Hotel Mangily Ifaty

... at a gas station along the way. The taxis here are not much more than four wheeled motorcycles with tiny engines. The gas tank is usually a plastic gallon jug that sits on the floor by the drivers feet with a fuel line running to the engine. I saw one driver start his taxi by connecting the two wires sticking out of the dash board. My new driver drove me all around to the places he thought I could ...

... arboretum and looking at cactus. I'm sure Lisa, who lived in Palmdale, California for a long time has seen enough cactus and desert plants. ha ha We arrived in Tulear around 1:00pm. Staying at the hotel Victory here which is located a bit of a way from the town center. Very nice hotel with air conditioned rooms and a big swimming pool. Went for a swim to help with the heat then Babba took me downtown to the bank as I needed ...

... and of course have a big party with the local village where much rum and **** shaking dancing is obligatory. Last week I went on a village home stay when a family came and "borrowed" me for 24 hours - I went in their boat to a tiny island and spent the 24 hours living like a Vezo - the local fishing tribe. I slept with the family of 20 under the stars on their sail like they do (they only have a couple of tiny huts and they are ...

Hello all, This will only be a short entry as this I am on the only computer at the hotel. We are in Tulear on the west coast of Madagascar. Gina and I both survived the treking and are doing well. We have seen many animals and are on our way to the beach tomorrow to relax. I will write more when we get to Tana on Monday. This is the first internet connection I have seen in 2 weeks. André

... and did a great deal of bottom wiggling while the boys wore sarongs over their jeans and trainers and did something similar to the twist. Of course we were all encourage to join in. After dinner, a couple of us spent some time trying to photograph the stars. We could clearly see the milky way and the southern cross and in the darkness they seemed to shine so much brighter than they do at home.

We had breakfast of bread and jam this morning at 4:00 so that we could be ready to leave at 4:30. I was expecting to see huge boabab trees, sapphire mining towns and elaborate stone tombs of the Mahafaly and Antandroy tribes but at that time in the morning I struggled to stay awake. We arrived in Tulear on the South West coast at around 8:30 to catch our boat to Anakao. We had to leave our main luggage in the hotel's ...

... We stopped 3 times along the way for the driver to present his papers (read 'pay bribe') to the police. We stayed at a great hotel called Nautilus, very pricey but it was the diving school that drew us in. The air con was also a big draw as the temperature was rising and it was very humid, especially in the afternoon. The Lonely Planet described ...

... richer than we were in the mood for. After lunch we set ourselves up on some beach chairs in the sun (well sunscreened of course), read our books, listened to music and dozed off. By that time, the dinner menu was up and it was, suprise, the shrimp from lunch and fish kebabs! They had no eggs or bread delivered yet, so we decided to walk up to beach to a neighbouring hotel and see what was on their menu. The place turned out to be ultra ritzy (which you know as soon as ...

... valleys, with wide, timbered watercourses and mesas beyond. See our first genuine baobabs in the distance. Pass through another smaller and newer sapphire mining town. Tiny woven bamboo walled houses, women and lots of small kids. Not certain where the mining is actually taking place. The town seems to be where it is because of the highway, not the mines. Terrain is getting lower and ...

... s first explorers, arriving parched and tired, expecting nothing but more grassland and craggy rock. They would have seen the presence of water from a distance because of the palm trees that enclose the pool. But to stumble upon such perfection! It must have seemed unreal. I had the pool almost to myself, so I splashed around for awhile and then headed out again. More emptiness, more heat, until we arrived at a forest-filled canyon carved into the ...