Tag Archives: National Park

Still getting there – Day 2: Transfer to Masoala Forest Lodge

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Sunday 2 Jane 2024 – After less than four hours’ sleep, we didn’t exactly spring out of bed with a song on our lips, but we did manage to get ourselves presentable and breakfasted in time for Aina to take us to the airport, past scenes of Sunday morning activity.

Even though it was Sunday, the streets were quite busy and the shops were open. Aina pointed out that shopping was a major activity, since very few people had the means to keep food fresh, so going shopping several times a day is the norm.

Once again, arrival at the airport was a slightly disconcerting experience; instead of dropping us off in front of the terminal building (where quite a lot of people seemed aimlessly to be standing about doing nothing), he parked up and suggested we stay in the car for five minutes.  A couple of guys in red high-vis came over and Aina got out and opened the boot so they could get at our bags.  Trustingly, we followed them and they appeared to be going towards the check in area, which was reassuring.  En route, we met a friendly American chap who introduced himself as Tom and told us that (a) he was going to be joining us on our flight and (b) we three would be the only passengers.  The check-in area bore out his story.

It was a fairly standard check-in, except that all three of us were weighed alongside our baggage.  Having gone through the standard security thing, we climbed into a battered minibus for our mystery tour to the middle of the airfield, which is where we found out why there were so few passengers and why the weight mattered.

Our transport was a Cessna 206, which has just four seats.  One of them is, of course, needed for the driver, who was called Fury.

We settled ourselves in for the two-hour flight and donned ear defenders, which were very uncomfortable, but absolutely necessary.

A flight in a small aircraft is a golden opportunity to get some aerial photos – if the weather permits.  We had moderate luck.  Jane was on the better side of the plane for photos and got a shot of the extensive rice fields outside the town,

but as we ascended, blanket cloud coverage developed below us.  This persisted long enough that I decided I would try to make up for lack of sleep, so dozed for a while.  When I woke up, it was to see that the clouds had cleared and so there were some good aerial shots to be taken. They were quite revealing, and, as it turns out, demonstrated to me how easy it is to miss a story if you’re not paying attention.

Out of my side of the plane, I saw mainly forests.

but what I missed was the signs of cultivation even among the hills, which you can see bottom left in this photo.

What Jane saw on the other side of the aircraft was a radically different story – that of massive agricultural exploitation.

which extended pretty all the way up to Lake Alaotra, which lies about halfway between Tana and Maroantsetra, the airport we were headed to.

At the north end of the lake, there were extensive rice plantations.

Even in the forested areas, it was possible to see the consequences of this exploitation in brown water in the rivers caused by agricultural run-off.

The flight had given me entirely the wrong impression about the state of the land in this area of Madagascar.  It turned out that Tom, our fellow passenger, is a distinguished academic – a Professor and chair of the Global Health Institute at Emory University in Atlanta, Georgia in the USA, and heavily involved with the Valbio Centre at Ranomafana, which works to protect Madagascar’s unique and biologically diverse ecosystems through conservation science and projects that directly benefit the local people.

It’s the first time I’ve ever met someone who merits a Wikipedia entry.

In later conversations with Tom, we learned a huge amount about the Madagascan environment including its reckless over-exploitation – 90% deforestation across the island – and its consequences to the health of the population; for example, one in six children born in Madagascar die before their first birthday.  Some reforestation projects are under way, but those aerial photos give some insight into the scope of the problems faced by the people here.

Eventually we landed at Maroantsetra, a decidedly rural airport.

The final stage of our journey to today’s destination – Masoala Forest Lodge – was by boat; but we had to get to the boat first, a journey which was undertaken in the sort of transport

which, it turned out, was essential for anyone trying to get anywhere on the local roads.

We passed the outskirts of the village, but the ride was so bumpy that I completely failed to get any decent photos of the life we were passing, which is a shame; it being Sunday morning, people were going home from church (or possibly to the pub, I don’t know) and so were dressed in their finery.

