Travelling in Madagascar

In the five years of their travelling together, they’ve visited almost all continents (Australia and Antarctica are still on the list); they visited orangutans in the Bornean jungle, hugged baobabs in Madagascar and fed flamingos on the coast of Aruba.

Describe your trip to Madagascar. Which landmarks did you visit and what does the island have to offer?

The decision to travel to Madagascar coincided with our interests mentioned above. We found two cheap tickets for May 2019 when the dry season started there. As already mentioned, biodiversity is one of the important factors for us and there’s plenty of that in Madagascar. We travelled for seventeen days. Vaccination wasn’t mandatory (well, maybe the current Covid-19 vaccination is), but we recommend antimalarials and diarrhoea relief pills.

Unfortunately, we had to adjust a large share of our trips due to safety reasons, as Madagascar is constantly being listed as one of the most dangerous countries. One shouldn’t wander around at night, so we organise all our transfers in daytime. In fact, the taxi driver might even refuse to give you a ride if they judge it to be too dangerous. We hired a driver for multiple days (either through an agency or directly in the street) and usually used Cotisse for long-distance travel. It’s a local transport service company using vans with a European-level of cleanliness, comfort and reliability. We strongly advise against renting a car, as the roads are in an incredibly awful condition, plus the local gangs tend to carry out armed robberies at night. We didn’t have any bad experiences ourselves, but we did “race” out of the national park one evening in order to get back before it would get dark; and that other time we travelled in a convoy accompanied by the army the whole day. We should also mention that, as female travellers, we didn’t experience any special trouble.

The above reasons were also why we booked our accommodation in advance. It just didn’t seem safe walking around the streets and looking for accommodation at night. Accommodations are poorly represented on booking portals, so we mostly looked for contacts based on the recommendations by Lonely Planet. Interestingly, breakfast is rarely included in the price, but there is a restaurant next to the accommodation where you can enjoy any meal.

The situation regarding safety can deter anyone from travelling to Madagascar, but if you take into account all the above guidance, then we believe there’s no reason to worry about it. What Madagascar has to offer makes up for all the risks.

We visited multiple national parks where we discovered various species of lemurs and visited Antsirabe, the capital of crafts and craftsmanship, after which we also visited the lake. We continued our journey westwards, towards the part that is the most reminiscent of Madagascar – that’s where you can find the Avenue of the Baobabs and is also where exploring the island on dusty red “roads” usually begins. Morondava servedd as a starting point for the Tsingy de Bemaraha National Park, a forest of sharp limestone peaks and impassable labyrinth of canyons, caves and tunnels, which, at first glance, seems like it doesn’t belong on this planet, not to mention you need climbing gear in order to explore it. In the end we also stopped in Antananarivo, the capital of Madagascar, where we learned more about the local culture and history and got an insight into the shocking, sad life of the inhabitants, marked mostly by poverty and conflicts.

Madagascar is famous for its plant and animal life. What did you manage to see first-hand? How is the protection of the rare species regulated? Is there more that could be done?

Its unique ecology has led to a lot of scientists to proclaim Madagascar as the eighth continent. It’s home to 5% of all the world’s known plant and animal species, and 90% of the plant species and 70% of the animal species are endemic to the island. One of these are the lemurs; there are more than 100 species living in Madagascar, and we managed to see about ten of them, such as the ring-tailed lemur, which can be found in the animated movie Madagascar. We also stumbled upon giant rats, a fossa, miniature tree frogs, interesting insects (e.g. hissing cockroaches) and snakes. One of the best areas for animal watching is the Ranomafana National Park, which is also home to a large number of chameleons, even the largest (and, in our opinion, the most beautiful) species in the world. Interestingly, there are no venomous animals in Madagascar.

As for the plant world, one of the first associations would probably be the baobab tree. These trees can be found in the western part of the island. The most attractive is the Avenue of the Baobabs through which a red road winds, and we visited both the Holy Baobab, which is 900 years old, and the Baobab Amoureux. In the local language, the word baobab means “roots of the sky”, stemming from the legend that says God created the baobab as the most beautiful tree in the world. But the devil was so jealous he turned the baobabs upside down, so he could look at them as well. And their canopies really are reminiscent of roots.

