Madagascar

The first settlers came from Indonesia and Malaysia. Portuguese came in the 1500's and then the French came in the 1800's and got its independence from the French in 1960. The spoken languages are Malagasy and French. It lies in the Indian Ocean about 400kms off the Mozambique coast. Its a huge island 1600km long and about
500km wide. Twice the size of the UK.

Chameleons live on the island and we hope to come across some. They can change their colour to match its surroundings and their eyes can swivel independently of each other to keep one eye on one thing and one eye on some prey and then shoots out its tongue that's as long as its entire body in 0.04seconds. Wham! Lunch. We landed on a resort island of Nosy Be and soon hired a couple of motor bikes and went exploring the mainland.

We headed for the northern city of Diego Suarez (also called Antsiranana) and instantly felt the warmness of people. Riding slowly through villages, they smile, say hello and give us enthusiastic waves. Men, women and children bath on the sides of the road and at water courses. The villages consist of small wooden huts and very friendly and happy people. Diego (as the locals call it) is on a large beautiful harbour and has many old buildings built by the French and Portuguese still standing.

We rode around the bay and saw a place
called the Emerald sea and went for a swim at Dunes bay. Diego Suarez is the first place since I have been on this trip that I have felt clear indication that not many people from Australia have been here. The guy that runs the internet cafe here said that he has met five Australians in five years.

Taxi drivers here all have old style Renault 4's which are small and uncomfortable but very personal as your just about sitting in each others lap. Its challenging just getting in and out of them and I know some people that just couldn't get into them. The gear stick comes out of the dashboard and if your lucky enough to be in the front,
the windscreen is in your face. They all run their vehicles on empty carrying an old plastic one litre water bottle and get you to guard the car, while they run up to the petrol station to get some more. He pours the fuel into the tank, opens the bonnet, disconnects the fuel line to the carburetor, sucks the fuel into his mouth, reconnects the line, spits the fuel into the carbie, drops the bonnet and away we go. There are man pulled rickshaws in this town as well but mainly just carrying materials.

In general Madagascan people because of their background and their diet of lots of fruit are not big in height or width and are reasonably fit looking. Its been hard to converse with them as our French or Malagasy is not up to scratch. Sign language and the few that speak English gets us by as these people love life and are very helpful.

There seems to be a disproportionately high number of 17 to 30 year old slim fit petite females in this country. So many more girls than guys in this age group and they are so beautiful in so many ways. You can see the
mixed cultures in the features of all the people. Some males in Madagascar as in Malawi walk hand in hand which is very different to what we usually see in
Australia. They're not gay, they just walk hand in hand. To the bank or even from the pub. They can be drunk on the their way home holding hands and still trying to chat up girls. Homosexual activity under the age of 21 is illegal here.

Time in Madagascar as in many African countries does not play an important role in peoples lives. Things just take as long as they take and are not measured. What matters what time the boat or bus arrives or leaves.

People here are very relaxed because of this attitude and its nice to communicate with them on such a relaxed level. Production levels naturally are not so high but does it matter if we don't produce things quickly. A great person was once able to work out that time is relative to where ever one is. I see this happening with us being over here, moving around and starting to adopt some of the same laid back attitudes as the locals.

Damien and I will take some adjusting to life as it is in Sydney when we return. My suggestion is not to employ either of us
for a while unless you want it to take a long time, but it might be a good time.

We rode to Amber Mountain National Park which has a big rainforest in it and saw a family of Lemurs. Their monkey like, living in trees but have big pearcing eyes. We also saw chameleons, snakes and waterfalls. We nearly rode over many chameleons as they crossed the road. They’re not fast and did change colour when we stopped to check them out. Didn’t see the tongue in action or did but couldn’t tell.

Riding through here was tricky with the narrow dirt track being pitted, wet and had green moss on it. We underestimated the size of Madagascar and the condition of the roads and were only able to explore the northern part of the country. The Madagascan beer is called three horse beer (similar to the dutch variety) and its one of the best beers we've had in Africa. It has a picture of three horses heads on its label and you start seeing three of things if you have too many of them.

For the men in this country, its quite common to have two or three wives. Here in the north the wives live in separate villages or homes. In the south of the country they all live in the same home. Back onto the island of Nosey Be the biggest town is called Hellville after a French admiral. It’s the commercial part of the island and doesn't live up to its name.

We stayed at one of the many beautiful beaches on the island (not in Hellville) having to put up with stepping out of our beach hut and going swims in clean still water, having people coming up to us offering fresh fruit, massages, drinks, gifts, etc. They have all the water activities available with lots of choices of restaurants and bars. The island is also called Perfume Island because of all the l'ylang l'ylang grown here. Its the islands biggest export and the smell of the plant is most noticeable on some parts of the island in the evenings.
Damien gets the three horse beer award for bravery for putting his body on the line when a family of ducks crossed his path while riding on a dirt road. He was sore for a few days but is ok now. All the ducks waddled off uninjured.

So if your looking for a beautiful wife or wives and if you like to eat lobster thermidor for $6.50. If you like getting around in a 600cc trail bike and maybe drinking one of the best beers in the world served up cold in 650ml bottles for $1. If you like dealing with relaxed people that have beautiful smiles and warm hearts,
Madagascar could be the place for you. Even if you don't want some of these things, Madagascar has so much to
offer with beautiful beaches, its national parks, its diversity in people, flora and fauna and much more. It is unspoiled, undeveloped, naturally gifted and one of the best experiences anyone can have.