July 13, 2007
Follow this plan to go about 300km from point A (Isalo NP) to point H (Fort Dauphin) on public transportation through some of the deserts of Madagascar, the fourth largest island in the world:
A - Beginning from the village of Ranohira close to the entrance to Isalo NP, take the two hour taxi-brousse ride to the town of Ihosy. Spend the night to get an early start on the long ride south. Do not be alarmed at the family of five crouched in the shadows beneath your hotel room window. The father, who grips a lethal looking spear, is the night watchman. Sleep well.
B - The next morning arrive at the bus station promptly at eight. When the bus finally leaves at noon be comforted that your wait has secured the two coveted fronts seats, which provide a sliver of additional space and a clear view of six hours of desert mountains and scrub plains. Also, enjoy your experience six hours of pot holes, wash-boarded road, and washed out four-wheel dirt tracks.
C - Spend three days in dusty, but not unpleasant, Betroka (pronouced Be-TRU-ka) telling everyone you meet who asks, mystified, why you're there, that you are trying to get to Fort Dauphin. And, listen to your neighbor, too scared to leave the hotel, tell you about cattle rustling, bandits and the guy who had his arm shot off down the road 10 days earlier.
D - Buy tickets for a bus. When the buses all show up full, get a refund and resign yourself to two more days in Betroka. While Leah is at the food market the next morning and you are reading the end of a mystery in the hotel room in your underpants, find out from each hotel employee, your neighbors and several passersby, who burst into your room one at a time, that your refunded ticket was sold to a four door mini-truck going most of the way, labeled "African Development Fund", owned by five people who dislike their own comfort. And, you have five minutes to pack and leave.
E - Suppress the memory of riding in a mini-truck for 15 bruising hours along more bad "road." Enjoy the 10 minutes of paved road in the middle of nowhere.
F - When the price of a room for a night in Amboasary is expensive enough to make the driver snort with laughter at the greedy hotel owner, accept the invitation to pitch a tent in front of a school room in which the African Development people spend the night.
G - The next morning, switch to a taxi-brousse for the last 75km and 4 hours, filled to record-setting capacity and which has live chickens hanging upside down from the roof and over the windows. (I have pictures of this, in case you don't believe me.)
H - Arrive at Fort Dauphin's dusty bus station and walk the hilly, relaxed town desperately trying to see the ocean. When you do finally see water, stop in the middle of the road and gape your mouth towards the ruggedly beautiful beaches.
Congratulations, you have reached Fort Dauphin, the launching points for a pirogue (a type of small canoe) excursion to the tiny fishing villages of Evatra and a week at Andohahela National Park!
