Tue, Aug 27 - Flight to Tana??

David said that we could sleep in today or meet for breakfast at 6 AM and drive up the mountain for more birding.    We both were feeling a little exhausted by this time and got up at seven and leisurely dressed.  

KBHZ admiring a Day Gecko

It was cloudy and starting to rain here so I imagined it would be  worst up in the park.  We had a pleasant breakfast inside as it was blowing quite a bit on the terrace, and then organized our gear. 

David Bishop

The others returned, having experienced quite a bit of rain, and we all packed up and drove down the mountain heading for the city of Diego Suarez.  

The old city is quite picturesque with crumbling French-style buildings and views over the 12 mile wide Antsiranana Bay. 

We were driven to a lovely restaurant overlooking the bay and had a great lunch of shrimp skewers, beer and ice cream.  

Lovely lunch

Fano said our delayed flight to Tana would take off at 4:30 PM, so he wanted to get us there by 1:30, as he doesn’t have  much faith in Air Mad, and wanted to allow lots of time.  We checked in and set for a long time in an outside waiting area.  Eventually we were scanned, all our carry-ons thoroughly inspected, and we sat in the inside waiting area.  We could see our bags being carted to the plane, taken off and put on another cart to be wheeled around the other side of the aircraft.  We boarded, had a pleasant flight to Tana, landing after six.   We waited for our luggage.  Dave and Nancy’s was on the carousel, but the rest of us got nothing!   It seems the plane’s luggage compartment was full, and they just took ours off!!

Air Mad finally said the suitcases were all still in Diego Suarez.  David and Fano decided that in order to get us back on schedule, Tuvo should drive us to Perinet tonight, and Fano would stay behind and somehow get our luggage.  Finally at 8 PM we all piled into the van with a bag of panini sandwiches, chocolate, bananas, and water and took off.  Tuvo drove for over an hour just getting out of the sprawling city of Tana, around countless traffic circles, and finally on the highway east.

We encountered endless heavy truck traffic, as they prefer to drive at night.  A huge amount of material is hauled from east coast ports up to the capital of Tana. The police at one point led a caravan of 53 very large tanker trucks roaring by us.  The glaring oncoming headlights and Tuvo constantly having to maneuver around big potholes made for a jarring four-hour ride. 

We finally pulled into the lovely strikingly-modern hotel, Mantidia Lodge, at 12:12 AM!   Nancy kindly give me some underwear and a toiletry pack from Air France so I could survive.   I showered and we collapsed into a soft wonderful bed (unfortunately surrounded by a 12” wooden platform that sent RRZ sprawling on the floor at one point.