The boatport was rudimentary

but it had a decent loo (something we had been warned was not available at the airport) and, importantly, a boat.

It was also a chance for us to meet Ursula, who was our guide from the Masoala Forest Lodge. Accompanied by Pascal, the other guide from the lodge, she shepherded Tom, Jane and me aboard and we set off for what was a long, bumpy and really not very interesting hour’s ride to get to the lodge. There were a few other small boats out on the water, powered either by hand or by sail

but otherwise precious little of interest to distract us. So we were glad to get to the Forest Lodge, and were made warmly welcome by Jessie and Alban with a drink and a short presentation about How Things Worked Here, which seemed both content-rich and relaxed at the same time – no mean feat of organisation. There are many possible activities on offer – wildlife walks, kayaks, snorkeling, canoeing – all in a lovely rainforest setting, and executed with as much attention paid to sustainability as possible; built in local materials, powered by solar power, serving locally-sourced produce at mealtimes and so forth. It’s an effortlessly friendly place, superbly organised and a great place for what we were primarily interested in, which is to see some of the wildlife for which Madagascar is justly famed.

Alban showed us to our accommodation

which was the point at which I realised that Jane had snared me into something that was dangerously approximate to glamping – nice and comfortable, yes, but imposing a need to get dressed and to tackle a flight of stairs should one need to visit the loo during the night.

Hmmmm….

Having dropped off our bags, we went to the lounge area where we were once again made welcome and offered cocktails and lunch, which was very good.  After just seven hours’ sleep over the last two nights, a siesta then beckoned before tea and a short excursion on an outrigger sailing boat which was parked in front of the bar.

The enjoyment of the day continued relentlessly thereafter, with sundowner cocktails

and dinner, which was, again, a very good meal. Much was made of the fact that the sun had been shining, which apparently is a departure from previous days.

After dinner,  we had our first chance to see some of that wildlife, on a night walk.  Similar to our time in Costa Rica, night time is the right time to see some animals, particularly the nocturnal ones, and so Ursula and Pascal took the three of us for a short walk around the local trails. As was the case in Costa Rica, I was astonished at the skill of both guides at spotting animals that I would have simply walked by, and with their knowledge about them.  The walk was a good introduction to the local wildlife.  There are 10 species of Lemur in the Masoala forest, and we found several within walking (or, in my case, stumbling) distance of the lodge.

Wooly Lemurs
Wooly Lemur
Mouse Lemur
Mouse Lemur

Masoala Sportive Lemur

We also caught sight of a bamboo lemur, but it was photographically uncooperative.  As well  as lemurs, we saw some of the other denizens of the forest.

Malagasy Kingfisher
Bright-eyed Tree Frog
Cyligramma joa Boisduval

Cyligramma joa Boisduval

Erebus Walkeri

Erebus Walkeri

At this point it started to become apparent why what we were walking around in was called a rainforest, so we retired swiftly to the lounge area and thence to bed for the night.

Before we retired, we discussed plans for the morrow and decided that, weather permitting, we’d go for a morning hike a short way up the coast.  This thing, “weather permitting”, is a feature of staying at the lodge.  The Masoala rainforest is the largest area of rainforest on Madagascar and the Masoala National Park is the largest protected area on the island. I have been to things that called themselves rainforests before, but never one as wet as this.  All the people we talked to seemed to be overjoyed that the sun had actually shone today, and equally uncertain as to what tomorrow’s weather would be like. So we’ll take a check on the rain and perhaps the hike will be a reasonable plan.  Stay tuned to find out.

Day 24, Part 2 – First flight of Angel’s

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Tuesday 14 March 2023 (0900) – Having got our wellies on, we trotted off after Angel as he led us on our first tour.  It wasn’t especially hot – I don’t know in detail, and there was no internet available to check up on this kind of thing – but I suspect it was a few degrees short of 30°C.  But when we got into the forest, it became clear that the humidity was pretty high.

