Fri, Sat, Sep 13-14 - The Journey Home

The Village next to our Hotel

We didn’t meet until  8 AM for breakfast, and then slowly organized our gear and left our hotel for the drive back to Morondava. 

Fano and David

We stopped briefly to enjoy the beautiful Baobabs and then drove into the coastal town and were deposited at a beach front hotel for a couple of hours

  to relax before flying back to Tana.   We got to the airport - every Malagasy airport has it’s own routine - here our baggage was thoroughly inspected, but we didn't have to pass through a metal detector! 

Lunch at the Airport

The flight was only one hour and when we arrived, we were informed that our old friend, the Au Bois Vert Hotel, was over-booked and we would be taken to another hotel for a dinner and a day room. 

View from San Cristobal Hotel

The San Cristobal turned out to be a snappy business hotel, perfect for a cleanup and final packing.  We had a last dinner with David who is flying home to Sydney tomorrow via Addis Abba, London, Singapore, and then Australia.

Tuvo, our nice driver, picked us up at nine PM and took us to the  airport.  We checked in, went through Security into the waiting area where there are many shops, which will only take US$ or Euros...no Madagascar Ariary!! (of which we have a fistful).  And the vanilla beans, which I was planning on buying as presents, were only sold as ten beans to a glass tube for 50 Euros!  A lifetime supply - ridiculous!

We took off on Air France at 1 AM for our ten-hour flight.  Bob and I fell asleep, thus avoiding the full dinner that was served!  We awoke over Italy and got great views of Rome and coastline, then the Alps, and finally France and the Arc de Triomphe. 

Italian Coast

Mont Blanc

Arc de Triomphe

We had four hours in Charles de Gaulle Airport- a very well-organized, well-designed airport with a nice mini anthropology museum, and more expensive shops than can be seen on Rodeo Drive!  We boarded our very comfortable (premium economy) Delta 777 at 3 PM and settled in for eleven hours of movies and meals, landing at LAX at 6:30 PM.  

We got through Immigration and Customs easily enough, but then, upon exiting the Tom Bradley terminal, entered quite a bit of confusion as LAX has changed their usual pickup spots for hotel, rental car, and long-distance buses.  There is no signage  as to what is where.  Dashing across traffic, towing large bags, is difficult enough when you know where you are going!  Finally a policeman told us where to stand and the Santa Barbara Airbus did finally come along.  There was quite a mob scene with everyone trying to maneuver their bags on the narrow walkway and get onto the bus.  Fortunately we had reservations as the bus was full and took over an hour to make the LAX circuit, but we finally took off and slept most of the way to Santa Barbara, where Hilary was there to kindly pick us up and haul us home!

Miss Maddie seemed unenthusiastic about our arrival and showed that she definitely preferred Hil’s lap to ours!  Oh, well!   We’re home and had a great trip.  We saw 150 species of birds, of which 107 were new to Bob for his life list.  Also, we saw about 25 lemur species, 2 tortoises, several Nile crocodiles, 2 mongooses, a tenrec, a fosa, and numerous geckos, skinks, frogs, and chameleons!   Madagascar is amazing!

Thu, Sep 12 - Birding Kirindy Forest

It got chilly during the night and we had to pull up the thick comforter that had seemed so unnecessary earlier.  We awoke at 4:45 AM, got dressed and stumbled over to the car park to meet Fano, David, and our driver. It was just getting light and the roosters from the settlement next door were in full crow.

Kirindy Research Station

We drove a few kilometers to the Kirindy Research Station, a collection of dorms, eating pavilion and labs.  The temperature was in the low fifties when we set out with our guide, Christian.

Crested Coua

We crisscrossed through a maze of trails, passing huge Baobabs standing in this dense forest, and seeing well some birds that we had just glimpsed before.  David used his tape to call out the White-breasted Mesite which we briefly saw in Ankarafantsika NP weeks ago. 

Frances's Sparrowhawk

They were a pair of lovely chestnut-backed birds with black and white streaks on the face and a speckled breast.  Then we saw a Red-fronted Brown Lemur sleeping high in a Baobab!  I don’t know how it managed to climb such a huge smooth-barked tree.

Red-fronted Brown Lemur

There are three species of Baobab (Adansonia  grandidieri, A rubrostipa, and A za) in this forest, but it is difficult to tell them apart (for Bob and me, at least) as they aren’t in leaf or flower.

Madascar Hoopoe

  Fortunately there is no commercial use (except tourism) for Baobabs.  When they are knocked down by a cyclone, for instance, they just dissolve into powder and disappear within a few years, leaving a hole in the ground; they are quite fire-resistant and so survive in fields that have been burned by farmers.

