we are still alive and we have done a small (554,59km) bicycle trip after spending one month waiting for a parcel. It happened that we went travelling to some parts that were not in our initial plan and in this month we were out from Tana (Antananarivo) twice – we did some trekking, relaxing near the beach, lake, visited some national parks, went up north and found out that there are regular cargo-boats to the Comoros and from there to Tanzania (wohoo!). Later about that...
After our parcel with new Schwalbe tyres, a new front rack, rear mirrors, bags and other stuff arrived (that was a long story, and we had to pay so much taxes for it that we will think twice before sending a parcel to Africa - in how many pieces it should come and what value should be declared), we packed immediately and left the next day - we had already missed sitting on our bikes so much!
We spent 6 days cycling - here is a table of the details:
| Date | Route (elevation) | Time | Distance | Average | Maximum | Comments |
| 25.02 | Antananarivo (1276m)- Ambatolampy (1644m) | 05:11:35 | 72,25 | 13,9 | 49,5 | Hilly sphagetti road, dangerous taxi-brousse drivers. It was quite tough for the first day after such a long time and I got a serious muscle pain after:). Going out from Tana was annoying - ugly traffic pollution, especially uphill. More ups than downs :) It rained quite a bit so we had to stop from time to time to put the rainwear on and off. |
| 26.02 | Ambatolampy | - | - | - | - | Resting and visiting the town. |
| 27.02 | Antsirabe (1500m) | 05:33:54 | 100,64 | 17,5 | 52,2 | Long downhills, beautiful scenery. Agnius got a broken spoke in the 13th kilometre, so I took a part of the weight and we continued until we finally reached Antsirabe. |
| 28.02 | - | - | - | - | Lazy :) Agnius is fixing the spoke - we don't have the gear cassette unlock tool, so they did some "inventing". Big market, with huge second-hand sections, loads of fruits, avocados and everything. Lovely place to stay for a while. | |
| 1.03 | Ambositra (1297m) | 05:00:36 | 94,83 | 18,9 | 49,9 | Even more beautiful scenery. Broken spoke after a few kilometres. Then the next one, just before putting the stuff back on the bike - lucky Agnius:).He must have tightened the spokes with all his power, I guess... Long downhills and uphills (we crossed over 1597m hill). Wanted to go a bit further and camp, but good that we didn't do it as it started pouring like hell soon after we decided to stay in a small hotel. |
| 2.03 | Ranomafana NP (~1300m) | 08:42:55 | 129,78 | 14,8 | 52,1 | This was a long day. We expected to go downhill all the time, but nooo :) It was a long uphill for quite a while from the beginning. Ups and downs and again.. We had to ride around 25km of shaky gravel road after the fork to Ranomafana. Asphalt was greeted with the biggest joy. Long, steep downhill, surrounded by misty rainforest - simply amazing. We stayed near the gate, camping, and decided not to visit the National Park as it was raining. |
| 3.03 | Irondro (44m) | 04:27:22 | 84,14 | 18,8 | 52 | This had to be our long-waited downhill, but again - no. Started very late and our breakfast was more like a lunch. It became much hotter down here! None of us had motivation for long distance today, but in the end we made over 84km - luckily there WAS more downhill on the second part. Or maybe it is just how we feel it:) Again - a broken spoke, it was not easy to invent now, because the spoke was on the sprocket side, |
| 4.03 | Manakara (29m) | 05:12:21 | 72,95 | 14 | 52,5 | This was the most difficult day for me - VERY HOT. Two more broken spokes, plus - the one from yesterday. Now it is three:) Again I took over some weight. In the end we hitch-hiked a car when it was 30km left to Manakara (we were supposed to do 102km today). Definitely not my day, I didn't feel pleasure of cycling at all. It's a shame, because the scenery was actually nice (but lacking forest, unfortunately), but you just don't see it when getting tired. |
Here are some things that we noticed during this trip:
- the most beautiful part was Ambatolampy-Antsirabe-Ambositra;
- on the road from Antananarivo to Antsirabe people were selling different things in every village (weavings, baskets and bags, mushrooms, pumpkins, holy sculptures, souvenir car models, small guitars, berries, etc.) - if you see something that you like, it is better not to wait for the next one, because you might not find any other. Different theme in every village :)
- people ask for money. I was a bit disappointed as we haven't experienced much of hospitality in Madagascar so far (it is very noticeable after coming from Indonesia and Malaysia), often you see expecting eyes - especially children. We didn't hear much of it closer to Tana, but as we were getting closer to Ranomafana (no such experience in Ranomafana itself) "bonjour vazaha" and "bon voyage vazaha" became "bonbon vazaha" or just "bonbon", without any hello and even demanding. Most of the kids scream it over and over again and don't stop until you disappear behind a hill or a turn. It became very tiring at some moments. Please - if you feel like giving charity, make something good for community and support a local school or something, but not individuals. Those expecting eyes of the people (and often - they say it), that is very sad - not because they are poor, they are not starving, but because they see you as a gift machine.
