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Day 5. Marojejy National Park
Early the next morning we are picked up by Eric in a tough looking
Jeep and we go on the way to Marojejy National Park. During
the ride Eric tells us about his frustrations about Tavy;
with the elections approaching, the despised slash & burn
method reaches a peak (or better said, a low) because the
authorities are too busy running campaign, they have no time
for a proper audit. In Madagascar, a strange rule applies:
the land that you slash and burn, automatically becomes your
property. Eric is trying hard to do something about it, but
not everyone is happy with that. Paul, a peacecorps volunteer
who has been responsible for plotting and touristically developing
the area (he also made the website) even had to be evacuated,
after he handed over the names of illegal rosewood loggers to
the authorities. But today, peace has returned so it seems,
and the locals draw profit of the tourists that visit this unique
area.
Marojejy is a rugged mountainous area with 60.000 hectares of
primary rainforest. It's the habitat of one of the worlds 25
most endangered species, the Silky
Sifaka. The animal has only been photographed for the first
time in 2000 and the first decent research took place in 2001
when broadcasting organization PBS came here to shoot a documentary
called Nova. The same guides that lead the expedition
back then are coming with us today. We got 5 people coming along:
a guide named Desiré, a Sifaka tracker named Nestor, 2 porters
and a cook.
The Jeep brings as far as we can go and from there we cross
a river by foot. The last village we see is called Mandena,
situated in an exotic surrounding at the foot of the Marojejy
Massive. It starts to gently rain, but soon it comes
pouring down and all our stuff becomes wet. About 7 meters of
rain drops here annually, even though this is supposed to be
the least wet period of the year.
After 4,5 kilometers we reach
the entrance of the park and we're grateful being able to take
a short rest and hide from the rain under the roof of a hut. Despite
the poncho's, most of our stuff is soaked.
We continue our way to Camp 1, another 4 kilometers, and we starts a firm climb
uphill, straight through the rainforest. It continues to rain and not only
does it makes things uncomfortable, but it also prevents me from taking pictures
of this beautiful area.
We reach Camp 1, but Desiré, our guide, says that we have to continue, because
we'll be spending the night in Camp 2, which is another 1,5 hour away and is
located much higher. I offer to at least have a short break to catch some breath.
After that, we start the heavy climb up to Camp 2.
Camp 2 consists out of some wooden shacks. A wooden encampment is build against
a steep cliff for cooking and eating. Finally we're there, soaking wet and with
bleeding feet from the leeches. The dry clothes in the backpack are wet - absolutely
nothing remained dry and we try to dry our stuff above the fire of the stove.
Zebu steaks have been prepared and when the heavy clouds clear up at some point,
there's suddenly a breath-taking view over the towering Marojejy peak.
Our last task to complete is to reach our shack without getting our - finally
dry - stuff wet. If it continues to rain (it's still showering) we will have
to skip the night walk en will have to reconsider if we will undertake the Sifaka
expedition tomorrow..
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