Awesome Red Island!

[xyz99]

What an amazing place!! I always wanted to visit it for the lemurs, but it has so much more to offer. And your pics and descriptions are wonderful, and they really show us the place. Thank you!

I thought too that stick insect are small...but this one looks to be a giant. Unless it's just the picture? More or less, how big was it? I could not find in the 1st pic...even knowing it was there

[Guidoriccio11]

@@Atravelynn Thanks. Here a picture which describe the insect of the picture:

 

 

Sadly I've never been in USA :-/ But I have in program to go next year for 3 weeks (still to decide the destinations)...

 

@@Livetowander I've been in Ethiopia and the economic/social situation is very similar. I found a lot of similarities as well!

 

@@xyz99 the insect was really big. I can say 70cm... It looks really like a branch!

[Atravelynn]

The legend to the stick insect was helpful. That thing is really camouflaged! I can see why you barely believed it. Good eyes for your guide!

[Guidoriccio11]

- DAY 10 -

 

We woke up in our great lodge and, after packing, we left the Isalo toward South!

After 1 hour we arrived in the first town along the road: this town simply didn't exist some years ago. This is Ilakaka!!!!

These area was a desert until 1998, when the sapphires were discovered, so A LOT of people, hoping in a better life pour out here, building poor house of wood or plate. Together with them arrived criminality and unscrupulous businessmen. My uncle went there 5 years ago, and the guide didn't even stop, saying it was a too dangerous place for tourists. Now the situation is a bit better. We could stop there and on the main street are built shops and other proper building. They organize tours for the sapphire mines, in order to have a new touristic income.

Anyway, we arrived at the town. First thing we sow was the little river close by. Dozens of people were filling the place, sifting the stones, hoping to find something of precious. They are obviously not organized: just people moved here to find their luck. In fact on the main street we could see a line of stands where people was evaluating the stones that these people found and, in case, paying them cash. I can only imagine how many frauds happen there!!!! But these guys who evaluate stones are obviously only a middle level: we sow some people there, well dressed and with the suitcase who buy the stones from them. They are easly spotted because, as our guide said they are mostly east european, nigerian or arabs.

Anyway we stopped there and we were included in a tour of the main mine. Well, it was not interesting at all from a scenic point of view, since the mine is just a big hole. But we understood a lot about their way of life: the mine is propery of an arab guy now and the people working in is paid 1$ per day (it is clear that if you don't work for any reason, you are not paid). Obviously without any insurance or even a real job-contract.

This is what we sow:

 

Ilakaka

Good luck!

Working for 1$

Shouldn't they be at school?

At least working at the main mine and at the river is better than working down here! (Notice the T-Shirt given by a politician to be elected)

 

We visited also a Sapphire shop (obviously owned by the same guy), and I was also really interested in buy one stone, but the risk to be cheated was too high! BTW was weird looking at small stones costing more than 100€ when just ouside, for the same stone probably the guy who found it was paid 1 or 2 (and probably for the whole sack).

 

Anyway, we left this town, which summarize well the Malgasy economic situation, and we continued our tour.

After Ilakaka the landscape changed. We found more trees and actually started the "Spiny forest". First thing we noticed, were the big Baobabs!!!!

 

On the top of the tree there is a bird!!! (Just to notice the dimension)

The road was quite long. We crossed a little town and an area where people produce rum (we were not interested to stop).

Just for info: here people is, in average, even more poor then in the North...

 

Before Tulear we stopped at the Antsokay Arboretum: this small park was created by a Swiss guy who moved there and you can really notice the Swiss cleaness, order and efficiency. For a while you don't feel to be in Madagascar at all...

The small tour was interesting. We had infos about some trees typical of the spiny forest biosphere and we spaotted also some chamaleons, birds and enormous spiders (they create their net between 2 trees and their body is big like an hand).

 

We had also a lunch there: delicious.

 

Then we arrived in Tulear, and finally we sow the sea!!!!!

Incredible: everything is wet. It rained, and this was defenetly uncommon in this period!

The city in itself is not fascinating at all: a big town which survive because of the harbour. Half of the town is now in the hands of Chinese trading companies which created huge compounds in the city outskirt. The center has a colonial main road, but is completely destroyed by the new buildings. Our hotel is a real "city hotel", so different from the forest lodges we started to be used ahahaha

Together with the rain, also mosquitoes arrived. So we were a bit concerned for malaria, even if in this part is not so spread.

After a small rest in hotel we went out, visiting the central market and the seaside area (not memorable). Here we found a lot of souvenir shops with interesting stuff. We'll be there at the end of the trip to waste the last money!

