Day 8 Andringitra National Park
Trip Start
May 25, 2007
1
8
17
Trip End
Jun 10, 2007
Andringitra, Madagascar
Saturday, June 2, 2007
Phillibert and our other local guides joined us on the bus for our ride to the start of the walk. Soon though Roger said the road was too bad and he was not going to drive us any further. We got out and began to walk.
We walked maybe 2 miles until Mamy said, "This is the start of the walk."
I have to say, that although we seemed to spend the first 10km walking uphill and even though it took us over nine and a half hours, it was the most spectacular walk I have ever been on.
In total we climbed 4-500m, first through forest with Phillibert pointing out chameleons, crickets and other insects or plants. We had lunch on a rock in the middle of a crystal clear river surrounded by granite peaks. The water was so clear we could fill our water bottles straight from the river. We split up into smaller groups, with the asthmatic photographers at the back!
We crossed the 'plateau' where Phillibert assured me there would be no more up. It was the steepest, most uphill plateau I have ever seen! Here we saw a snake. There are no poisonous snakes in Madagascar and Phillibert took great pleasure in catching it and letting us photograph it. He said that ants dig holes and allow a snake to come in and hide, they feed it grasshoppers until it is too big to escape then they fill in the hole at the top, kill the snake, eat it and clean out the hole again ready for the next victim.
Over the plateau, we climbed again into the 'moon landscape'. Here, it looked like a giant rock garden with colourful lichens making artistic patterns on the rocks and strange, almost alien plants clinging to the trail of mountain streams. Above us, red kites circled on the thermals. To our left, blue mountain tops spread as far as the eye could see.
I thought walking downhill back to the road where we started our walk would be easy, but it was nearly the hardest part of the walk. The rock steps were very steep and tough on my knees. The views were impressive though, particularly as the sun was beginning to set.
When we made it back to the bus, it was dark. We drove back, had a luke warm shower and dinner in the open air again.
