We climb 1900 metres up and 700 back in one day!

  Moroni, Grande Comore, Comoros
Thursday, June 29, 2006

We're now heading to Grande Comore, the largest (60kms by 20 kms, with a population of 363,000) of the independent Comoros Islands. The only time most people have heard of it was when in November 1996 an Ethiopian Airlines flight was highjacked, ran out of fuel, and tried to land here, but ditched in the sea, right near the beach.
The main thing we know is that since independence in 1975 they have had more than 20 coups d'etat, so we're a bit wary about coming here, so are only staying two nights - just long enough to have a look. While we were in Madagascar we found out that they had an election in May, and that things are calm since then, and that Mt Karthala, at 2360 metres, the largest active volcano in the world, erupted three weeks ago, but all is quiet now.
During the flight see a couple of isolated islands, but miss out on seeing most of Grand Comore, as we fly down the west coast through wind and rain, to swing south and land at the last moment. The shoreline is jagged lava, with clean green sea, and a surf. The hillside which isn't lava is covered in green vegetation, with a lot of coconut palms.
In immigration, we are forced to fill in a visa application form, even though we show our visas, but some sort of English speaking expediter shepherds us through without any extra charges. They seem to be surprised to find tourists at all. We see a man in Islamic dress waving a Les Arcades hotel sign, as well as a guy with a Le Moroni hotel sign. The former is better placed, so we give him a wave, and he assigns us a driver. Take our bags straight to the taxi without thinking too hard as we thought it was the hotel drumming up business, and we wouldn't be paying.
The man with the sign joined us and proceeded to give us his resume as a guide - at this stage we started to think we had been conned. Long trip in, with the main road half closed by trenching. We leave the main road, go past the Presidential palace, and along the "corniche", which was indeed that, but, while it had good views of the rough sea and rugged coast, it also had heaps of garbage and plastic bags spilling down into the water.
We recognise the "pink palace" as our hotel, but aren't entirely sure, as we enter the side gate.
The staff are familiar with our "guide", and he helps sort out a room in the "superior" class at E37.50 without breakfast. Our guide, "Chauffeur" now sets out his proposition for our stay, which involves climbing the big volcano. It looks like being either a walk of 30km if done in one day, or splitting the trip over 2 days, and camping at 1600 metres on the way back. The former is too much for us, and we think we don't have enough time to do the latter as we fly out on Thursday, but work out that we don't fly till 4.30pm, so can do it. The negotiations almost break down when we are hammered 18 to 20 euros for the taxi in, versus about E5 in a share taxi. Settle for E15, and a total charge of E170 for a tour ending back at the airport. Pay him E80 advance, to line up the gear, excluding sleeping gear, as we will use ours. One hour ago we had no intention of climbing the volcano, but realise it is one of the main features of the island, and after our bad experience in Mayotte trying to arrange something in a short time, are happy to have organised something so quickly. We got the distinct impression that the French money in Mayotte made everyone a lot less entrepreneurial than the poorer countries.
Head out to explore the "handsome main town" described in our guidebook.

We assume this was comparative to the rest of the island, not the world, as we find the place pretty depressing - foreshores full of garbage,

the boat harbour encumbered by a large wrecked wooden boat, the lighter barges for unloading ships offshore the roughest examples of boatbuilding that MP has ever seen,

and the famous mosques pretty ordinary. From the guidebook descriptions we had been imagining another Muscat, Oman, but there was definitely no comparison!
The town is constructed of either volcanic rock or concrete block, or galvanised iron, or a combination of all 3. It is not without its charm, and has interesting narrow lanes, and the odd carved doorway. We get E20 changed into 9600 local francs at Western Union, as the banks are closed, so when we are buttonholed by a French bottom of the market traveller, we are able to get a coke while we sit and listen to him.
He wants to check out our Mayotte guide, as he is on his way there tomorrow, courtesy of the French Consul, by air. He was supposed to get a boat to Madagascar, but it was calling in to Mayotte, which won't allow tourists to travel on single engine boats. He is looking for possible ferries or cargo routes out of Mayotte, and cheap accommodation. He has worked his way here by cargo boat, and has been scrounging on the locals.
After, we walk the back streets,

past the market,

taking photos (including one of woman with the distinctive sandalwood paste on her face