Angel explained a little of the history of the La Sirena Ranger Station as we headed off on this tour.  The site was once home to an airstrip and so there was a certain amount of exploitation of the resources – forest one side of the airstrip was cut down, leaving primary forest only on one side.  In the mid-seventies the government stepped in and closed down the exploitation by setting the area up as a National Park, and now the side that had been cut down is growing again, as secondary forest.  Numbers of tourists are carefully controlled, as is their behaviour when they are in the park.  The desire is to make it as natural as possible, so there is no feeding of the wildlife, which is left to get on with its own business in its own way.  The rangers maintain tracks through the forest and it is these trails which the various tours go along.

The experienced guides (and Angel is one such) know the patterns of wildlife behaviour in the various areas of the Park and so can do a little bit by way of tailoring their routes to match the desires of their groups, some of whom will have detailed and arcane species to seek, and others have a more general desire to See Stuff.  I’d put Jane and me about midway on that spectrum; having been here for over three weeks (and having been lucky on other tours) we’d seen a good selection of wildlife and only had a few boxes we’d like to tick.

So, come with us on a typical wildlife tour in Corcovado National Park.

The first thing that struck me as we walked along is that for an area which holds a reputed 5% of the world’s biodiversity, bugger-all happens. I had some kind of fanciful idea that the wildlife would be running, flapping and flying around us and making loud wildlife kinds of noise.  I suppose this image comes from having visited the Galapagos islands, where you actually have to step over some creatures because the buggers won’t get out of your way.

Corcovado is not like that.

A three-hour tour, such as we did this morning, consists mainly of following your guide and trying not to fall over the innumerable tree roots that cross the path – because there are a lot of trees in this forest, many of them quite magnificent.

Every so often, the guide will stop and peer around, sometimes trying to foment some kind of action by imitating animals or birds.

Then the guide will suddenly stop, point and tell you what can be seen. In the case of our group, this consisted of Jane quickly being able to see things, followed by many minutes of (normally) patient explanation by the two of them to tell me exactly which tree I should be looking at and exactly which branch the practically-invisible bird is perching on. Many more minutes follow whilst I try to get a photo of whatever it is that’s in focus and not obscured by the fucking vegetation which grows abundantly in these parts, for some reason.  Photographically there tend to be three outcomes; Angel uses his spotter scope, considerable skill and one of our phones to get an image; I get a fix on the animal and shoot off several frames in the hope that one might be in focus; or I give up because whatever it is that Angel has found I simply can’t see because of my deteriorating eyesight.

Occasionally it works, and I managed to pierce the vegetation to pick out a shot, like this Agouti, munching on mushrooms. (I have to say that the combination of a Nikon Z6, a 100-400mm lens and the camera’s ability to help getting the focus right by a capability called “focus peaking” was at times essential and hope this shot demonstrates that).

Sometimes (rarely, of course) the wildlife in question moves into a spot where in theory it’s possible to take a more satisfactory shot (the Agouti again).

Sometimes what the guide finds is so unutterably tiny and so distant that I have no chance of seeing it for myself, so a mobile+scope shot is the only way to get an image, like this long-nosed bat

which is tiny but which Angel not only could see but could find with his scope and muster the photo with Jane’s phone.  Very impressive and, for me, very frustrating.

The reason it’s frustrating is a philosophical one with its roots in copyright law. Because Angel took that photo, it’s not mine and so I can’t take any pride in it.  It’s lovely to see the creature an’ all that, but as I’ve said elsewhere in these pages, if I didn’t take a photo of it, it didn’t exist or never happened. There were times I was able to see things and still couldn’t get a decent shot. For example, we were wandering along, and I was several paces behind Jane and Angel when all of a sudden an anteater – a fucking anteater, one of the things we Jane really wanted to see! – calmly wandered across a log not twenty yards from me.  Could I get a decent shot? Could I buggery.

A combination of my own incompetence and there being too much vegetation in the way.  The best I could do, before the benighted creature disappeared from view was this.

Jane maintains this is a great image, and it is indeed sharp.  But I never caught the head and face, which means it’s not, to me, a satisfactory image. Angel was pleased that he saw it, too, even though all he got was a dwindling rear view.

