What a unique experience. Incredibly lovely people living for the most part in unimaginable poverty. Mangroves, forests, deserts and oceans, and some pretty cool wildlife – whales, lemurs, chameleons, lemurs, ghekos, lemurs, dolphins, lemurs, flying foxes and lemurs. Did I mention the lemurs?!
Mandrare River Camp – now this is what I call camping.King Julian.Crossing the river to the sacred spiney forest with some of the locals.The local people clearly thought we were mad taking so many photos of lemurs. It’s like getting out of the car in England to take a snap of a squirrel.A dip in the Indian Ocean after a walk over the sand dunes. The Mandrare River Camp staff had come with us and set up an amazing posh picnic for us next to the dunes.Shh. We’re hiding.After a lesson in making fire with sticks, local villagers came and showed us their traditional performance as we sipped our cheeky gin sundowners.Charter flights; the only way to travel. Of course, it’s not the only way, but given the unreliability at the time of commercial flights, this was definitely a bonus. And hey – it was a lot of fun!Deep sea fishing for tuna.Salama! I don’t think I’ll ever stop being amazed by how friendly and happy people can be, even when there’s no electricity or running water.The ancient and beautiful baobab tree.Flying foxes. Or vampires.Boating through the mangroves…… to beautiful walks and more picnics.Manafiafy Beach and Rainforest Lodge – what a treat!This is the main national road from the south to the capital. We were told the EU had given funds three times to the government to build a proper road….Antananaviro – the capital city.
cheeky gin travels 