We stayed in Manakara for 3 nights and took a train to Fianarantsoa. For "vazaha" it coasts 40.000Ar (4 bicycles cost around 13.500Ar extra, as an overweight of 60kg) and at least this time of the year it goes twice a week. Our train was supposed to leave 7 in the morning, and we woke up at 5. But finally we had to wait almost until 11, when it moved. We heard it would go around 13 hours but we spent almost 24 hours on board - most of the time we were just waiting for the tones of banana or other goods to be loaded. The seats were quite small and later the "1st class" doesn't look like - it seems that when the train is full, it doesn't matter so much. So the sleep was not as comfortable as it could have been... And the scenery.. well, have seen much better (considering that the most beautiful part was probably covered by the night), but of course it was nice to see those villages that only the train reaches. And the fruits were super-cheap.
Now we have ambitions to visit so many places, that we have to leave our bikes in Fianarantsoa. Agnius's bike needs to be repaired, and nobody has the tool. Well, it is possible to do it without it, but anyway, we don't have time for everything so now we will continue with the public transport.
Tightly stuck clay house village
Streets of Ambatolampy are full of aluminium shops. We wondered into one of the workshops, where they make souvenirs (and wanted to make us "visit the process" - that was rather not nice of "inviting", so we didn't even go to that side) from aluminium window frame leftovers.
The colourful Pouss-pouss
It is a quite common means of transportation. These are more serious ones, usually they are made from leftovers too, old bearings are used for wheels. People steer this vehicle by pulling the rope. Going downhill is very loud and sometimes it looks scary, but we haven't seen any accidents :)
Everything (almost) for a bike. Every old part, even almost decomposed, can be "waken up" for a new life.
THB - three horses beer is a most popular beer brand. We like the way they paint the houses-shops and there are no ugly plastic commercials.
There is a lot of clay... Villages in the highlands are made from clay and bricks.
Sometimes you have to slow down not to run into one of the zebus (local cows).
It was not easy to resist buying one of those cheap guitars... Every village has it's own speciality of products they make and sell.
This area was only grapes
...and here - only souvenir/toy cars..
Scenery of the valley (on the road from Ambatolampy)
The valley is full of rice balconies.
Joyful turkey herdswomen. After they were trying to ask for money (they say "la munei"), but were not sure how to say it - it seems they haven't done it but probably heard that "vazaha" should have a lot of money..
Another area - apples.
They put them really nicely :)
The road of the sky
Pouss-pouss in Antsirabe - they run fast, but we would not feel comfortable seeing somebody working so hard for the distance that you can walk yourself. Sometimes they are really insisting - even if they see you on a bicycle :)
Transporting the coal.
We were surprised how clean it is in Madagascar. The empty bottles and everything else that is reusable can be found in the market. And there are hundreds of ways to recycle - love it.
These guys are making sandals from old tyres. A pair costs 5.000Ar
Our orders were perfect
A season of pineapples is almost over and now it is time for avocados - we eat them almost every day.
Agnius and company changing the spoke
A small village shop - today you can buy some meat here
Coal sellers. People cut trees for producing coal, which is number one source of energy for cooking food.
We saw a few accidents in those wavy roads
Chameleons try to cross the road sometimes, like this one.
In one mountain area the had these berries.
When you stop to buy some, everybody grabs his basket and tries to sell. The basket sizes are different but they all cost 1.000Ar:) We noticed that 1.000Ar is a very common price for many things :)
Sometimes the road got worse but that was not a big problem for us
Another tight village..
A duck/chicken/geese seller under the shade.
Ranomafana National Park
Another chameleon caught on the road (and put back safely) was interested in the mirror.
This was another accident. People were picking bananas from the water (I am not sure if the truck smashed some banana trees or it was delivering banana).
A pleasant 6km way down and laying down the bike from one side to another:) This was one of the moments that I was dreaming about when climbing up - a reward.
Scenery on the way to Irondro
These are our favourite fruits (also a season now) which we are almost fed up with. They remind of yoghurt
A famous bridge of Manakara, connecting the mainland and Manakara Be - a strip near the ocean. A story says this bridge collapsed when one really overweighted truck was passing. I don't know if the truck made it or not but now pedestrians are using the wooden stairs. Cars have to go round as there is another, small bridge.
Children posing near their school in Manakara Be. They were the first ones who were thanking me for taking pictures (I stopped to take a picture of the school, but they saw me and started running out happily :)) and didn't ask for anything.
Almost every Pouss-pouss has a painting of a Madagascarian motive on the back.
This was our last dinner in Manakara. The lights there are fisherman who are trying to find eels - now it is a season and eels are the speciality of Manakara.
The workers expect (well, more like demand) to get something for helping to load the bikes. But we do it ourselves and every charge must be followed buy a receipt - there is always somebody trying to suck some money. But it was already painful to pay this crazy amount of money for a 24h, 170km ride.
Cleane-up before leaving