and buying a suspect coconut, then walk all the way to the commercial centre to Air Austral, and check out an Indian restaurant before walking all the way along the coast home.
After dark, we walked through the dark streets for a reasonable internet, and fair meal, but not Indian.
Streets even darker on the way back, but no problems. Pack our gear for the climb. Take a long while to sort out how to pay the bill - ended up with euros, euro coins and local Francs, probably paid over the odds, but better than having to sort it out if running late for the plane.
Spend a long time killing at least a dozen mosquitoes in our room, a lot with blood in them, but can't find any way they are getting in, though do find a lot of them hiding in the heavy curtains, which end up on the ground in our enthusiam. Dianne also re-hurts her shoulder with her enthusiastic swinging of the towel on the ceiling. This may seem a bit unnecessary, but we've been told that malaria is rife around here. We also carefully mend the very holey mosquito net, dose up on repellent, set our alarm for 4.45 am and hope for the best.
Wed 28th June Moroni - Mt Karthala Volcano
Our alarm goes off at 4.45am, but it wasn't necessary as the muezzin started his very loud, very long, call to prayer at the same time. Dianne cleans her teeth, and ends up with two large pieces of her upper molar tooth in her hand. Not a good start to the day. Leave our large bags in the room (to be put in storage) and lock the room, and out the front with our two small daypacks at 5.00, the appointed pick-up time. Wait with the night watchman, after waking him, and giving him the key and explaining that the bags were to be put in storage when reception opened.
By 5.30 starting to worry that we have been really scammed, but not sure whether we're glad or not, as we're not sure we really want to do such a taxing walk. However taxi turns up at 5.50am. We're confused by the presence of a second vehicle, a van, which we think is for the gear, but turns out to be the bread wagon, with our guide getting a stack of fresh bread.
The guide, Ahmed Said, excuses the lateness as trouble with "les pneus", and we head out through the dark town under a slowly lightening sky, and up the hill on a rough tar road. Dianne is still not 100% sure it is the same person, as he looks so different in cap and jeans, and his English seems much more limited than yesterday.
Think for a while we're on the rough road which goes higher up the hill, and cuts out two hours of walking, but not so, and we get out in the village of M'vouni, at the start of the hard climb. Guide hasn't arranged a porter, as the phone wasn't working last night, so he goes off to do this.

We leave our sleeping bags with the tent and food to be carried, and we set off with our daypacks with our clothes etc in them.
The bare statistic are: picked up at 5.50 ; started walking from 400m elevation at 6.30: reached campsite at 1600m at 10.30 - a 1200m climb in 4 hours. Had to wait a half hour at the campsite for the porter to catch up till 11.00, as he had all the water apart from the little we were carrying, which we'd now used. Leave before the porter, and climb for another 3 hours, and 700 metres, to the 2300m summit, arriving at 2.00pm for lunch, after having to wait, once again, for the porter half way up as he had all the water, and we were getting dehydrated. Walk out into the caldera and look into the crater, and return to the rim at 3.10: reach the campsite at 5.10pm. Start walking down at 7.10 the next morning, and reach the village at 10.00am.
The road up the hill in the taxi was severely deteriorated tar, which we thought was the 4wd track the guide book referred to. The village was a collection of basic concrete block houses, with concrete roofs, not attractive, but not desperately poor. Set off up rock-walled path through the village fields, with vanilla, cloves, bananas, coconut palms, other fruiting palms, and lots of citrus trees.
The path varied from gently sloping with good walking to rough and steep volcanic rubble, plus mud and slippery clay. The actual paths become watercourses during heavy rain, so are quite deep and slippery in places. As we climbed higher away from the village, we had the first of many rests, got out of our 300 polyfleece jackets, then entered scrubland of red guava trees, and started to get into rain forest with some large trees covered with epiphytes.

The bushes at the side of the narrow path closed in, so we were brushing against wet leaves all the time, becoming soaked and muddy in the process, so much so that MP had to take the camera out of his pocket, dry it and put it in the pack.


We could get the occasional view down over the town, and up the coast as far as the airport. Took photos of a local black parrot, saw a strange brown ground bird which hopped a few feet ahead for a hundred yards of the path.
We were feeling the climb a bit when we came to an old road with a narrow path through the regrowth. Much better walking, although still pretty wet. Timed our stops where we could at suitable sitting rocks, or patches of sunlight penetrating the forest. After a few hundred metres of good walking, crossed a lava based watercourse, then headed straight up beside it, on rough lava rock and tree branch steps, with occasional muddy and slippery patches forever. In spite of how wet everything is, there is no sign of permanent water in any of the creeks. The ground is just too porous.
As we climb, we see changes in the vegetation, getting out of the rainforest and into more open forest, with occasional grassy patches, now glimpsing what could be the end of the steep part of the climb.


