The Tsingy…finally!

Decken’s Sifaka

It was another day we had to wake up around 5am but I had no trouble jumping out of the tent knowing that it was Tsingy day. We had a hefty breakfast as the there was a lot of hiking to be done that day and then picked up our local guide which was mandatory to enter the national reserve and proceeded towards it. We entered the park area soon enough but still have to drive for about 50 odd minutes to get to the point from where we were to commence the hike into the Grand Tsingy. The Tsingy de Bemaraha actually has two areas that showcase the typical landscape, the Grand Tsingy and the Petite Tsingy. That morning we were going to visit the Grand Tsingy with the petite one reserved for the afternoon.

Decken's Sifaka looking for breakfast

In an event that was going to be symbol of how that day was going to turn out, our local guide turned around and said “You are lucky…very lucky” and then pointed to a leafless tree about 200 yards away and asked us if we could see the Decken’s Sifaka. It took me a few seconds to focus on what he was showing but when I set my sights on it I could see a stunningly beautiful white lemur with a long white tail and a black face. From a distance it looked similar to a Verreaux’s Sifaka but apparently it’s a completely different species.

The guide leading thro' the chasm

After getting the go ahead from the guide I started to deftly move closer to the sifaka and at my closest point I was right under the tree while the Sifaka was foraging for flowers in the cool of the morning. Upon closer examination, I could see the bright orange eyes which was a stunning contrast from it hairless black face and spotless white fur.

All of us were like little kids whose eyes were wide open and hardly blinking when after 15-20 minutes the guide asked us to move on as we still have to see the Tsingy. Reluctantly, I pulled myself away form the Sifaka and proceeded on towards the Tsingy landscape. The guide asked us to wear our safety harness as there were some very tight as well as steep places through which we had to squeeze through all along the whole hike.


Soon we were descending into a narrow chasm having just enough gap to allow a mid sized person to squeeze through. The chasm soon turned into a labyrinth leading to narrow and dark passageways where there were small bats roosting. We just did not have the time to explore all the passageways (I guess it will have to be an expedition in itself) so we proceeded onwards and started climbing out of the chasm and to a slightly more wooded regions where we saw a lot of cacti type plants chiefly among them where a group of plants called Pachypodiums as their succulent stem is thick to store water.

Unknown bat species

At this point were started to see the predominantly spiny features on the rock that I had associated this place with when I had seen Planet Earth. The pictures do a far better job of explaining the strange formation of the limestone rock which was caused by very unique physical and chemical conditions of limestone erosion to give this region a feel as though we were walking on a different planet.







As we continued to climb to the roof of the caves we had to grip the needle sharp edges of the spiny rock formations and that’s when I realized how sharp they were. We had to be fairly careful while placing our hands on them as we gripped them for leverage. I tried to avoid to carelessly stumble on these rock edges as even a small slip could easily pierce my skin and potentially do pretty decent damage to the bone itself. Before we got to the top we again had to scramble through a small cave with sparse vegetation wherever the sunlight could penetrate this rocky fortress.

View of the Grand Tsingy from the roof

Soon we reached the roof of the caves and…it was a dazzling sight and it sure seemed as we were on a different planet. I think it ranks among one of the most naturally stunning sights I have seen. So here I was…in Madagascar where I had seem a lemur pretty close and seen the tsingy too…but...I was still far away from my holy grail of seeing lemurs (or even a lemur) jumping through the tsingy. I however knew at the back of my mind that what I really wanted to see was going to be a pretty rare sight but that did not stop me from dreaming.

Formation like these give this place its otherworldy feel

Red Tail Sportive Lemur

I spent a lot of time trying to soak in the spectacle before starting to descend from the roof from where we could see the panoramic view of the Tsingy into the woods. As we were walking through the dense dry deciduous forest away from the Tsingy formation we were lucky enough to catch a red tail sportive lemur settling into its daytime roost. There was no way we could have spotted it without the trained eyes of our local guide. The sportive lemurs are mainly nocturnal lemur and hence it’s very rare to seem them during daytime when they usually hide in tree holes. These lemur were completely different from the ones that we had seen so far which were diurnal lemurs and it was also a lot smaller in size that the Verreaux’s or the Dickens Sifaka.

