Day four – Lemur attack, then back to Tana

Feeling much better the next day, we visited the hotel’s island sanctuary for ex-pet lemurs, and had a thoroughly silly morning of being peed on by critters who have the firm belief that banana trees have white skins and two legs (as there is insufficient food growing on the islands, the lemurs’ diet is supplemented with many boatloads of fruit). Lemurs are still cute when they put their fingers up your nose for a better hand-hold – although one of our fellow vahaza was less than impressed when a lemur investigated the contents of her cleavage in the hope that there would be a banana in there.

We had bananas in our packed lunch...

The black-and-white ruffed lemur was bullied by the others, and kept trying to use us as sanctuary...

Me

Tim, sporting a stylish hat

Can you guess which hand has the banana in?

Bamboo lemurs

Common brown lemur figurehead

It appears that the Malagasy for "ring tailed lemur" is now "I like-a-move-it-move-it"

The welcoming committee

Just five days old, the first lemur born in the sanctuary

Shortly after this photograph, a large yellow stain was noticed on my shoulder...

Tim

Just checking the boat for spare bananas

Om nom nom

Jean-Jacques drove us back to Tana for lunch, which we took at the delightful Café de la Gare in the centre of town. This building, situated next to the historic train station, seems to be a regular haunt of Europeans and “Business men who come here with not-their-wives” (thanks to Jean-Jacques for that description). Still feeling weak from the previous day’s incessant regurgitation, I settled for drinking lots of fresh juice, and watching the over-weight and middle-aged white men with their slim, revealingly-dressed, barely-legal Malagasy female companions.

Zebu in paddy field

A riverside garden

In the Cafe de la Gare