The camping area is beside some galvanised iron roofed volcanic building, hugging the earth on a fairly level, grassy shelf, below the final rise to the summit. Redistribute gear for the climb, including lunch and water, into our 2 daypacks, carried by the guide and the porter, and leave the tent etc in a hut. We set off up the hill, only to find we have put both bottles of water into the pack the porter has, and he has decided to have a sleep before coming up. We wet our whistle with oranges, but eventually have to stop and wait for him.
Above the shelf, most of the big trees disappear, and the grass looks like Australian blady grass, with a fair number of the dry style raspberries like in Oz, and wild strawberries. Higher again, there are dwarf pine-like trees. As we come onto the flatter sections, the ash which we have seen in the watercourses starts to cover the ground, and has killed all the trees,

with the exception of a few survivors which are showing regrowth from the dead-looking trunks.

Bracken fern has also started to colonise. The ash towards the top is up to a metre deep from the recent eruption,

and has been eroded by rain into a series of steep ridges which we must walk over.


Further toward the top, close enough to the crater to have received larger particles, a crust has formed, and this is easier walking.
We get to the rim of the caldera which is 30 to 50 metres high and quite steep. We found a reasonable path down it, and proceeded down and across the sand sea with dead trees and a scattering of boulders to a second, lower slope towards the crater. The latest eruption, which was three weeks ago, was only of this ash, and some rocks, but no lava.
We stop here as the guide and porter are hungry. Chauffeur prepares an excellent lunch of good bread, tomatoes, boiled egg, and sardines, which make a magic monster sandwich.
The weather is still fine, but a very chilly wind has got up, and we retreat into thermals and raincoats with our shorts, and get by OK.

Walk as close to the edge as the guide thinks safe, and have a good look into the crater, probably 100 metres deep and 200 across, with remnant solidified lava in the bottom, and a lake of muddy water, with a ring of steam jets around it.


One section of the crater is a lot higher, where the side of a cone has collapsed, leaving a 200 metre cliff of striped, layered lava. There are some good colours on the south end cliff, and, on the far side, the caldera slope is covered with greenery, as the wind was from this side during the eruption.


We walk north to look at another smoking crater, but are too far away to get a good look.


After the porter has some fun rolling rocks down into the crater, we have the guide take our photo in our flash emergency warm gear, walk back to bury our lunch garbage, then climb out of the caldera on a particularly steep path where visitors have left their names.
The walk, or climb, back down goes a lot easier, as we are pretty well fed, and only have to look after our knees, not puff and pant and stop every 100 steps to get rid of rubbery legs.
At the camp, we recover our gear from where it has been locked up in a shed, and the guide sets up the tent with the help of MP, having cleared rocks and cow pats from a small dell, and put some ferns down (not sure whether these were for comfort, or to reduce cowpat stains on his tent) He makes a cooking fire and a warming fire, using timber carried down from further up. We can see others from the small village also walking through the gathering dark with similar trees. We can't tell whether they are permanent homes up here, or just basic huts that they stay in to tend the animals, but it is definitely a very hard way to live. However, there was a touch of the twenty first century, when one of the young blokes got out a mobile phone and rang someone!
DP sets up our little home, then MP has a sleep until dinner is just about ready. It is quite cold in our 300 coats, and the others don't have as much gear, so they must be feeling it. We sit by the warming fire, but the wind is blowing from the fire, so it is pretty smoky.
Dinner is chicken with a tomato and pimento sauce, and a heap of rice, pretty good, and we put a fair bit of it away, and go to bed almost immediately. It is unclear where the others are going to sleep, and they are pretty non-committal about it. We hear them talking by the fire for a while, but it is not impossible that Chauffeur, at least, may have found a warm bed in the village.
DP remembers that we can, with difficulty, zipper the two sleeping bags together, and, with our thermals and socks on, are fairly warm, apart from where we are lying on the ground, as the sleeping bag doesn't help much here. DP has to curl around a lump in the tent floor, which we later find to be a large stick. MP has a reasonably flat patch, but hasn't enough padding to be comfortable, other than flat on the back.
It blows pretty hard in the night, and the tent flaps a lot, so sleep is hard to find. Nocturnal excursions are no fun either, but at least it is a clear night, with no rain or dew.
Thur 29 th June Moroni - Karthala Volcano- Reunion
Awake pretty early, up and packed by 6.30,