I went also to a sapphire shop in front of the hotel where finally I got my stone!

For the dinner we went in a great restaurant owned by an italian guy. We ate so much fish and so delicious and so fresh and so cheap! It was a really great dinner!

 

 

Then we went back to hotel: from tomorrow... seaside lifestyle!

[Livetowander]

Interesting to read about and see photos of Ilakaka, a modern day boom town.

 

Also interesting to see the Swedish effect on Madagascar!

[xyz99]

@@Atravelynn Thanks. Here a picture which describe the insect of the picture:

 

P1011153_2.JPG

 

Sadly I've never been in USA :-/ But I have in program to go next year for 3 weeks (still to decide the destinations)...

 

@@Livetowander I've been in Ethiopia and the economic/social situation is very similar. I found a lot of similarities as well!

 

@@xyz99 the insect was really big. I can say 70cm... It looks really like a branch!

 

Wow! that's a huge insect...your guide had a good eye

[Alexander33]

@Guidoriccio

 

I am late to this report, but not too late I see. Good! I have long wanted to visit Madagascar, but the logistical problems of where to go within a limited amount of time as well as some challenges in intra-island travel have always led me to push a decision until later in life when I have more time to dedicate to travel. I hope that day comes, indeed.

 

Thank for your a fascinating and insightful report. I'm enjoying it very much.

[Kitsafari]

what beautiful landscape pictures you had of the valley in post 29.

 

and the lemurs - they're gorgeous! so great to have them around you while you are lunching.

 

I too couldn't see the stick insect. Master of disguise!

[Marks]

Really nice artwork in the next-to-last picture.

Impressive baobabs, too!

[Guidoriccio11]

- DAY 11 and 12 -

 

We woke up and we had breakfast in the restaurant overlooking the main street of Tulear. This is quite funny because we can observe the normal life of the city in the early morning, made mainly by people going to the main market bringing every kind of stuff with them... The winner is the butcher who bring the bloody meat using a pousse-pousse ahahahah (don't envy the guy who's sitting there next)...

We pay the hotel and we meet our guide and driver. Our stop is the seaside in Ambatomilo!!!!

Out Tulear in the north we find again the spiny forest and the remains of the old mangrove swamp which is sadly now almost comletely cutted off.

The road toward north is large and sandy, and it is under construction by the chinese in order to allow them to connect the harbour of Tulear with the mines under their control in the central Madagascar. This road is going to be super-useful for the people living in the poor countryside, BUT from a traveller point of view, this will allow a lot of visitors to reach the western coast, and probably the sublime natural savagery of this place will be corrupted by "all-inclusive resorts".

Anyway we are lucky: the road is still under construction, so reached a point, we are forced to turn left and find the old road. This is a problem because the costal tiny road is well hided in the spiny forest and even our driver get lost: after asking to some people and crossing some very small villages finally we got the right road.

It is very very sandy, and the 4x4 is completely mandatory (even with this we got stucked twice).

We met a taxi brousse on our road and I cannot imagine how much time and effort can take for the complete path...

 

 

Around 14.00 we arrived at Salary Bay, not far from our destination, and we decided to stop to eat something. This place is not really a village: it is a bay with a big dune where there are 2-3 small resorts/lodges. We stopped at "Francesco's resort", a beautiful lodge built and owned by an Italian guy who looks like Robinson Crusoe. We ate superwell and we felt the isolation from the rest of the world.

Just an anecdote: Francesco proposed us to cook some fish, so he asked it to his wife. She answered: OK, I go to bring the fish... And took the boat to fish! ahahaha

 

The restaurant of "Francesco's"

 

Getting close to Ambatomilo we started to see some strange baobabs, of a type we never sow before. Another reason to come here.

 

 

Finally we arrived to our resort. We are once again lucky! Because we discovered that we are for these 3 days the only guests!!! So we have all the resort for us. We can even decide the time for dinner. It is quite late to go to the beach, so we just got a walk and we went to eat, watching a superbe sunset on the Mozambique Channel. Then we enjoyed our chalet, sleeping listening the waves...

 

The day after we are full of energy, and in the morning, after breakfast we got a long walk on the baech. We feel soooo lonely. The water is perfect, and the beach is completely white... We only met few fishermen on our path who watched us like aliens.

 

 

The beach was full of crabs...

 

 

Back to our resort we had some swim and then we ate some lobster at our "private" restaurant.

 

 

In the afternoon we had a walk into the spiny forest around the resort, alongside with our guide and the owner.

 

Back to the resort we could enjoy a perfect sunset

 

[michael-ibk]

Glad to see you continue. What a beautiful place - and what a delicious-looking Lobster!

