Category: Madagascar

The cultural side of Madagascar gets less attention than the wildlife and is easier to reach. Markets, village visits, vanilla and spice farms, craft workshops and the vast zebu market at Ambalavao all sit alongside the standard circuits, and several…

Île aux Nattes, known in Malagasy as Nosy Nato, is a car-free island of around three square kilometres off the southern tip of Île Sainte-Marie, widely rated as holding the finest beaches in Madagascar. Access is by dugout pirogue across…

Madagascar rewards travellers willing to work for it. The via ferrata at Tsingy de Bemaraha, the summit of Pic Boby at 2,658 metres, the four-day trek to the silky sifaka at Marojejy and the Tsiribihina river descent are the genuine…

The Avenue of the Baobabs is Madagascar's most photographed place, a 260-metre stretch of dirt road near Morondava lined with 20 to 25 Grandidier's baobabs standing 30 metres tall. Most visitors come for sunrise or sunset and stay an hour…

Cyclone season in Madagascar runs from roughly November to April with a peak in January and February, and the east coast and northeast take the worst of it. Storms cut roads, stop ferries, disrupt flights and close several parks outright.…

Île Sainte-Marie, known in Malagasy as Nosy Boraha, is a narrow island off Madagascar's east coast offering the most accessible humpback whale watching in the Indian Ocean, uncrowded lagoon beaches and the world's only pirate cemetery. Whale season runs July…

Ambalavao sits on the RN7 about 55 km south of Fianarantsoa and holds three things worth stopping for: the Antemoro paper workshop, the largest zebu market in Madagascar on Wednesdays and Thursdays, and access to Anja Community Reserve 13 km…

Baie de Baly National Park is the only place on earth where the ploughshare tortoise survives in the wild, one of the rarest reptiles anywhere and the target of a poaching trade that has pushed it to the edge. Four…

Madagascar has reefs on every coast and the diving is far less developed than the wildlife, which is both the drawback and the appeal. Nosy Be and the northern archipelago hold the most infrastructure, Toliara has the longest barrier reef,…

Madagascar is safe for most visitors who travel sensibly, though several governments currently advise a high degree of caution. The realistic risks are petty theft in Antananarivo, road travel and health rather than anything involving wildlife. A transitional government has…