Beyond Baobabs

Tags

AFRICA, baobabs, Indian Ocean, islands, lemurs, Madagascar, sailboats, sailing

“Why Madagascar?” I ask Lisa when she suggests I visit during her four-month anchorage off the coast of this Indian Ocean island. I’m thinking I might wait until one of her next few stops, in South Africa or maybe Namibia, to parachute into her floating world for a brief stay. But baobabs, the thick, upside-down African trees I’ve seen once before, are one quirky draw, and I am eager to interact in the wild with lemurs, the tiny primates that live only in Madagascar. Beyond the unique flora and fauna, however, I know little about this poor island nation and am unconvinced I should spend thousands of dollars and many days of my time to get to it for a week or so this summer.

I let the idea languish until I try to explain to my sister one day why I can’t get the idea out of my head. By then, I’ve found flights both ways using miles, devoured all the links Lisa has sent on the country, and read her enthusiastic reviews of Nosy Be, the biggest island off the northwest coast of Madagascar. I hang up feeling I have convinced my sister I should go … and then wonder why on earth I haven’t booked it yet! I lock it down that afternoon.

A few months later, I land in Hell-ville, the only real city on Nosy Be, meet Lisa and The Captain for the first time (a story in itself), and am whisked to their sailboat for the next week. I tried hard to include parts of the main island in my visit, but even though I am a pretty brave solo female traveler, everything I read says it is a very bad idea to try getting around there on my own. Once on the boat, listening to The Captain relate his own aborted attempt to travel there with a friend, I am glad I elected to simply stay on the water and see the smaller islands in the Mozambique Channel.

I throw myself wholeheartedly into the life aquatic. I pop up jetlag-free after night one in my rocking boat-cradle, stuff myself into a wetsuit, strap on a mask and a snorkel, and topple over the side of the dinghy for my first Indian Ocean swim, this time with sea turtles off the coast of Nosy Sakatia.

Photo Credit: Lisa Dorenfest

My underwater camera does not do justice to these majestic creatures, who munch a while on the bottom plant growth, then breast-stroke to the surface in graceful slow-motion, all within inches of us humans.

I’ve been here less than a day, and I’m already in another world, lulled by the sea, by the creatures and coral below, by a patch of jumping fish flashing in the sun above. I feel extravagantly far from home.

A diurnal rhythm emerges in the following days – up with the sun and usually out with the local fleet in the morning and, later, drinks on deck as the same orb sets, igniting the sea and coastline. The local boats are things of great beauty and ingenuity. Often simple, wooden canoe-like vessels with home-made sails, the boats and their dexterous sailors skim the ocean in search of fish, as a means of transportation among islands, and even as small floating purveyors of goods like fruits and vegetables.

Day’s end comes earlier here, not too far south of the equator, and by 6 pm, we have front row seats for the sunset show in various anchorages. Whether it is illuminating the water, a nearby landmass, another boat, or just the shiny metal parts of ours, the sun is our nightly source of art and entertainment, a tangerine-pink glow that deepens in front of our eyes before our watery world plunges into darkness.

In between wake-up and a climb back into my cozy berth below-deck, there is a new kind of magic every day: the bestowing of gifts upon the mpanjaka (island queen) on still-primitive Nosy Mamoko. A hike almost the whole way around that rocky island with friendly local Thom, the epitome of patience as we scramble for hours over slippery rocks and I somehow snap the sole off my shoe halfway through.

More snorkeling, this time off Tanikely, where we spy vast schools of flat, round fish and a huge red snapper. On the more developed Komba, I play a one-on-one soccer match with a six-year-old while Lisa is busy taking and printing photos of the islanders, and there I also meet an enigmatic Italian man who has singlehandedly transformed life on one end of the island over the last twenty-five years. We hike along the beach and up into the hills, and miraculously find a crusty baguette (we are both bread fiends) at the end of the day on the dusty main street.

I seek out the lemurs, the bright-eyed prosimian primates that live only on Madagascar. I’ve been lucky to see lemurs in a research facility before, so I know the little imps will be friendly. I am not, however, wholly expecting to become their jungle gym. I should know that the little bits of banana I carry to attract them will mean lemurs on my arms, my shoulders, and my legs, with the capper being a lemur fight on my head, my hair snarled beyond redemption.

The country is achingly poor, among the top ten neediest nations in the world, and the markets in Hell-ville are busy but ramshackle, a shocking amount of litter covers the main city shores, and local officials have no qualms about asking visitors for “little gifts” at the docks or the airport.

At the same time, the town feels comfortable and open to outsiders, and the true treasures both here and on the smaller islands are the people. We are met with shy smiles and sincere attempts to communicate everywhere we go. They are a beautiful and reserved bunch in general, sometimes even wary, but we feel absolutely welcome everywhere.

It’s a surprisingly rich cultural experience for such a short time in the country; we even luck into a brass band parade on Nosy Komba one morning and just miss getting to attend a festival on Mamoko the day before.

By the time I leave, baobabs are but a backdrop to this beguiling series of islands that broke off from the African continent millions of years ago. Much of an African nature remains, but Hell-ville and some of the more established islets also feel distinctively Polynesian, vaguely Arab, certainly French, with a healthy dash of other Southeast Asian flavors thrown in. It’s a mysterious and heady mix, and our small but unhurried explorations make for one of the most absorbing trips I’ve ever taken.

A Leap of Faith

Tags

circumnavigating, Indian Ocean, leap of faith, life dreams, Madagascar, sailing

This travel story begins the way many do when I relay the news of my next trip to family and friends. Because there are times I travel on my own, to weird places, in strange ways, I sometimes get furrowed brows, worried shakes of the head, and occasionally outright outrage. This time, the questions start the same way but expand from there.