Anyhoo…

When groups meet or get in earshot of each other, the guides communicate among themselves to say what they’ve seen and where.  And every so often there’s a frisson as something worthwhile is visible, like this Collared Forest Falcon

and you take your pictures and then turn round and see that The Word Is Out.

The guides all can hear things that normal people can’t and so they might hear the peep of a bird and know (a) where to look for it and (b) what they should be looking out for. They also look at the ground to see what clues there are there.  Often, it’s just scuffing where a Peccary or two has been rooting around for stuff; but sometimes it is another frisson, like, in this case, Tapir footprints.

We ended up scurrying through the trails, along with many other people, following reports of a Tapir having been seen.  Eventually we persuaded Angel to break away from this scurrying as we’d already seen Tapirs and we were getting fed up with (French) people pushing in in front of us.

The trail we then followed led to the beach

where, after a while, we saw a Black Iguana.

At first I thought it was a wooden carving that some unkind soul had put there to annoy punters like me, but no, it really was a genuine Iguana.

Other things we saw included a pair of Trogons, man and wife;

Male Baird’s Trogon
Female Baird’s Trogon

a decent view of a Tinamou, the “Forest Chicken”;

and a male Curassow (apparently auditioning for Yellow-Nose Day)

which was disinclined immediately to make way for us; but mainly what we saw were scenes of serene sylvan boskiness

which were pleasant enough but devoid of any further wildlife sightings of any pith or moment.

And then we were back at the Ranger Station and it was time for lunch, which is very works canteenish, but set up very efficiently.  Jane went vegetarian whilst I opted for the beef.  Jane’s decision was definitely the wiser.

Thus ended our first Flight of Angel’s.  We didn’t know what excitement (or otherwise) the afternoon might bring, and neither do you, which is why you should come back to read the next thrilling instalment. Yes, really.

Day 24, Part 1: Cor! Covado

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Tuesday 14 March 2023 – I don’t think that I ever, in all my 42 years in Corporate life, had to get up at 0330 and wait, in fear and trepidation that the taxi wouldn’t show up to whisk me off to wherever. But that’s what this particular Monday morning held for us. It never happens in business, therefore we must be on holiday travelling. The plan was to catch a boat to La Sirena, where we could spend a couple of days in the wildlife reserve that is the Corcovado National Park, an ecosystem that is reputed to house some 5% of the world’s total biodiversity.  Our mission, which we appear to have accepted, was, unsurprisingly, to see what we could see and what photos we could get of this huge biodiversity. But it required this early start.

The combined efforts of the agency looking after this particular segment of our trip and the concierge team at El Remanso, however, seemed to be on the same page, and Luis (the El Remanso chap who had picked us up in Puerto Jiménez) arrived at 0415 bearing breakfast wraps.  He would have picked up our bags from our room, too, but in an excess of caution I’d brought them along in case we needed sudden and swift access to them.  The agency had sent a pickup truck and so we rode the bumpy trail back to Puerto Jiménez. The idea was that we should take just an overnight supply of essentials to La Sirena and our suitcases would go on to meet us once we’d left the National Park.  Since my backpack was full of all my camera gear, this meant that Jane had take on a minimal change of clothing and toiletries for us both.

It was at this point that my visualisation of the journey to the National Park proved really wide of the mark.

I had fondly imagined that the reason for the early start was so we could go to this port (Puerto Jiménez, after all, would appear to have ambitions of portliness), where we would be catching a day-trippers’ boat of some size to get us to a disembarkation point near to “La Sirena”, where there is a ranger’s station at which we would spend the night,

Not quite.

What actually happened was nearer how I imagine the retreat from Dunkirk must have been, but without the military uniforms and the threat of enemy fire.

We were deposited near something that could only just about be graced with the the title “beach”, where it was clear that many other people were expecting to go on a similar journey to ours.

The soundtrack was amazing, courtesy of some parrots in the trees.

