Welcome back to the Madagascar blogs! I'm not even halfway through our trip - so you have many more stories to look forward to. If you missed my blog about the Tsingy, I posted it on Christmas Eve and you can find it by scrolling down the page to older posts.
Once we left the Tsingy, we headed south to Réserve Forestiére de Kirindy, a private forest reserve that is a center for research and sustainable logging and forest management. It also happens to be one of the few places where you can try to see a
fossa, the largest predator in Madagascar (yes, they are lemur predators). We went hoping to see a fossa, but really we went because the place sounded like it was loaded with cool lemurs, birds, and other fascinating wildlife. Our original plan was to spend two nights here, but upon arrival we realized the place was a total rip-off. Not in terms of the forest, wildlife, or guides....but the food and lodging was insanely expensive and we simply didn't bring enough cash with us for two nights there (no one takes credit cards in Madagascar so you have to visit ATMs and travel with lots of cash). Had we dropped this kind of money elsewhere in Madagascar we would have had a pretty nice room. Here the room was fine, but it was what we would expect for about $20 a night in this country and they were charging double that. Ergh. And the food - one dinner was $20! Eke! Anyway, they got away with these prices because there was no other competition
and the wildlife is amazing so folks pay to stay. While I was busy grumbling about these prices, I happened to walk outside onto our little bungalow's deck, glance to my side, and discover that I was staring into the eyes of a fossa. I immediately decided that it was time to stop grumbling and get my binoculars out for some wildlife watching!
This male, and oh boy was it a male, was hanging out on the cool cement slab under the bungalow located next to ours. We were super close and he was totally unfazed by our presence, so we were able to get some really great views as well as photographs.
Fossas baffle me. I can't describe them! They are the size of a lynx and they look like they are part cat and part dog. But this is Madagascar right? Evolution dished out a lot of weird and wacky wildlife here - so fossas are quite normal in their wackiness. I did a little research and found out that these predators are closely related to the mongoose family, but they are in a separate family called the
Eupleridae family or the "Malagasy carnivores." From what I can gather, scientists don't quite know what to do with Malagasy carnivores - so despite all their obvious biological differences, they lump them into one biological family and call it good. How odd.
We stayed with the fossa for as long as he let us stay with him. We watched him roll around on the concrete, get up and saunter around the camp (great views of his bum and the reasons why we know he was a boy), and even drink water from a puddle by the camp's kitchen. Clearly this fossa liked the area around the camp and it sounds like fossas are commonly spotted there. What luck for us!
Our first plan at Kirindy was to head out on a night walk so we could see nocturnal lemurs! We had a fantastic guide who understood the importance of silence during wildlife walks and he seemed interested in the species and in helping us spot as many as we could. His English was good too - so we were able to learn a lot from him during this walk under the baobabs and moonlight.
There are six species of nocturnal lemurs in Kirindy and we saw four of the six. The red-tailed sportive lemur (top photo) was the species we saw the most often - we also heard them and saw them during the day hiding in trees. The bottom photo is the fork-tailed lemur and you can see that it is licking sap, its primary food source, off this tree. Our guide had a bright light that allowed for great viewing with binoculars at night, but forget photos. They suck. My memories of these animals, however, is strong and I was thrilled to get some fantastic views of tiny little fuzzball nighttime lemurs. We also saw a grey mouse lemur and the fat-tailed dwarf lemur, but only managed to get super crappy photos or excellent views with binoculars. Night time walks also allow you to hear these species which are quite vocal and really neat to listen to.
Other species we spotted during the night walk included huge spiders, geckos, lizards, and a baby snake (unknown species). Once we were back in the camp we sat down to an insanely expensive and crappy dinner that didn't really matter because we had just seen so many fantastic animals! And the wildlife sightings continued when a giant jumping rat appeared on the scene just outside the dining area! Don't freak out - these are not your average rat. These critters are huge and seriously cute....check out some photos of them here:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Malagasy_giant_rat. They also happen to be the most endangered mammal in Madagascar (
http://animaldiversity.ummz.umich.edu/accounts/Hypogeomys_antimena/). Who knew? Everyone, including us, thinks about lemurs and how they are impacted by slash and burn agriculture - but this funny little rat (that looks more like a rabbit) is the most seriously endangered on the island due to humans habits.
We slept well that night, serenaded by the sounds of the dry forest, and woke early to head out on a morning walk in the forest. Almost instantly we found a troop of red-fronted lemurs with a seriously cute baby (see photo above) and a curious one-year old juvenile (photo below).
Our guide was great about giving us as much time as we wanted with this troop, which is why we happened to be around when the juvenile decided to climb down and walk over toward us before getting spooked and running back up a tree. I have yet to figure out how
National Geographic photographers get such great photos of lemurs because branches are always in the way for my shots!
