Our first full day in Madagascar. In the morning, we caught our flight to Morondava and met up with our guide for the next week. Morondava is n the West coast, and is famous for its fishing and its giant Baobab trees. After a late lunch, we were driven to the "Baobab Lovers" (picture will make the reasoning for the name clear). Once we returned to town, we checked into our hotel, and took a walk on the beach - until the hawkers drove us back to the hotel, which was fine with Christopher, because the 3rd-place World-Cup game was about to start.
A couple of things about the Baobab trees worth noting: Baobab's grow very slowly, and a lot of the ones in the picture below are over 2000 years old; the trees are commercially useless - they are fibrous and cannot be used for lumber, and this has helped to prevent them from being harvested; the fruits are edible, but not delicious.
I was surprised that Madagascar, in many ways, has more similarities to Indonesia/Malaysia than it does to mainland Africa, both ethnically and culturally. Rickshaws and Tuk-Tuks everywhere. A lot of seafood and rice.
Amazing sunset.
We have been warned that for the next several days, internet will be spotty. The number of pictures I can upload will also be entirely dependent on internet speed. Here, it takes 20 seconds to get a text response to a Google query (uploading photos will be a chore). The pictures below took over an hour.
I will do my best to upload when access is available.
Driving out towards the Baobab Lovers: baobabs in the rice fields
Driving through the Avenue of the Baobabs
Jana dwarfed by a big tree.
The lovers
From the opposite side (with sun behind)
Returning thought the Avenue of the Baobabs
More Baobabs in the fields
Women working in the rice fields
Back to town. The market was bustling with people, tuk-tuks and rickshaws.
A sand crab that Christopher found
Sunset over the Indian Ocean
Christopher at sunset.
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