Madagascar info
Hello,
Read your post and thought I might have some input that may be of value to you.
I have travelled in Madagascar twice, for 3 weeks in 2011 and for 2 months in 2015 (and we are going back again in September).
Our itinerary in 2011 was as follows:
Day 1 arr Tana
Day 2 Tana
Day 3-4 Fly to Fort Dauphin, transfer to Berenty
Day 5 Transfer Fort Dauphin, fly to Tana
Day 6-10 Fly to Maroansetra, transfer to Masoala (boat)
Day 11 Transfer (boat) to Nosy Mangabe; camp overnight
Day 12 Transfer (boat) to Maroansetra; overnight
Day 13-15 Fly to Ile St. Marie via Tana, transfer to Ile Aux Nattes
Day 16-20 Fly to Tana, transfer to Andasibe (car)
Day 21 Drive to Tana
Day 22 Depart Tana
In 2015 (Feb/Mar/Apr) we didn't plan much in advance and travelled by road from Tana to Toliara stopping in cities/towns/parks on the way.
We then flew from Toliara to Morondava (via Tana) and travelled back to Tana by road.
A few points:
-Travelling by road in Madagascar is a time consuming affair. Public transport (taxi-brousse) is cheap but not especially comfortable. Renting a car
with a driver (a 4x4 is often required) is expensive but shortens your time on the road.
-We rented a car/van for the drive from Morondava to Tana - it took 14 hours (with a short break for lunch). Not something we would happily do again. We try to take public transport as much
as possible and attempt to break up long journeys with overnight stays but it isn't always possible (especially with time limitations)
-The road from Morondava to Kirindy (with Allée des Baobabs on the way) required a 4x4 in March - at times the road became a lake.
-Allée des Baobabs is beautiful - we were lucky to be there on a clear moon-lit evening returning from Kirindy.
-In the rainy season roads are often impassable, e.g. it was not possible to drive from Toliara to Anakao in March (but the speedboats have regular service on this route)
-By road from Morondava to Toliara: we looked into this at one point but scrapped it pretty quick. However, this was in March and there might be better possibilities in the dry season.
-South of Morondava we enjoyed staying at Belo-sur-Mer (again, no road possibility but app. 3 hours in a pirogue with motor)
-We are not divers so cannot give you tips on that but we snorkelled at Ile Aux Nattes, Anakao and Belo-sur-Mer. Not the best in the world but quite enjoyable.
-We loved Masoala and if you have the time it is well worth the effort getting there. Personally I wouldn't rely on a boat to get back down the coast, even if it probably requires a flight via Tana to
get to Ile St.Marie. We are budget travellers but have not regretted spending €€ on domestic flights in Madagascar. (If I had to choose between Masoala and Ile St.Marie however, I would definitely choose Masoala)
-We chose Ile Aux Nattes instead of Ile St.Marie (smaller, a bit less crowded) and enjoyed it immensely
-As I'm sure you know, Air Madagascar flights can be rather erratic. We tried to be within driving distance to airports the day before travelling. We called to re-confirm all flights some days prior to travel. (the agents always spoke English as well as French). One of our flights was changed resulting in a missed connection in Tana but AirMad put us up in a hotel overnight.
-In case you're not aware - if you fly AirMad internationally you get a 40-50% discount on domestic flights. We flew AirMad (CDG-TNR-CDG) in 2011 for this reason. The aircraft on this route was banned from flying in the EU so they had leased another aircraft from a Portuguese company but as far as I know this issue has been resolved.
Just let me know (pm is fine) if you need any more information - happy to help!
Karin.