and on the way down the hill by 7.10. It is a lot better going down hill, and we are in surprisingly good shape, although DP has a sore little toe, and damage to the bunion areas. DP is looking after her feet, so does a lot of braking with her legs, and has to have frequent stops, but a lot less than on the way up.
The trail still has some surprises for us, and is so continuously steep on the way down, we can't believe we climbed up it.
The leaves are not nearly as wet as on the way up, and we stay pretty dry, even though we get into shorts fairly high up the mountain.

Take photo looking down on to Moroni and the sea.


The guide gets us to pay the money before we get to the village to keep the amount paid secret, from the villagers and the porter. Also, we don't get to see what the porter is paid.
While we wait for a taxi, DP gets out of her shoes, but then, because there are a lot of people waiting for taxis, we walk a couple of hundred metres down through the village to intercept taxis on the way in.
In the strange way these things happen, an incoming taxi turns around, gets rid of two pasengers, and we proceed down the hill with a woman in the front, and the 3 of us in the back.
After a number of macho confrontations on the narrow road, we drop the woman, take Chauffeur home, and we are taken back to the hotel. Miraculously, don't have to pay.
At the hotel, have to wait while they find the wife of the owner to unlock the baggage, but at least it's the amiable girls on the desk, instead of the dickhead son, and we get to watch CNN in English. We rearrange our gear, and are let into a room to change, then DP sleeps with her head down on a table while we wait for Chauffeur to turn up with a taxi to the airport at 1.30 pm. We still need E10 change from Chauffeur, which he said he will put towards the taxi fare to the airport (despite the fact that in the original negotiations this was included). Think we have the balance of E5 to make up with an odd assortment of change.
We are considering our options when Chauffeur turns up at 1.40, but without the taxi, which arrives soon after. After taking a group photo with him in his Islamic gear,

get into the taxi with the original airport driver.
Have a pretty quick, but not necessarily safe trip to the airport via the corniche, where the waves have quietened down considerably. The beach at Itsandra, 3 kms out of town, looks very attractive now, and it looks OK for snorkelling. Once again, weather is so important as to how a place looks. Miss taking a photo here, but take a few other high speed photos on the way, and get to airport in plenty of time.
The airport, the showplace of the nation normally, is right back in the dark ages. Fortunately, Chauffeur knows everyone, and shepherd us through the formalities. He gets us to leave our bags in a queue, then MP writes out a testimonial for his scrap book while we wait. While DP goes to the loo, all the people waiting in departures are shepherded outside, including MP and the two daypacks. Security is not interested in where DP is, but by the time she got back, MP was back in with the boarding passes and both passports.
Try to get a window seat at check-in, but there is a separate office, with a laptop to allocate seats. DP asks for a window seat, which she gets, but finds that he has allocated us 5B and 5F. Go back to try and explain that we would like to sit together, but he doesn't seem to grasp what the problem is, so leave them as is, and hope someone will swap with us on the plane. Bid farewell to Chauffeur. Passports get a lot of scrutiny, and have to put belt through X-ray, then talk to a Frenchman, a Mauritian, and two teenage girls on their first flight, going to meet their mother in Reunion, while their father has been refused a visa. They are very excited, and insist on talking to DP in fractured French, with MP filling in the gaps.
When we get onto the plane, there are 2 people in first class, and 12 in economy, in a 180 capacity wide-bodied jet, so not sure why we coudn't be seated together. DP takes the big camera and sits at a window on port side, and gets a view of various volcanic cones,

and "our" volcano on the way out, though partly covered in cloud. MP gets the coast and Moheli on the starboard, and a good look at Mayotte and the scene of our marathon walk. A good and very welcome meal on board, with a Bordeaux white wine. When we made these bookings, we hadn't even heard of Air Austral, and neither had the travel agents in Australia. No-one in Australia would even ticket them, and had to do the bookings by internet, and have the tickets sent out from France. However, we've found them to be great - planes are all modern jets, and service has always been excellent.
Dark when we land in Reunion at 7.30pm local time after a one-hour time change.