Our Fosa - related to Civets and Mongooses

It got warmer finally and we continued walking until 10 when we returned to the research station, and there, relaxing under a bungalow, was a Fosa (Cryptoprocta ferox), a civet-like carnivore, weighing between 15 and 20 lbs, scary looking, like a small mountain lion!  He woke up and walked right by me, over to a water tank, and started munching on something - stolen chicken?  We had seen signs warning us not to feed Fosas and to avoid them, but it was a thrill to see one so close.  He had ferocious teeth!

We were driven back to our hotel where we had breakfast next to the pool - the temperature now 95 degrees and me without my bathing suit!!@$## which I had left in Tana.  We napped and

reassembled for lunch at 1 PM:  green bean salad, then shrimp for the boys and cauliflower for me. 
 

Grey-headed Lovebirds

At 4:30 we got into the Toyota and drove back to Kirindy, and met up with Christian again . He showed us a group of Red-fronted Brown Lemurs right by the car park who were racing around.   Then he led us back into the woods as the sun set and the almost full moon rose beyond a Baobab.  

Narrow-stripped Mongoose

We had our torches with us which we used as it soon became dark.  Christian showed us several kinds of lemurs, including incredibly cute mouse lemurs which didn’t seem to mind having lights shone on them and continued licking sap from tree trunks. They are about the size of a small chipmunk

Mouse Lemur 

  We got back to the car park and found twenty other vans there for night walks - glad we got here early!   We returned to the Relais du Kirindy; I grabbed a shower and we joined David for dinner: smoked fish salad, chicken with gravy and ice cream.

I was trying to stay up until eleven when the plan was to drive back yet again to Kirindy and look for the Giant Jumping Rat!

Bob decided to stay home and sleep, but I joined David and Fano and we returned to the research station.  We sat staring into the darkness, and Christian walked around with his torch looking for eye shine.  This went on for a while as I dozed.  Finally at 12:30 we decided to give up - the full moon made it unlikely that the rats would dance around and expose themselves to the Fosa.  The rats, which weigh 2-3 lbs, and have rabbit-like ears, can jump 40 inches into the air, and only exist in this corner of Madagascar, so it was worth taking a chance on seeing them!

Wed, Sep 11 -Off to Morondava

Bob and I got up at 6:30 and had some yogurt, crepes, and coffee, and organized our gear. We’re going to leave a couple of suitcases here at Au Bois Vert as we’re only going to be gone two nights in Morondava.  Our two check-through bags were picked up at 8:45 and we met up with Tuvo, our driver from the first part of the trip, and drove over to the airport with David and Fano.  

This time I put my camera and binoculars around my neck as they had always caused my carry-on to be overweight (David would hustle me through so it wouldn’t be weighed).  This time, of course,  there was no one at the weigh station, so no problem!  

We had three hours until our flight to Morondava.  I bought a NYT and the tiny cafe supplied us with coffee and pastries.   After a while Fano and David consulted and decided that we should head straight to the Avenue of Baobabs from the airport and onward to our hotel in the Kirindy Forest, and therefore we should buy some more food as there’s no place to eat on the road.  So we bought zebu pizzas (not bad) and orange Fanta to hold us over.  (We have been eating so much, that a little starvation wouldn’t

too be bad!)

We boarded at 11:30 and took off early at noon and were served cokes and peanuts.  We flew west to the coast and landed at 1 PM disembarking into warm tropical air, a change from the cool highlands.

Coastal Highway

Fano found our Toyota Land Cruiser and our new driver and we took off east from the coast and  airport and then north on the highway to Kirindy.  This area is not very well developed and the highway is a single dirt lane! 

After 45 minutes we suddenly saw huge Baobabs,   the Adansonia grandidiera species.   We had arrived at the famed Avenue of Baobabs, a natural area where many baobabs grow among various villages and agricultural fields.  It was now 2 PM, and according to custom not the time to view the trees, but there were no tourists there and the sun had moved enough so the there were wonderful shadows stretching across the road, Plus zebu carts, and villagers walking along, creating a lovely scene.

We got out and walked the main stretch of trees, bought a beer at a stand and then continued on in our car.

Baobab fruit 

We entered the dry scrubby forest and drove for a couple of hours.  We started seeing a lot of traffic coming towards us and figured it was people from our hotel, dashing back to see the Baobabs at sunset - in a crowd - glad we stopped when we did!

We arrived at the Relais du Kirindy - a collection of huts modeled on the huts of the locals, but with bathrooms and beds.  Bob and I moved into bungalow #4 and unpacked a bit and relaxed.

