Madagascar is an island we have often thought about visiting since my first encounter with Jaya, Indira and Boupen in Montpellier some 38 years ago. They would often talk about how much there is to see in Madagascar, from the national parks to the forests and the beaches and how rich it is in minerals. 

Hitesh’s love for documentaries means he has seen a lot of birds and lemurs endemic to Madagascar so when the opportunity arose to visit Madagascar this September we jumped at it to go and see this beautiful island and its wildlife in person 

It is the 4^th largest island in the world and is actually bigger than France. Initially we thought we would try and also fly to Mauritius for a few days but taking into account what we wanted to see and the time it would take we decided to concentrate solely on Madagscar. 

We had hired a 4 WD with a driver – a 4 WD is essential here as roads are pretty awful, and distances are long so it takes a long time to get from one place to another. Coupled with this is the fact there are actually very few roads so you end up going on the same roads. 

Despite having gold, sapphire , cobalt , bauxite and other minerals as well as pallisander wood and rose wood, it is the 10^th poorest country in the world.

The currency is Ariary (over 4000 Ariary to £1) so if you have £250, you are a millionaire in Madagascar. Before that they used to use Malagasy Francs and the old notes display both. Some of the villagers still use the old currency so if they tell you a price that seems a bit expensive , chances are they’re talking in old money and you have to divide by 5 to get to Ariary. 

We arrived in Ivato airport around 10.30 at night, having left home around 4.30 in the morning and it took another 2 hours to clear immigration and customs so by the time we got the hotel it was around 1pm. And we had an early start the next day as we were due to hit the road and go to Antsirabe. 

The traffic getting out of Antananarivo or Tana was something else but it gave us a chance to observe local life, the hustle and bustle and also take in the rice paddies to making bricks and watching life on the river, from bathing to washing clothes to fetching water.  

Rice is grown everywhere throughout Madagascar, we were told, solely for local consumption – they eat a lot of rice. When the clear the rice fields, the soil underneath is clay and this is then used to make bricks – we saw bricks being made everywhere again for local consumption. 

En route to Antsirabe, we passed a local village selling aluminium pots and pans in every other kiosk, another village selling only raffia baskets and lots of roadside stalls next to each other selling brightly painted toy trucks and lorries. 

Antsirabe grows a lot of fruit and vegetables we were told and we did see some strawberries but we didn’t stop for those and then we saw lots and lots of avocados and of course we had to stop and buy some. 

We finally arrived at our hotel around 2.30 only to find it was being renovated and no-one but the guard around! He managed to get hold of the owner and all was ok. We had a lovely big room. 

Antsirabe is supposedly the 2^nd largest city in Madagscar but doesn’t feel so large and is quite lively with a lot of pousse pousse drivers wanting to take you everywhere. It’s also quite safe to walk around in even at night.  

We wanted to visit the 2 lakes outside Antsirabe – Lake Tritriva is a natural crater lake and Lake Androikiba is a huge artificial lake and picturesque.

Of course everywhere you go, there’s always some children following you around asking for something little, some sweets, some pens . We didn’t have anything and ended up giving about £3 to them an extortionate amount as we didn’t have any small change. Lesson is to keep lots of change and also keep the 2 suitcases of old clothes we have brought handy! 

By the time we got back to Antsirabe it was already dark– it gets dark around 6.30 as soon as the sun sets and we needed to get to an ATM as our cash that we had taken out at the airport was depleting fast. It is a completely cash society – very few places accept credit cards and if they do they charge you a 5% surcharge.  The town wasn’t far and we got to the ATM only to find out most of them don’t accept mastercard. Luckily someone pointed us to the BNI Atm which does (also Soc Gen)

The next day was going to be a long 10 hour drive to Morondava – yet more rice paddies and we also stopped at a local market  

En route, we also stopped at a place where people were digging for gold literally

With Hitesh also trying his luck at it but without success. Mind you judging by their clothes, it hasn’t made the locals very rich either.

Meanwhile I was surrounded by these kids who wanted some sweets or something from me – I had earlier given some clothes to couple of the children and the word had spread- in the end they settled for a photo!

We passed lots of mango trees en route – not in season yet said our driver , and finally stopped for a late lunch at a scenic restaurant atop a hill where we had pasta and rice with vegetables. 

As can be seen the road is often shared with cattle and lots of potholes laso so by the time we got to the hotel it was already dark.  

The hotel Cap kimony was a beautiful eco lodge , only opened a couple of months ago, but a little out of town so we were disappointed we were unlikely to see the Morondova the town but things have a way of working out.