[xelas]

If anyone will ask me for a perfect sugar white beach destination, now I have the answer!

[Guidoriccio11]

@@michael-ibk yep, for a reason or another I always delayed the post...

[Kitsafari]

@@Guidoriccio11 that;s a stunning beach - and the food looks so good and fresh. i just love love the photos of the baobab trees - they are so other-worldly and so surreal and yet beautiful.

[gagan]

Only one word ..awsomeee...

[Guidoriccio11]

- DAY 13, 14 and 15 -

 

We woke up quite early, because the owner of the resort, the day before told us that the day after it would be the perfect weather for a boat-trip toward the small island in front of the beach. In fact there is no wind and the sea is placid.

So, after breakfast, we rent some snorkeling stuff, and we met our "commander". The boat is a very-traditional malgasy thing rented by our lodge from the local fisherman village ahahah!!!

So we started and by wind we arrived to the small island.

 

Our cruise-boat

The island in itself is a peak of the barrier reef, with very cutting stones. Since the tides are quite strong here, the only part always dry is a small peak with some grass. This is interesting, because the local fishermen consider this part a kind of sacred, so there are some rituals to perform: not using the shoes and put some "gift".

It is a strange feeling, because since the lodge where we are is quite new, this visit has been mada by few tourists before us. So we felt like real explorers!!!

 

Then we come back to the boat and we got closer to the barrier reef, where we snorkeled a while. I didn't visit much barrier areas in the world, but I didn't get excited. Yes, we sow a lot of fishes and corals. But just I think I'm not into it...

So we went back to the lodge on time for the lunch!

 

The afternoon we stayed on the beach, looking for shells, walking, swimming... Beachlife!

 

We had another great sunset, the last one! Tomorrow we leave!!!!

 

After dinner we took advantage of the full moon to walk on the beach. This was one of the most surreal experience of my life: we didn't use any light, but the moon was so shining, and the beach so white that we felt as in daylight: WE COULD EVEN SEE THE COLORS!!!

We had a long walk spotting a lot of crabs and enormous hermits looking for food during the low tide.

Back to the chalet, we slept, setting the alarm at 3 o'clock. Why? Because at that time the moon was setted, and we could watch the milky way and the Magellanic Clouds...

 

The day after we woke up and we packed our stuff. We met at breakfast our guide and the driver, who enjoyed as well the beach even if they stayed a bit a-part from us...

 

We said goodbye to all the staff (which was almost a private-staff) and we travel through again on the horrible (only for the bottom not for the landscapes) road toward Tulear.

 

 

Little digression: In my life I never felt a feeling of extreme isolation like here: the only 2 guests in a place with no Internet and no phone and only the white sand and blue sea in front of us. The staff was around but sometimes (usually after lunch) they disappeard, leaving us comletely lonely, only with the sound of the tides and some birds (not much). Even the 2 excursions, in the spiny forest and on the island, were easly and organized "at the moment", completely customized. A nuclear war could have been happened in the rest of the world, but we would have notice only 4 days after...

 

The road back was a bit boring. The only interesting area was before the city of Ifaty, where there are some cotton fields. Looking at this black people harvesting cotton singing, my mind come back to the Confederate States in the late '800...

 

We stopped in Ifaty, which can be considered the "holiday city" for the (rich) people of Tulear OR the old French retired (sad to say, but often along with young malgasy girls). We ate good seafood as well for lunch.

 

We stopped in Ifaty also to visit a natural reserve: The Reniala NS.

At the gate of the park we got a local guide and we choose to visit the "small path" of 1h. Also because we were a bit late and we considered we already sow a lot of spiny forest before... WE WERE WRONG! Well... we still enjoyed the 1h visit, but the reserve is wonderful: it contains different flora compared to the other part of spiny forest and we sow a lot of fauna!!!! The guide was very good.

Here what we sow:

 

Another type of Baobab

Petter's sportive lemur

Terenc

You can belive or not, but this is a 5 years old baobab!!!!

Close to the Reniala Reserve there is also a Tortoise Reasearch Center where the Radiated Tortoises are saved and handled. These reptiles are, in fact, endangered by poaching and wildfires...

 

Running coua

So we left Ifaty and we reached Tulear (same hotel) and for dinner same perfect restaurant of 4 days ago!!!

We ate a huge fish for such few amount of money!!!

 

For the dinner our guide and the driver were "forced" to join us (obviously we paid) for a great last dinner! We took a bottle of champagne!