#4

I took a shower and noticed out the back window a glowing red setting sun next to a beautiful baobab and dressed enough to dash out and try to photograph it!

We met up with David and Fano at the bar and had our usual Nosy Be dark rum and coke before sitting down poolside for a really delicious dinner of veggie soup, tuna-like fish with creole sauce and peanut ice cream!

We’ll meet at 5:30 tomorrow for an early walk, rest during the heat of the day, and then out before and after dinner for night walks and maybe see some of the wonderful critters of this area like the Great Jumping Rat!!!

Tue, Sep 10 - Back to Tana

After yogurt, croissants, and coffee, we loaded up and started back to Tana at 8 AM.  Dave spied an avocado stalls and asked to stop. 

He hopped out and came back with six fruit!   We continued passing vast agricultural areas with people stabbing their spades into the soil to till it, and others using buckets to  water veggies planted in foot-deep hole on the hillsides.  All the rivers seem to be flowing well so there is no water shortage and the soil looked particularly rich in this valley as the spring planting begins.

Brick-making - a popular enterprise

Aluminum crafts

Several towns along the highway specialize in different crafts, so Fano broke up the ride by giving us a chance to shop.  One town makes pots and decorations from aluminum.  Another makes fanciful wooden trucks, and one we particularly liked was a large stall of sissel woven animals and mats!

Sissel animals

We entered the Tana traffic mess, and Vincent, our driver, used his expertise to weave around the city using the by-pass and then switching to local streets when things got bogged down! 

He pulled into our home away from home, Au Bois Vert, about 12:30 and we were given yet another attractive room with many carvings and decorations. 

Stone carvings in our bathroom

We met for lunch at 1 PM and divided up two of Dave’s avocados which were perfectly ripe. I ordered zebu carpaccio, paper-thin slices of raw beef with a lovely dressing - yumm!   We had the afternoon off and relaxed.  Dave and Nancy are flying back to England tonight, and Bob and I will continue on for a couple of days at Monrondava, the location of the famous avenue of Baobabs!

We had rum and cokes, more avocados, shrimp and chocolate coconut ice cream, gathered for a group photo and said a fond goodbye to Dave and Nancy.

Mon, Sep 9 - Driving to Antsirabe

It was still drizzling when we went to breakfast and when we loaded up the bus and drove off up the mountain.  We are heading back to Tana with a stop overnight on the way. 

Vincent, our driver, stopped to pick up William and Olivia from their village as they are going to help us find a few species in a nearby marsh before we leave the area.  We stopped by a little settlement in what used to be marsh, but now is rice paddies and plots for other veggies. 

The inhabitants followed us as we looked for a Madagascar Snipe.  They looked wet and muddy, but were cheerful.  I can’t imagine their existence out here - tiny kids to adults running around barefoot, building paddy dikes, planting cabbages, living in small huts.

We walked a ways, found a flock of small birds which contained the Cryptic Warbler, a very plain little bird, but a new one.    Then David heard the call of the Pitta-like Ground Roller.  It responded to his tape but was very difficult to see through several layers of branches.  Finally it moved and we could see this lovely bird:  brown head with streaks, white throat, and a greenish back.  

We had to leave at this point and dropped our nice guides off and started driving NW.  As we moved inland the clouds broke up a bit.  The houses here are 2- and 3- story of adobe brick with small windows. 

Market Day

Fano said the kitchen would be on the ground floor and the cooking would heat the house.  Except for the highway we were on and a few streets in towns, there are few roads and cars. 

Everything seems to be done by hand - even cultivating the fields is done by men - the zebu cattle pull carts, but are seldom used to cultivate the fields - maybe because they might damage the complex paddy dike system?  Water has to be hauled up to the houses as does everything else.

We stopped at 1 PM and pulled into a nice motel complex where a local ethnic song and dance group was entertaining the lunch crowd.  Bob and I split a pizza that was surprisingly good. 

We continued driving - we can’t go too fast as this highway has potholes, occasional zebu cattle, men pulling wooden wagons of supplies in the road as there’s no other place to do it.  

We stopped for a break in a small town that is famous for its wood carvings.  Fano took us into one and down some steps to the workshop where several people were carving, polishing, jig sawing, etc.  They were very friendly and showed what they were doing.  The countryside elevation got higher and more beautiful.  This area grows most of the vegetables for the country and the elaborately terraced hillsides and valley were all shades of green and brown.

Just as it was getting dark - and definitely unsafe for driving - we pulled into the Palace Hotel, a very nice business hotel with excellent wifi in our rooms, allowing me to send out a blog post from the distant past!

I had a hamburger for dinner with a delicious chocolate lava cake for dessert.