Three members of the red-fronted lemur troop.
Once we left the red-fronted lemurs we only had to walk for about 10 minutes before we found the other diurnal lemur species in Kirindy, the Verreaux's sifaka (it almost looks like the Decken's sifaka we saw at the Tsingy, but this is a different species). And yes, this troop also had a damn cute baby. This little fluff was particularly energetic and it entertained us with many leaps from tree to tree or troop member to troop member (as seen in the video below).
Leaping baby!
One of the sifakas came down a tree directly in front of us which finally allowed me to get the shot I had been dreaming of - great light, sharp focus, not backlit, and the sifaka is not looking at me. All things I had been hoping for. This is my favorite photograph from our entire trip. I'd give this lemur a cookie if I could thank him or her.
Kirindy's birds were also fantastic! This rufous vanga was a curious fellow. During the day hike we also spotted a cool owl called the Madagascar scops owl and both the male and female cuckoo roller.
Jay tried to get up close and personal with the vine growing off this baobab until he felt the vine start slipping and jumped off.
Stunning blue vanga
When we finished as much wildlife viewing as possible at Kirindy we met back up with Jack and headed south to Morondava. Jack stopped by the Baobab Amoureux so we could gawk at the two enormous baobabs that grew twisted together near the famous
Allée des Baobabs. Back in Morondava we found a hotel room, spent some time on the beach, and grabbed some lunch with Jack. Here is a funny story - our lunch was pizza. You may think we are nuts for eating pizza in a country where we could try so many types of exotic foods. And you are right, but sometimes you just want some pizza yo. And guess what? The Malagasy people love pizza and they make some damn good pizza thanks to the fact that most (all?) are made in wood-fired brick or clay ovens. Back in Anacortes, WA we have more pizza joints that I can count and the pizza sucks at ALL of them. In Madagascar we had pizza that shamed many of the pizza joints in Washington and certainly could compete well against a thin-crust NYC pizza. So, I've justified my pizza lunch and I enjoyed every crispy, crusty bite. Yum.
That afternoon, Jack picked us up at our hotel and we headed back north to the
Allée des Baobabs for sunset. Once at this amazing place we left Jack and wandered around the dry rice fields, staring at the trees and watching how the color of their bark changed as the sun dropped further down in the sky. This bird, a crested drongo, was fairly common to see around Madagascar and I finally got a great shot of its cute little "crest".
I love this shot with our shadows in the photo.
A taxi brousse drives through Allée des Baobabs
Have I mentioned yet how striking Malagasy women are? These three girls were all beautiful, but I never got the nerve to ask for a shot of all of them, so I was only able to fire off this photo of them while they walked down the road among their baobabs.
No need for explanation eh?
As the light disappeared, this kid went past us in his zebu cart. Heading home to go to bed?
The next day was fantastic. We did nothing. I love nothing days. Well, the most we did was walk to the beach, go for a swim in the Mozambique Channel, sit on the beach, wander around Morondava a bit, get a beer on the beach, watch the sunset on the beach, and sleep. The beach was a key theme, if you didn't pick up on that yet. All other travel days thus far had been quite adventurous, so it was lovely to just sit back in a gorgeous beach town and read a book.
Well, a mostly gorgeous beach town. The tourist beach area was trash free and gorgeous. But, as you approach the area of the town where the majority of the locals live, you find their idea of a landfill on the beach. The chickens were stoked (there are a bunch in this photo, just look closely). And check out the trash - mostly plastic water bottles. It sure made me feel good about the fact that we were sterilizing tap water most of the time and not contributing to that pile. Piles of trash were common throughout the country, I'm not sure if they have much in the way of a solid waste division in the government but I seriously doubt it.
Near the market in Morondava
Happy travelers in Morondava
The next morning we were scheduled to take a flight at 8am back to Antananarivo (Tana) but the airline, Air Madagascar (also known as "Air Maybe"), called our hotel and told us the flight had been delayed until the early afternoon. We couldn't complain much because that gave us more time to sit on the beach! We wandered down to where the larger vessels were sitting on the beach at low tide and watched locals fish with nets for little schooling fishes in the tide pools.
Flying over Madagascar is an experience. Here is a view of the beach in Morondava from the plane; you can see a nice mangrove system to the far left of the photo. Jay and I were pleasantly surprised to see a largely intact mangrove forest system to the north of the town from the plane's window - so some important habitat was still intact despite the fact that the particular area we were looking at was unprotected. Encouraging sights!
Rice fields and other agriculture dominate the view near the capital. You can clearly see why Madagascar is called the Red Island.
Next blog: Marojejy National Park and silky sifakas!
