Weddingbee Blog

And the story continues…

When our time at Anjajavy was over, because of weird flight issues (the Anjajavy private plane that’s the only source of transportation only runs three days per week, and Air France screwed up our return flights), we had nearly two days in Antananarivo (don’t worry, everyone just calls it Tana!) which is an incredibly vital and real, although poverty stricken, African city. We loved what time we spent in Tana, but probably wouldn’t have wanted to spend more time there.

We were also exhausted (side note: you should DEFINITELY hire a driver and guide if you go to Tana - there are no real street names so cab drivers don’t know what you’re talking about unless you can describe it with relation to landmarks, and there are a number of less savory parts of the city that travelers should try to avoid). Our guide just drove us around and showed us various spots and we got out to wander around a few areas, but still felt as though we’d seen most of the city by the end of our 1.5 days. The trip out to Ambohimanga is definitely worth the time if you have it though!

Whew, that’s a lot! But of course I have to give you the “but…” section with the negatives…. Our only real regret/problem was that apparently Malarone, the most common preventive medicine for malaria, causes extremely vivid nightmares and sleep disruption. So even though all our days were completely relaxing, we didn’t really sleep well at all the entire time we were there, and talked to a bunch of other guests who all said exactly the same thing. The greater peninsula on which Anjajavy is located hasn’t had a single case of malaria in over 30 years, so the employees were telling us just to stop taking the pills, but Tana does still have a fair amount of malaria, and one of the other guests told us a story about a guy who stopped taking his malaria pills and dropped dead six months later, so we figured better safe than sorry.

But basically, Malarone sucks and be prepared for the fact that virtually everyone who takes it has extremely extremely vivid dreams (mostly nightmares!) mixed with the inability to sleep at all! Did this ruin our honeymoon? Nowhere near! Was it a pain? Welllll yes. Are we looking forward to finishing the course of the treatment for 1 week after you leave the potentially malaria infected region? Not at aaaall.

Oh and one other mini-problem! Remember how we were going to spend 24 hours in Paris on our way there? Yeeeah not so much. Our plane was delayed nearly seven hours so we didn’t get to our hotel until past 7:00 PM so we just ate dinner and wandered for like an hour then went to bed and got up at 6:00 to go back to the airport. So it was nice getting to see a wee bit of Paris but didn’t really feel like an actual visit at ALL.

And now…here’s part two of pictures! (Starting when we’re still at Anjajavy because the bulk of our pictures were taken there.)

Really crazy light at the smaller of the two villages we visited, Amboudro-Ampasy:

Beautiful sifaka:

Mr. Bluebell bonding with a sifaka:

Upside down sifaka! They do this all the time; I want feet like that!

The view from one of the hikes we went on, of a private cove:

Hey there, Mr. Lizard.

The incredibly scary rickety crooked ladder we had to climb down into the cave to see the fossilized extinct lemur skull (the size of a gorilla!)

The pirogue (traditional Malagasy boat) we went sailing in! One of those guys sat on the outrigger the entire time.

Some kids playing on a pirogue as we approach Anjajavy village:

There is no electricity, etc. in the village, so all the kids were begging to have their pictures taken so we could show them to them. 90% of my pictures from the village are just close ups of the kids! They were all so cute and sweet.

The Sunday market in Anjajavy village. With about 600 residents, it’s by far the largest village in the vicinity so people come from all around every Sunday to shop, mainly for fruits, vegetables, and meat.

Me wearing the traditional lamaown (no clue how that should be spelled) I bought, and contemplating the embroidered tablecloths sewn by the women of the village. A non-profit was set up to provide the women with supplies and training and the embroidery is just magnificent!! (I bought a tablecloth with matching napkins and a runner for about $20 USD and am still kicking myself for not buying more!!)

Hehe, this just cracked me up. Someone named this beat-up old pirogue Telephon Portable - aka Cell Phone!!

BABY LEMUR!!! If you look closely just below the mother’s elbow you can see the baby sifaka’s head peeking out on the right!!!

A view down on the flight back to Tana:

Tana (Antananarivo, the capital city of Madagascar) from up on the hill by the Rova (Queen’s Palace):

Another view of Tana:

At Ambohimanga, there are two teeny holes in the rock where women throw pebbles to try to solve infertility. If your pebble lands in the hole to the left, you’ll have a girl; the hole to the right, you’ll have a boy. I gave it a shot but apparently my interpretation of the hole wasn’t quite as strict as theirs was? Because I thought I was going to have like 4 girls but they laughed and said they didn’t go all the way in…

More views of Tana:

Random street in Tana:

…and that’s it! It was truly incredible, and I highly recommend Madagascar, and more specifically Anjajavy for anyone who’s interested!!!