“I’m going to Madagascar!,” I announce.

Oh, cool … where is that again?

Why on earth do you want to go there?

Is J going with you?

Aren’t you afraid to fly alone (through Qatar, Ethiopia, Madagascar, and everywhere else on so many flights)?

And then:

You’ve never met the people you’re staying with in person?

You’re staying on a sailboat the whole time?

Wait, you’re transporting two suitcases full of stuff that they’ve had shipped to you?

The where, the why there, the inevitable husband question, and the fear query are typical. My mom is just a normal nervous parent when I fly so far away alone. My husband makes me locate a hospital on the island I’ll be near, just in case. My sister mentions very large insects. A startling number of my friends remain aghast at my globetrotting without a husband in tow.

But this time, almost everyone also wonders how I can trust my hosts, people I have never met beyond WordPress or email, with some musing that the sailboat parts and other products I have jammed into two extra bags could be full of cocaine or other contraband and that my “friends” have been playing me for a mule. By departure day, with its usual last-minute frenzy and edginess, even I am writing a thriller in my head about what happens to the naive American woman who gets thrown into a grim prison cell in Addis Ababa or Antananarivo and finds her blogging friend to be a carefully-constructed online personality designed to lure her into a life of smuggling.

But as always, my imagination has simply run wild, and the trip turns out just fine.

Actually, it’s way more than just fine; it is perhaps one of the most unique forays I have made into the world, a dreamlike seven days of sailing off the northwest coast of Madagascar with the inimitable Lisa and the Captain, whom I have come to know over the past four years through Lisa’s blog and, later, email.

I figured I’d like Lisa in person as much as I did through her words. We had discovered much in common: prior financial careers, years in Chicago, tomboyish childhoods, and wanderlust, of course. Through our correspondence, the list grew. One small example: as I readied a surprise gift of Frango mints and pondered other goodies to take my hosts, I asked what they might like as a treat. Frango mints, Lisa replied immediately, another sign that our friendship was meant to be. Seeing our identical flip-flops lying side-by-side on the deck a week later (or uncovering our shared obsession with toast) no longer seemed surprising; we were clearly sisters in a previous life (in a royal family, we agreed, laughing for the thousandth time onboard).

Lisa is the first blogger I’ve met in person. I used to recoil at the idea of people “making friends” with others online; I found the whole idea both ludicrous and sad. Why did these people have to turn to the internet for friendship, I smirked. Why would anyone fly anywhere, let alone for 48 hours overseas, to meet a stranger? I get it now. There was something about this virtual friendship that seemed solid and real, and when we met, it was as if we had known each other forever. The Captain began to refer to us as the “bumble bee convention” as he tried with varying levels of success to interrupt our constant buzz of conversation. I realized they (and certainly he) needed to take a leap of faith on me as well. What if I showed up to live for a week in a small, confined space with them and turned out to be a complete pain in the ass or someone on my own nefarious mission?

Madagascar itself was a distinctive destination that demands its own upcoming post, but I think the biggest impression of the trip was what life as a full-time circumnavigating sailor looks like. Some parts I adapted to very easily. I never got seasick, and I felt totally comfortable living, eating, and sleeping 24/7 on a sailboat. (I am actually land sick now, a full two days after leaving, a fate some people suffer for months afterward, and so far I seem to be one of them …) I loved the cruiser social life, motoring over to other boats in our dinghy for cocktails and appetizers and meeting people from all over the world who have become friends as they make their way around the globe. I could appreciate the minimalist way of life that is part of having one’s entire existence fit into a 15-meter vessel, and I fell easily into languid afternoons of “nothing to do” as we floated in our anchorages off a series of islands.

There were other parts of life at sea that would wear on me after a while, I think, and I marveled that Lisa and The Captain have been onboard their tiny home for five years now. I might get used to pumping a toilet 40 times every time I used it, but I was pretty eager to return to a gleaming bathroom with a spacious countertop and a shower. I suppose I would grow accustomed to washing my clothes in a basin of soapy water, agitating it with my feet, but I couldn’t wait to throw my salty, sandy clothes in a machine when I got home. I am fond of my husband, but I shudder at the thought of spending a 21-day passage at sea with him and only him, arguing non-stop over things large and (more likely) small. Last but not least, I think I would be terrified of those long sea passages, days and weeks of seeing nothing but ocean, sleeping in shifts and imagining ocean liners bearing down on me as I tossed about in frothy waves.

Lisa and The Captain not only do not fear or feel annoyed by these facts of life on a sailboat; they embrace and are invigorated by them. Lisa related her feelings of deep happiness on a solo night watch in a dark sea, Fabio never seemed to tire of cooking on a tiny stove or tinkering with the boat, and while they can squabble like any shore couple might, there is clearly an abiding affection between them that has survived or perhaps been enhanced by an interconnectedness born of true reliance on one other.

If you do not know Lisa, sail over to her blog and get a taste of her floating life and non-traditional choices. She and I talked a lot about what we want from life, the dreams we had or have for it, and what we have done or not done about it. In short, she has seized her opportunities while I have made only tentative grasps at mine. Yes, I saw another new country and I experienced a tiny taste of life on a boat, but I also saw what life has available for us if we are brave enough to really reach for it. This trip will ultimately reveal that the leap of faith I took to get there is a tiny one, and that some people are brave enough to jump into much more unknown waters. Thank you, Lisa and Fabio, for a matchless vacation and, beyond that, a vision of life lived to its fullest. You are both inspirations, and I would gladly take seven flights there and back to visit you again someday!

 

Lisa, lemurs, Lexie