Petite Tsingy

Petite Tsingy cave

Unknown species of lizard

We got back to the 4X4 after four and a half hours and it was time to head back to the village that was our base. Upon getting there we had our lunch and had about an hour to relax before the guide would come get us to explore the Petite Tsingy. I took that short break to doze off right on the lunch table.

Unkown species of gecko

Soon we entered the Petite Tsingy and opposed to the grand tsingy, the rock formations were encountered as soon as we entered the area without a lot of hiking. I remembered my agent in Antananarivo saying to me that after visiting the Grand Tsingy, a lot of people skip the Petite Tsingy or are not as impressed with it. Based on what I saw, I have to disagree with him.

Species of Pachypodium



Chameleon

While the Grand Tsingy covers a much larger area and had formations that are colossal, their charm is different from Petite ones in that the stone formations provides the most alluring part of the landscape. In the Petite however the formation are much smaller but I think that the rock formation forms a much better contrasting relationship with the vegetation. Since the sizes of the rocks are smaller there is more sunlight that penetrates through to the ground where a lot of plants grow and conversely supports greater wildlife. The spectacle actually looked totally fake…it seems like I have walked into some kind of Jurassic Park theme park where there are these awesome spiny rock formations and within them are endemic plants growing giving it a surreal feel. I though that I was the only one who felt so but Mike also mentioned the same thing. We got to roof of the tsingy and spend a few minutes after which our guide asked for us to descent and continue to walk through the forest.

I was still lingering around that sight to catch one last glimpse of the Tsingy from that vantage point and so was Mickael, and just as we were about to start descending I saw something moving in the trees and I think I shouted Whattttt! While at exactly the same time I head Mickael saw Wohhh!!!...we had just seem a bunch of brown lemurs, eight to nine strong jumping from tree to tree and hearing our commotion the rest of our group along with the guide figured that we had spotted something and started hurriedly climbing back up.

The sight i wanted to see and capture

Another chameleon


For one moment I could not believe what I was seeing…was I really seeing the lemurs jumping from the trees onto the tsingy? What I was seeing was infact real and there was my hold grail …not one but eight or nine red fronted brown lemurs moving through the Tsingy.

That moment lasted no more than maybe a minute or so but it was immensely gratifying…the one thing that I had come to see in Madagascar had just passed and I had just witnessed that moment and had I been a few seconds early to descend I would have missed it.

Eager to know me

Amazing colors of the Chameleon

Later as we started descending, I felt like I had achieved the one big thing that I wanted to see and from them onward anything that I see and do will be a bonus. We soon encountered an unknown species (to me) of a lizard, a gecko and a chameleon. After the hike through the Petite Tsingy we rested by the Manambolo River at the edge of the reserve before returning back to our base camp. It was about 5:00pm by the time we got back to the our camp but we wanted to go the full distance with the day so had struck a deal with the guide to take us on a night walk to hopefully see some nocturnal lemurs and chameleons.



A species of Mouse Lemur...my best shot


We got about 30mins of rest before picking up the guide at his office to embark on the night walk at around 6pm. The guide took us to a place not far away from the dusty road reckoning that if we wait at a specific spot he knew in the bush we would have the best chance to see a nocturnal lemur as it came out to feed. We waited for about 30mins but to no avail so decided to move on.

Last Chameleon for the night!

We wandered on in the woods for a longer and saw a lot of chameleons sleeping on the branches of tree but the nocturnal lemur still eluded us. Finally as our walk was coming to and end when Mickael and I were snapping pictures of a chameleon, I think either Mike or Jantien called our attention and said they saw something in the trees. Our guide quickly went about trying to find it and located a species of Mouse Lemur hiding behind a branch. We had all our torches pointed at the lemur to see it but it as it was pretty far away and a very small species (small or smaller than a mouse) it was really hard to see it properly.

At that point I decided to climb a nearby tree to get a better view of the lemur. With my small torch in my mouth I climbed an adjacent tree until I was almost face to face with the mouse lemur which was a few yards away from me. I think with the flashing torch light from the base of the tree in its eyes the little dazed Mouse Lemur missed me climbing the tree and I was able to get a very up close and personal encounter with a lemur that is extremely otherwise very fast and elusive.

We got back to the camp around 8pm in time to eat a sumptuous meal and jackfruit dessert that Bernis had cooked for us. Back in the tent, I dozed off within a few minutes of lying down as I was reliving the best moments of the day that had just passed.