Buzzing Around The World With Fellette & Doug

Madagascar, our quest for the elusive Lemur...

There were no organised tours on Nosy Be, [the island we visited], from the ship, it could be classified as "not much of a place." The talk by the ship's tour staff did not paint too rosy a picture either. When we got to our rooms last night there, on the bed, was a "CHIKUNGUNYA ALERT." A day biting mosquito which can transmit a viral infection with symptoms of fever, chills, headache, nausea, vomiting, joint pain and rash. Typically not fatal. It sounds like what I had a couple of weeks ago.

In the early morning, we anchored about 1/2 mile off the town of Hell-Ville. Yep, that is it's name, Hell-Ville. The ship's morning announcement also warned of a "slippery and steep ramp when getting off the tenders ashore." The weather forecast was threatening rain. The number of people going ashore was dropping by the minute. The ship did its duty by warning us of the conditions ashore, even supplying mosquito repellent to those who were to venture ashore.

A short boat ride and we were on the docks at Hell-Ville. A bevy of guides and hawkers were soon able to distinguish us from the natives in spite of us being camouflaged in sun bonnets, long sleeved shirts, Holland America shoulder bags and all smelling of deet!

We negotiated a taxi to take us to see some lemurs. Soon all six of us were in a mini cab meant for four. [We had a driver and a guide.] A 15 minute ride through some interesting streets with shops, markets, donkey carts, and other photographic delights and we then turned off a paved road onto a road that until today was dirt. They had heavy rains the day before and the dirt turned to mud. The cab bottomed out a few times in the ruts but nobody seemed too concerned until Jim thought that we may be heading into trouble. We stopped, the cabbie with Gail still in it, turned around, I know not how, and headed back down the rut to the pavement. The other four walked back, asking about things like snakes as we walked through the grass to keep out of the mud. Ben, our trusted guide assured us there were no snakes.

We then had a discussion on where to go to see the lemurs. Long story short, we turned the cab around again and the cabbie went back the same road to where the road would ''get better". The five of us happily trod our way through road, rut, grass and field to a settlement. I use the word loosely. There, a shack the size of a single garage, only lacking a "condemned" sign on it, was the School House for about 20 pre-schoolers.

They were clustered around the door as the teacher sat wearily on the stoop. F. lightened her load by giving a bag of Holland America chocolates to the teacher. The kids then all sang "Thank you for the chocolate" in French. Of course F and I being proud, completely bilingual Canadians (not) had a 30 second uni-syllable conversation with them, and continued on our way.

The trek continued, the road worsened, the humidity was at the max., and the temperature although only in the mid to hi 70's was wearing heavy on us. By this time any concern about my Arnold Palmer sneakers getting dirty was about the least of our concerns, my Chaps pants were also a candidate for cut-offs. In Africa the standard answer regarding how long, or far to go on a journey is either soon, or not far. The same answer each time from Ben began to get annoying.

We walked for the better part of an hour, the length of our column was now beginning to be a security concern, we closed up periodically, but not close enough to talk about the mess we were in. The women were real troopers. The sweat on us white folks was dripping down and beading on our hair, the shirts and blouses had all changed colour with the sweat. Our shoes became heavy with the mud clotting on the soles, but we were determined, we had invested too much time in this Lemur hunt to turn back now! Our two leaders were in bare feet or sandals walking through the water periodically to keep their feet clear of mud. Jim has size 12 shoes and they looked like they weighed 12#. Along the way we came across a chameleon slowly working it's way across the muddy trail.

We eventually arrived at two buildings, one an abandoned "Classique Galleria and Pizzeria" the other a shoddy home of sorts for a lone man. Our guide conversed with him and much to our horror we were taken into the abandoned building to see two Lemurs, tethered. We were saddened for two reasons, one the condition that these cute little critters were in, and two, we felt like asses! All that for this!

Not to despair, after a few false starts we trekked down the shore to a mangrove jungle where we did see them in the wild. Not sitting on our shoulders eating bananas but where they are supposed to be, in the trees.

By this time, our lust for lemurs over, we began to think about the return walk! No fear, our guide had a short-cut. Over the hills! Better sweat than mud, so off we went. The cabbie was to go and get the car and meet us on the other side of Mount Everest.

What happened next was almost magical. When we crested the hill we were in a Madagascar hill-village. The people were happy, clean and friendly, photo taking was not a problem.


Too bad they didn't have cameras because by this time we looked like part of the search party for Dr. Livingstone. Jim and I went photograph-happy. We were really into it. The girls...that was a different matter. At one point I heard F say, "at this time I understand toplessness."

The girls seemed to feel the heat and humidity more than Jim and I. The photos cannot begin to show our sorry state, but spirits were high. We wandered through the village, observing these people go about their everyday life, kids off to school,

women making their meals outside, workmen going about their business, etc. Our guide suddenly said "SNAKE!", Jim quickly grabbed Gail's hand and scooped her around and ahead, I fumbled with my fears and figured that I would be safe to look at it through my video camera eye piece, when I zoomed in it got a little spooky, but I got a bit of snake on my video, a first for me. It was about two feet long, and an inch in diameter, black. It slowly shrunk in length as it went under a rock wall into somebody's garden! In all our visits to Africa this is only the third snake we have seen alive. Ben said it was poisonous but did not know the name of it. Of course he is the same guy who said we didn't have to worry about snakes to start with.

We passed some "bars" and asked the guide if we could get some beer. This was an attempt by Jim and I to conserve the water for the girls, really! Soon, magically two ice cold bottles of Three Horse Beer appeared. Litre bottles, $2. Our guide used 'The Madagascar Bottle Opener'

Yes, I drank it!

Back in the cab, proud of our adventure and thankful to be uninjured, we drove the few miles to the market area, not a tourist market but the local market. We settled with the cabbie, with the usual look of disappointment at the size of the tip. Our guide said that he, our guide, would accompany us so we wouldn't get hassled, so we kept him. He was right. As we went to the meat market, [you don't want to know], and through the various darkened stalls selling everything you could think of we never felt pressured or hassled.

Next we went to a supermarket. More like a 1939 grocery store in Cloverdale. We made a few essential purchases and slowly wandered back to the ship. We soon met some camouflaged fellow Prinsendamians. One or two bravely walking to the local market, but most clustered in the one street bar, drinking Three Horse Beer, for which they paid $3. The closer to the ship, the higher the prices.

Back down through Tablecloth Row, [that is where the locals string up their table cloths for sale to tourists], to the port, where I think our guide was ashamed to lead his "Clients," dripping in mud and sweat through his friends there. He seemed to know everybody we met.

We paid him off and caught the tender back to the ship. Dirty, filthy, smelly, dishevelled and delightfully happy! It was "A Forest Gump Day", you never know what you are going to get! One of our better days.

Time to strip down and into the shower, F first, stomping on her mud-stained trousers to clean them before we send them out for cleaning. D did the same. F. then spent one and one half hours out on the deck cleaning our shoes. Dutiful wife that she is! Our shoes were so bad that some hawkers wanted us to give them to them, or trade goods for them, they looked so bad that I guess they assumed we would never wear them again.

A great day in Madagascar!

A port day is the luck of the draw and personal taste. I would rather have a day like today than a day in Downtown New York! Some passengers wondered why we even came here.

posted by Doug and Fellette @ 7:39 PM