Traversing through the Mightly Baobabs

Shepherding Zebu on Tsiribihina

Having negotiated Tsingy successfully the prior day, we left the village of Bekopara via a ferry on our way towards Belo Tsiribihina where we would stop for lunch. After lunch we would continue south to the city of Morondava. The journey from Bekopara to Morondava was a bone jarring eight hour drive in our 4X4 in the all too familiar by now dirt roads of south west Madagascar.

Mickael and I were swapping between the worst and the second worst seats in the 4X4 for the whole 8 hour ride…the scene however was spectacular and more than made up for the crappy seats. The ride took us through the Kirindy Reserve (where I would have loved to spend a day or two but alas, I did not have the luxury of time) were the vegetation is very similar to the Tsingy de Bemaraha Reserve except that there are no Tsingy’s there.

Passing through the Baobab forests

As our jeep moved along the dusty road, we passed a region that is world famous for its baobab trees …initially we traversed through a region which seemed like a forest of Baobabs, then we came across a baobab that is more than 800 hundred years old. A little further from the 800 odd year baobab, we veered slightly off our path to visit the Les Baobabs Amoureux (the lover Baobabs) where two baobabs have seemingly entwined in a pose reminiscent of lovers…the scene was pretty good but I guess it was more for couples and the romantic fools. I personally though that the 800 year old baobab scene was far better :)

The 800 odd year old Baobab (my co-travelers on the left of the tree illustrate the size of the tree)

When we left the village of Bekopara early that morning, our main focus was to arrive at the Avenue de Baobabs (Avenue of the Baobabs) by sunset. This area is an extraordinary stand of several baobab trees some of which are more than 30 meters in height. The dusty dirt road from Belo Tsiribihina to Morondava passes through this picturesque spot creating a natural scene of an avenue lined with baobabs, which makes the scene especially gorgeous.

The lover Baobabs

Arriving at the Avenue

The Avenue of Baobab was also featured on Planet Earth (along with the Mouse lemurs) and that competed the Planet Earth experience for me as now I had seem all 3 of them…the Tsingy, the Mouse Lemur and the Avenue of Baobab.

We sat around the avenue till sunset and then continued on our way towards Morondava which we reached around 8pm. Upon reaching Morondava we checked into a hotel close to the beach and that night would be the last one together for us.

The next day, our group of 6 was to head in different directions. Mike and Jantien were planning on staying in Morondava for a day or two to recover while for Mickael, his Madagascar experience was coming to a close because after spending a day in Morondava he would be taking a flight back to the island of Reunion before heading back to France. Jilli and Luke were planning on going to the east coast and stopping by the cities and parks along the way.

Picture taken with the sun behind me

Bernis who was our guide for the 7-day trip was heading south to Toliara and as for me…I still had 3 days left before I check out of Madagascar. Considering the limited time I had, that night I decided to head to Andasibe-Mantadia National Park that was 3 hours east of Antananarivo rather than the initial plan of going south to the Isalo National Park to see the ring tailed lemurs. I was slightly disappointed at to know that I wont be going to Isalo but there is only so much I can cover plus there are always things that have to be left of the plate.

The highway between Belo Tsiribihina and Morondava

To get to Andasibe, I had to pass through the city of Antsirabe and since Luke, Jilli and Bernis were going to pass the same way, we decided to hire a 14 seater taxi brousse and pay for all the seats of the taxi brousse. We figured that this would benefit us in multiple ways.
1) We would travel during the day and this would enable us to see the landscape of Madagascar change from the dry region to a region of high altitude, plus the road was reputed to be very scenic
2) We could also leave Morondava when we wanted (early in the morning) rather than waiting for the taxi-brousse to fill up. This would really help me as I wanted to maximize my time now that the clock was ticking
3) We could have loads of space which meant that we wont be traveling cramped for a good part of 9 hours from Morondava to Antsirabe
4) It would be cost effective as we would share the fare

Catching the sight one last time

Bernis (in white) singing in Malagasy

The first thing we did after checking into the hotel was to negotiate the fare and departure time with the owner of the taxi-brousse.

Upon feeling pretty pleased about my arrangement for the last leg of my journey, I joined Jilli, Luke, Mike and Jantien for a celebratory dinner at a nearby restaurant which was Rastafari inspired. We had our meals while a local band played some Malagasy music and Bernis could not help join in the singing and it was a fitting end to a really nice 7-day trip through south west Madagascar.