In order to conserve the animal and plant species for the future generations, the local government designated protected areas. The needs of the people living in these areas were incorporated into the plans; the money goes to the local communities who use it to buy seeds, grow trees, build schools and dams, which help them with field irrigation. National parks provide an opportunity for employing rangers and guides, strengthening the presence of tourism and, consequently, helping establish restaurants and accommodation. Sadly, deforestation and poaching are still very pervasive issues, as political crises divert the focus from protected areas, and foreign donations for the conservation of animal species decreasing. Consequently, this has earned Madagascar the second place on the list of countries with the highest number of endangered mammal species.

What’s the country’s culture like? Are the locals friendly, how did they welcome you?

Foreigners are widely welcomed, as hospitality is sacred to the locals. Foreigners do have to accept what is offered to them because otherwise they risk offending the locals. We noticed this a couple of times; we fell asleep on the bus and the driver politely woke us up when we arrived at the right station. An experience that probably stands out even more is the taxi broussa one. It’s a low-cost van transfer service; it’s a van that only leaves when it’s full and doesn’t have any regular stops (people get on and off wherever it’s convenient) or schedules (the local island way of life is best depicted by the phrase “mora mora”, which means “slowly, slowly”). Despite there being three seats in a row, there were at least five to six people sitting there. Passengers were seated with us only when there was no more space elsewhere.

Even though we felt great, we were somehow surprised by the country’s multiculturalism – sadly, in a negative sense more often than not. The first settlers were the Austronesian peoples (who brought their language with them) and they were later joined by the Africans and Arabs. The population is divided into two main groups. The Merina live around the capital and have Asian roots. They’re aristocrats and support the caste system. Other ethnic groups are lumped into Cotieres (which literally means “those who live on the coast”) and have African roots. They often suffer discrimination by the Merina. Consequently, the women straighten their hair to hide their African curls. Our hostess (a Merina) told us her niece married a black man and her family disowned her. The Merina often communicate solely in French, and we noticed on the buses that they sang only to foreign music, wore prestigious clothes and often studied at universities abroad (mostly in France). Multiculturalism is reflected in religious practices; they perform a dance with the dead (Austronesia), regularly offer gifts to their ancestors (Africa) and believe in fate (vintano; Muslim religion).

Did you also try any of the local specialties?

Of course, along with religious rituals, the cultural mix is also reflected in food where one can feel the French, Asian and African influences.

The French influence can be felt mostly at breakfast, as there’s no scarcity of baguettes. We also ordered coffee and tea to go along – both locally produced. Coffee lovers will be disappointed, but the tea was top-notch – we recommend the black vanilla tea.

The locals eat rice three times a day. The verb “to eat” in the local language literally means “to eat rice”, and words that describe the growth of rice are the same as the ones that describe a pregnant woman and the birth. An alternative to meat is misao, fried noodles that we ate many times as they’re prepared in many ways – with vegetables, with various types of meat, in a soup etc.

Petra also tried the traditional holiday dish, the zebu. It’s local humped cattle. It’s nothing that would stand out when it comes to its taste, but it’s regarded as a specialty because most people don’t have access to meat and can only afford it on special occasions. Consequently, most of the local food is plant-based, so vegetarians definitely won’t have a hard time there. It could be a little more difficult for the vegans, though, because legumes aren’t that widespread or present.

As a fun fact, we’d also like to add that when it comes to celebrations, there’s a lot of alcohol involved, mostly rum, and it’s expected of you to get drunk till you drop (the local minister doesn’t warn about excessive alcohol consumption being bad for your health :) ).

Did you have any silly experiences on your journey?

Despite experiencing a road rage in a thirty-year-old car and the fact that we avoided a potential armed robbery by a local hang, we’d like to point out that we didn’t have any bad experiences and we hope that safety reasons don’t deter you from travelling there. With some common sense, you’ll be perfectly ok.

Luckily, however, there were quite a few silly adventures; the one that has stuck with us the most is our trip to Lake Tritriva. It’s located about 20km from the city and we got a flat tyre soon after we set out. Our driver was (obviously) trained, since he changed the tyre in two minutes – which was still enough, it seemed, for the entire village to come and see what two white girls are doing around here. On our way back, our spare tyre blew as well, which meant a new one had to be brought from the city. And that one didn’t last long either, but we were luckily already in the city, so we stopped at a random house, where they gave us a fourth one. Spare tyres are a staple equipment at every household, since only 11% of roads are paved in Madagascar.

And the day wouldn’t have been perfect without two young girls addressing us by the lake. It was unfortunately already getting dark, so we ran down the stairs towards the lake. Petra tripped and fell, and one of the girls said: “Miss, do you know mora mora? Slowly, slowly.”