About Ambatondrazaka and Zahamena

The distance From Tana to Moramanga takes longer than from Moramanga to Ambatondrazaka that last one take 2 and haf hours which was in average 6 hours before. That place don’t have tourist I didn’t see any tourist during my expedition time. Roads gives a lot of opportunity to that region, you have to pay attention cause that good road stop in Ambatondrazaka the way to Zahamena, Didi, Camp Bandro or the gentle bamboo lemur… is still off road.

Zahamena have difficult access during the raining season but it’s doable during the dry season, that area have more species than Andasibe, they have the in dangered Gentle Bamboo lemur endemic of Lake Alaotra, they are leaving on the lake inside the « Zetra » local people call them « Bandro » . Why they are in dangered ? cause of the climate change the lake disappear slowly and local people like planting rice than having Zetra which is understadable, so we really need to support them, training them and comming with more tourist like this they can have some income and protect it. They have probably aye-aye cause their forest is still impressive and I didn’t have enough time and budget to camp inside. Ambatondrazaka don’t have luxury accomodation and don’t have enough trained local guide so if you choose Zahamena you’ll need to camp I think camping 3 nights is better for enjoying more and increasing the aye-aye chance, they have probably fosa but I can’t say that all of it is possible to see before arranging and seeing it, as I said they don’t have enough infrastructure so it makes the visit more complicated cause you’ll need daily tickets, local guide who don’t have enough experience but kind and we can trust, cook, carrier…. If you don’t have enough time or don’t like camping there is one reserve one hour from Ambatondrazaka who have the Madagascar flying fox bat and some birds also there is a place for nice other view that you can do your lunch and can see more or less the huge lake Alaotra near the museum where you can find all existed birds to that region, half an hour from there you can see the camp bandro one tiny accomodation who organize the gentle bamboo lemur escape with pirogues, I would like to suggest sleeping in Vohitsoa there is guest houses more confortable than the camp bandro which is one hour from that one, visiting bandro at least is early morning they are more active at that time so if you sleep in Ambatondrazaka it’s too far away, Vohitsoa is closer (around one hour) or sleeping in Camp Bandro where you don’t need to drive again just awake in the morning and visiting it, having breakfast after the visit to the Camp so you’ll have a lot of time free so some visit is still possible you’ll need local to arrange it. On the way back to Ambatondrazaka the sunset is amazing with hectares of rice fields.