar). In fact, after parking, we choose a local guide and after a short trail, we met them!!!!!!!!! They are adorable and not scared by humans. So we could get quite close, taking great pictures. It was funny to watch their interactions and the roles of the individuals within the community. Only pity is that was not children period...

 

And now... A long group of pictures!

 

It was a great place, so defenetly you cannot miss it!

 

We left tha Anja and continued towards South. Finally the sun was really warm!

We left the main RN7 road following the direction for the Andringitra area. The gravel road is quite bad, and the 4x4 is defenetly necessary.

The area is surrounded by big rocks. In someway it reminded me the Namibian Damaraland. The trip was quite long, and after 3 hours we arrived at our destination: the Camp Catta. This is a beautiful lodge just at the basis of the Tsaranoro massif: a big vertical rock quite impressive.

We found our chalet which was huge: theoretically 5 people could live there!

We took a short rest when we heard something walking on our roof and jump. So we went out and... 5 lemur catta were on the trees around us!!!! And when the darkness arrived, they went to sleep in the tree in front of us! What a great place!

The dinner was average, and then we went to sleep quite early.

 

The day after we woke up early because we already organized a small trekking (only morning) in the area. Obviously was not enough to explore this great park, but we enjoyed it. The guide was really competent and spoke perfect English. He was young and, as he behaved, we thought he was a kind of "smarter" than the other guides we met before. He has a good future I hope.

Anyway we walked into a small forest where we spotted some chamaleons and endemic flora, then we stopped to a natural pool, where we could put out foot into the freezing water and then we arrived at a small (poor) village in a valley.

This is what we sow:

 

 

 

Then we had lunch at the camp and we left.

Next stop is the Isalo NP. Probably the most important and famous of the area. The day after we disovered it is also une of the first National Parks of Madagascar and also the better organized from a touristic point of view.

The road toward it is not memorable, just straight (our driver for the first time asked to stop for a while because was sleepy). Just the area approaching the part is interesting, with a lot of strange rock formations everywhere. The landscape is even more dry...

We stopped at the town of Ranohira, where there are all the departures for the park, to meet the guide for tomorrow. This also was good using a TO: the day after we already had the guide, while the other tourists had to stop at the Info Point to choose one and to fill the bureoucracy.

Close to the sunset we arrived to our lodge, which is also the most luxury of our trip: the Jardin du Roy. I have to admit that the place is stunning, 5 stars defenetly. We had wifi and drinkable water. And, for dinner, foie gras and champagne! We felt in colonial period!

After dinner we had a walk outside the lodge taking advantage of the full moon. Then we had a really confortable sleep...

[AfricIan]

Great views of Andringitra @@Guidoriccio11, although it was on our original itinerary we had to drop it to give us some respite from the endless travelling so it's good to see what we missed - from your account & photos it's a real shame we missed it out!

[Guidoriccio11]

@@AfricIan actually for a 16 day trip, usually the Andringitra is left apart. We discussed about this with the TO and we "sacrificed" 1 day on the seaside to visit it and... defenetly it was a good choice. The lodge was awesome (even if reports of this year say that it has downgraded for some problems among the owners) and you feel isolated since few tourists can find an accomodation here.

Defenetly if you go there for another trip it is worthy to visit. Maybe, if you like, 3 days. So you can explore the surroundings!

[Hads]

Thanks for this TR @@Guidoriccio11.

Great Lemur pics - thankyou

[Marks]

I really love seeing/reading about the culture and people in this thread, thanks to your insights.

Beautiful photos, of course!

[Guidoriccio11]

- DAY 9 -

 

Sorry for the delay! :-D

Well. The day after we woke up early and we had an enormous delicious breakfast. We could also surf a bit on Internet (even if I hate beeing connected when I travel). Then we met our guide and we left the lodge towards Ranohira, where there is the meeting point with the park guide.

Once we met we started the trek following a very clear path. Weather dry and warm.

First part of the path is a long stair which allow us to enter into the long canyon of Isalo. The morning sun is perfect for the rocks around us.

 

 

Our guide is quite skilled and gave us a lot of infos about the geological, natural and cultural aspects of the area. In fact into the rocks around us there are the graves of the notable people of the Bara tribe. First animal we met... is an insect: the stick insect! When the guide found it and showed us we barley belived it! We were used of small sticks in Europe, but this one was a real branch of the bush! And was so adapted and well done!

 

Try to find it!!!! :

 

 

And this is the "head", notice the eye: the dot almost in the center od the picture:

 

Then we found the plain, with a typical savannah atmosphere. We found there little trees, similar to small baobabs (but they are another family!):

 

We reached a nice viewpoint from where we could see the canyon:

 

 

From here, using a path, we went down into the canyon... and we discovered the water!!! In fact some small rivers create a completely different biosphere compared to the surroundings. Creating also some nice natural (cold!) pools...

 

After a small break there, we went out, meeting again the dry area...

 

We met then another steep canyon, with a good view:

 

We spent the rest of the morning going down until we reached a "camping area" organized with stone tables where people can also stop to eat.

All the organization of this trekking was made in order to be here at 12.30 in order to have lunch. In fact some other people was already there waiting for us and cooking our lunch. A king service!

So we just set at the table and they served us.

 

 

And then... Around us shown off the lemurs!!!! Don't know why they concentrated here: for sure because of the trees. We thought the tourists gave them food, so that's why they are attracted, but this is not true because for sure they don't eat meat or cooked stuff. I didn't see anyone eating "men food"...

So here what we sow:

 

Red fronted lemur

Red fronted lemur

Catta lemur

Verraux's Sifaka

We also sow the Sifaka in the typical side-jump movement, but no pics, sorry!

 

After lunch and staying with the lemurs, we continued the trekking, having a round-walk which touched some other natural pools:

 

 

We went back in the afternoon, when our driver finally picked us up.

Tired, we arrived at the lodge at 17. And I tried to jump into the swimming pool... for 5 seconds. Then was so freezing that we went in our chalet and chilled out before another great dinner.

 

By the way this is our chalet and room: in this part of Madagascar is extreme luxury!!! But cheap if compared to similar services in South Africa or Namibia!

 

 

 

 

[Atravelynn]

You are bringing us all creatures great and small, including the stick insect. I admit I could not find it in the wider shot. The closeup with the prominent eye was easy to spot. Lovely, lovely lemurs. All those striped tails in the tree don't look real. Anja Reserve--noted!

 

Some of your scenery is causing flashbacks from a trip I just returned from. The colorful rock formations are similar to the Badlands of South Dakota, USA.

 

The Paper Manufacture is quite the art form. Gorgeous work.

[Livetowander]

I'm not sure how I missed this report previously, but I'm happy to have found it now @@Guidoriccio11. Nice job.

 

I loved your description of arriving at the airport, people recognizing their luggage with screams of joy, LOL.

 

A lot of the photos of the people and landscape remain me of Eritrea.

 

Another (expensive) option for seeing the North of Madagascar is to go by cruise ship which can eliminate some logistical worries.