 

Next day we had the internal flight back to Antananarivo in the morning and then the international overnight flight at midnight to Paris and than Milan...

Sad, but happy, we just finished our dinner when...................................... the our guide received a call!!! It was our tour operator which told us that the internal flight was just cancelled !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

 

PANIC

The flight was supposed to be at 8.30 in the morning and AirMadagascar cancelled it at 22.00 of the day before!!!!!

Brainstorming:

• train? there are no train
• other flights? no other flights: only AirMadagascar, and they cancelled all the flights for the day after
• private flight/helicopter? NONE
• Taxi brousse? OK, it was a NO option becuse it would be never arrived in Antananarivo on time

Only solution to find an "empty" driver who had to come back the day after in Antananarivo to meet new guests and (after a good amount of money) to drive us the next day. Our guide made a simple calculation: to be in Antananarivo at 22.00, we have to start at 3 o'clock in the night!!!! So, we went to the hotel, set the alarm and our guide and the driver went to all the other hotels to find the solution telling us: "you wake up at 3. Someone will drive you, in a way or another!". OOOOOOooooookkkk!!!!

 

The alarm rang and... our guide was there with a driver!!!! We said goodbye to our guide and the old driver and we begun a new adventure.

 

It was a psichedelic trip in the night crossing back all our stops of the whole trip... So, look the arboretum there, and this is Ikalaka! Look... the Isalo... and so on... Around 10 o'clock we stopped at the Anja Reserve, where the new driver met another driver and said to us: "I'm tired, sorry, you'll continue with him"... OOOOOoookkkkk!!!!

 

So, swapping car, we continued the trip. At least this new driver spoke english and we could discuss a bit...

We crossed the Ranomafana road, then Finaratsoa and the highlands cities. We only stopped 5 minutes in Antsirabe and then go and go toward Antananarivo.

 

We finally, in the dark, arrived at 21.30 at the airport. On time for the open of the gate. We said thank to the driver which we nicknamed "Robocop" and destroyed, ate something and took finally the plane (which was late!!!).

 

It seems hard, and it was, but now when I remember this "problem" I smile and I remember it as a mithological event. This is at the end the point to travel: have adventures!

 

So, this is the end of our trip. It was great, interesting, full of nature and wildlife... But beyond, we could explore a complex political and social situation and understand that it is easy to "solve problems" speaking from the West. But looking them "on the ground" a lot of sides rise...

 

Hope you enjoyed this report even if I took sometimes to finish it!

 

P.S. Our tour operator was refounded of the tickets by AirMadagascar and, since the driver for the way back costed less, we got some money once at home!!!

[michael-ibk]

Wow, that´s what I call a nerve-wrecking last evening. But it all worked out nicely for you in the end. Thoroughly enjoyed this report, it was wonderful seeing all the scenery and the many one-of-a-kind animals Madagascar has to offer. Thank you for sharing.

Edited July 3, 2016 by michael-ibk

[AfricIan]

What a nightmare end @@Guidoriccio11 and I'm so glad it all finally worked out. I've thoroughly enjoyed your account of the trip which has brought back so many memories of our visit - thankfully although Air Madagascar changed the timings of our flight (again, the day before), it did take off when they said it would and was, to our surprise, very pleasant.

 

Thanks again for a great report.

[Super LEEDS]

Fascinating report, thank you for sharing.

 

What came first, the brick or the furnace?

[lmonmm]

This has to be one of the best reports I've read in a while. I've always wanted to go to Madagascar....just never sure this older solo female could handle it Your descriptions were amazing and I loved all the digressions. You totally did that beautiful island justice. I still dream of going and this made my dream real again. Thank you

[Guidoriccio11]

Thank you @@lmonmm. It is a really intense trip under every aspect. I'm not a fan of solo travelling. I really need a mate to share emotions and memories once back.

But if Madagascar is really a dreamtrip for you I think you can manage for sure to get there! I still think a driver and a guide are really useful...

Thanks for your nice words... :-D

[Livetowander]

I love the tenrec!

 

You handled the adventure at the end well, but I would rather do without that kind of 'excitement'!

Edited August 22, 2016 by Livetowander

[lbamber]

I am planning our trip to Madagascar in Oct 17 - and have loved reading your report - many thanks

[Atdahl]

@@lbamber, I am jealous. Madagascar is the top destination on my list now. Please feel free to share lots of details in the trip report we hope you will post .

 

Alan

[xyz99]

What a crazy last day/night...yes, it makes for a good story now, but I'm sure it was not at the time

Oh boy...Madagascar...definitely on my top list now, thanks to you and your TR which I enjoyed immensely. Thanks for the journey.