Fortunately there was someone there (apparently the daughter of the local  owner of some (all?) of the boats) who knew what was supposed to happen and therefore managed to develop some kind of order from the apparent chaos.  At least we had a decent sunrise to watch whilst we waited to see what happened next.

The lump on the horizon to the left of the rising sun is apparently Volcán Barú in Panama, which is normally hidden by clouds

The organiser lady put us in contact with a chap who calls himself Hossway, though for some reason he spells it Joshua, who had been given the mission to look after us until we met the guide who would lead us in La Sirena, even though he wouldn’t be travelling on the same boat as us.

Whatever.

After a while there was a concerted rush to the water’s edge as a small flotilla of small boats started to head into shore.  We’d noticed that a lot of people had taken their footwear off, so we did the same, just in case, and wondered whether the Tevas we were wearing were going to be the most sensible option.   We, along with a goodly number of Francophones, scrambled aboard what we hoped was the right boat and after a while it set off in what seemed to be roughly the right direction.  Other boats were doing the same thing, which gave a little confidence.

The Pura Aventura materials had talked about a fast and bumpy boat ride on a small boat

and that’s what we got – 90 minutes of very bumpily rounding the southern tip of the Osa Pensinsula (at one stage we could have waved to Luis at El Remanso, had he been watching out for us). We passed a couple of interesting sights en route: a magnificent storm cloud

which fortunately wasn’t targeting us; and a rock which is home to the Costa Rican supply of Brown Boobies

whose nests were being looked at, I imagine with greedy eyes, by Frigate Birds (with the white beaks).

We also Had A Moment when someone spotted some dolphins and so the boat did a couple of slow circles whilst everybody gurgled with pleasure and took photos of the patch of sea where there’d been a fin just milliseconds before.

Eventually we arrived at what we knew was going to be a “wet landing”.  Ours wasn’t too wet as it happened, but it could well have been.  The boat and shore crew can have their hands full keeping control of the boats.

So, there were were, on a stony beach, a bunch of people at least two of whom were wondering what the hell was going to happen next, again with an extraordinary background soundtrack.

We linked up with Joshua and he led us half a mile along the beach to a “welcome” station, where one’s bags are checked for contraband such as food or single-use plastic bottles.  (We came to an agreement with the chap there that he would ignore the small plastic bottle I mentioned that I had with me, provided I promised to take it away with me – slightly embarrassing moment.) There’s a check-in book which we also wrote our details in.

And then we three set off on the mile-long walk to La Sirena’s Ranger Station.  At one stage, Joshua cautioned us not to brush against this acacia bush

as it provides a home to fire ants (they live in the hollow thorny-looking structures), who earn the right to live inside the plant by fiercely defending it against any attacks.  Apparently, their bite is pretty uncomfortable; but we weren’t afflicted.

We saw some kind of hawk on the walk (sorry, don’t know what sort, may be a Grey Hawk)

and also passed a tree which Joshua called the Tourist Tree

because it peels in the sunlight.  Ho, ho.

So the first exciting installment of the morning came to an end as we arrived, around 0800, at the La Sirena Ranger Station.

As well as being where the National Park Rangers base themselves, it does a healthy sideline in supporting tourism in Corcovado.  All tours in the National Park are guided, and the guides also use the station as a base.  There are sleeping facilities

(more of that later), a dining room and a kiosk.

The kiosk is where you can rent a towel, a pair of rubber boots and a locker, all of which Jane and I did – my camera backpack weighs 30lb and I was buggered if I was going to (a) lug it around on a wildlife tour or (b) leave it lying about.  You are obliged to take your shoes off before going on to the station,

so we left our Tevas on the rack, donned boots and were introduced to the chap who would be our private guide for the next day and a half – Angel.

We were due to undertake four guided walks with Angel – two today and two tomorrow.  He proved to be an excellent guide and we saw Lots Of Stuff.  Now that I’ve set the scene, I’ll describe the walks (the “Flights of Angel’s”) in separate posts; I hope you’ll come back to read how they all went and how successful were my attempts to capture the local wildlife.