Nautilus diving

Trip Start Oct 17, 2006

Trip End Apr 27, 2007

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Hotel Nautilus

Flag of Madagascar Ifaty, Madagascar
Friday, April 6, 2007

After a stormy night in Tulear, with candle lit dinner thanks to the power cuts, we caught a Renault 4 taxi to Ifaty with a girl called Linda from Leeds. There are very few roads in Madagascar that are paved, and the road to Ifaty isn't one of them. Our Renault 4 bounced its way admirably along the 22km of dirt track past mud huts and zebu drawn carts. We stopped 3 times along the way for the driver to present his papers (read 'pay bribe') to the police.

We stayed at a great hotel called Nautilus, very pricey but it was the diving school that drew us in. The air con was also a big draw as the temperature was rising and it was very humid, especially in the afternoon. The Lonely Planet described Tulear as falling into 'heat drenched torpor' between 1pm and 3pm and we can confirm this.

We just did one dive off Ifaty at an offshore reef. Sadly the area has been overfished so we didn't see as much as anticipated but there were some fantastic anemones and a handful of smaller fish. It was also interesting to swim along a kind of canyon in the reef.

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