After a noisy night at Chez Maggie, we left early for our long drive to Bekopaka. This is by far our longest drive day. In the wet season, the road is impassable and closed. Now, in the winter (although it hit 38 degrees today) the drive can take 8, 10 or 12 hours depending on…

We returned to the airport for a noon flight to Morondava. A turboprop ATR 42. It is a competitor to a Dash 8. 20 rows of 2+2. We have business class because of the larger luggage allowances. Economy only allows 10kg. Business is 30kg. We don’t need all that but our bags are ~15kg. The…

We had a nice breakfast with our new lemur friends Charlie the Ringtail and Gaston the Common Brown. Charlie really needs to be named Julian. Dave got a few good cuddles with Gaston. He was the friendly one. Apparently Charlie sometimes bites. He liked Kris, or at least the pool water on her arm yesterday.…

This morning we said good bye to the Isalo Rock Lodge and the amazing scenery of Isalo. It was a short 30 minute drive to our first stop in Ilakaka. This is one place in Madagascar where sapphires and other precious stones can still be found on the river shores. Although most are now found…

After a nice breakfast we headed back into Ranohira town to pick up our guide. Mammy joined us and we headed into Isalo National Park. There are many trails but the main circuit takes you up onto the massif and along a nice cliff area. There are incredible views and it is pretty decent trail…

A group of lemurs is called a conspiracy. Today we saw about 5 conspiracies or 5 family groups. We visited the Anja Reserve after breakfast. It’s a small 36 hectare park abutting the mountains and has about 450 Ringtail lemurs in about 18 family groups (conspiracies). It was a much easier trail system than Ranomafana,…

We had a later start today because the drive from Ranomafana to Ambalavao is just over 3 hours. That’s 140km on those curvy roads but still short by our recent treks. We did meet a bunch of Zebu (cows) on their way to market. A large Zebu can cost one million MGA ($400). That seems…

We had another early start as these lemurs get up, eat and then snooze. So we have to get there after they wake up but before their morning naps. This was our view from the front door of our bungalow as we headed to breakfast. Wow. Ranomafana park was created specifically to protect two types…

We got to sleep in all the way to 715 today. It did feel good. I think we are finally getting over our jet lag. We toured Antsirabe city which means we drove through town to get to our requisite tourist traps. We saw a toy shop which makes miniature cars, rickshaws and bicycles out…

After a nice breakfast we visited Analamazotra (Indri special reserve) for a much easier and much shorter walk to find more lemurs. There are 97 species of lemurs in Madagascar, having split off from the monkey family prior to the island breaking off from mainland Africa. We also learned that lemur comes from the words…