East Africa, Victoria Falls and Madagascar

[Fruitloop50]

Mahebourg was originally built by the Dutch during their brief period of colonisation of the island. It was close to their landing port, had an ample water supply from many rivers and streams, and had a scenic view of the large bay area. It underwent major development around 1806, during the French colonisation era, and after the French chose Port Louis as the main port, Mahebourg declined into a sleepy coastal city.

We went for a walk down to the waterfront. Most of the buildings in town are pretty run down and there is a lot of rubbish everywhere.




A large statue of Swami Sivananda, built by his Mauritian disciples.


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A monument to commemorate the Battle of Grand Port, a naval battle fought in 1810 between the French and British navies over possessionof the harbour during the Napoleonic Wars. This British defeat is often considered the worst suffered by the Royal Navy during all of the Napoleonic Wars.

 

[Fruitloop50]

At the airport we went to the Air Mauritius lounge which is on two levels. The bottom level is quite dark because there are no windows, and the top level is much brighter because it has a wall of windows overlooking the departure gates. It had a pretty decent sized buffet and food was the same on both levels except that upstairs they also had soups and a bar.

Our flight to Perth is with Air Mauritius on an Airbus A330-900. The business cabin has a one-two-one layout. Shortly after take off a full dinner was served but we didn't have anything.

Before landing breakfast was served. The only choices were muesli, a croissant, pain au chocolate and a peach muffin. When I asked for jam for the croissant I was told that there wasn't any because it is only a limited breakfast being served. It was pretty average.

The flight took off five minutes late and landed just over six hours later at ten to nine in the morning local time.

As much as we love travelling, it's always a nice feeling when we land back in Australia

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[bPeteb]

We are also staying here overnight next month enroute to Windhoek.

Bathroom looks a bit basic.

and we're staying here as well in a couple of weeks on our way to Livingstone

 

[VPS]

Thanks for a very interesting trip report. Some interesting out of the way places.

 

[Fruitloop50]

Thanks for a very interesting trip report. Some interesting out of the way places.

Glad you enjoyed it

 

[mahooligan]

Wow, what a full on trip!!! So great that you were able to explore so much of East Africa.

Felt like you spent more time on planes, in airports and in transit.

Would you do anything different if you were to do the trip again, or when guiding someone?

 

[Fruitloop50]

Wow, what a full on trip!!! So great that you were able to explore so much of East Africa.

Felt like you spent more time on planes, in airports and in transit.

Would you do anything different if you were to do the trip again, or when guiding someone?

When we saw the flights listed on paper it did look like too many flights but in reality it wasn't that bad, and most of them were fairly short flights.

Also, because most of the time we were on pre-arranged tours we didn't have to worry about how we were getting to the airport, or to the hotel etc, so that made it quite relaxing.

We really enjoyed it and would do it again, but it may not be for everyone.

 

[drron]

What a fabulous trip. So many different experiences. I particularly liked your Madagascar journey. You rally got to see some of the real life of the people Thanks for the report.

 

[RB]

A great read. We really enjoy the style of travel you have outlined and you have some fantastic photos

 

[kpc]

A great read. We really enjoy the style of travel you have outlined and you have some fantastic photos

I won't be rude and ask @Fruitloop50 how much the whole trip cost but I have a rough idea (a lot!!) as we did Rwanda and Tanzania last year...and even though nearly all our flights were awards, it was probably the most expensive trip we have ever done to date!

 

[Kelstarama]

Our Precision Air flight to Nairobi isn't until this evening so we booked a late checkout and just hung around the hotel relaxing.

We have another flight in the morning, from Nairobi to Zambia, and when we were checking in at the airport the lady said she would check our bags straight through to Zambia. But we don't want that we told her. Why not? she asked. Well, because it's tomorrow morning and we need our stuff tonight we told her.

She didn't seem to understand why we would want our luggage and made us write our details down and sign a piece of paper saying we wanted our luggage back when we got to Nairobi. The two flights are with two different airlines, and booked on two separate tickets so we didn't really know what she was on about.

While we were standing there another staff member came over and asked MrF if his walking stick could be folded up. Yes, he replied. Can you show me? said the man. So MrF had to fold it up and then put it back together again so he could use it!

Our original flight was due to leave at twenty past five, but like many of our flights on this trip, we received an email several days ago saying it would now be leaving at a different time, twenty five to seven. The email also said that it would be arriving at five to seven in the afternoon, the next day ie. over twenty four hours later.

We were hoping this wasn't the case.

Before we left the hotel Daniela asked us who we were flying with. When we told her Precision Air, she just smiled and said their name is a misnomer since they are anything but precise. ​

The flight took off at five to seven and it is on another ATR 42/72. We had the same seats as last time in row four, and again boarding and deplaning was done from the rear door. We were given a packet of cashews for a snack.

At half past eight we landed in Nairobi, and went back to the HiltonGarden Inn. We really like this hotel, and this is our third and last stay here. It is really clean, the rooms are modern, the showers and air conditioning are good, the wifi works well, and everyone is friendly and efficient except for the one numpty we had the other day.​

Precision Air... sometimes known as Indecision Air

 

[OZDUCK]

I also really enjoyed reading this and was very impressed by your photos.

 

[craven morehead]

I've been reading this forum for several years and have obtained a lot of good information from the generous people that post here. I especially like reading trip reports so thought I would give something back by contributing one of our own.

We have just returned from a month in Africa. Eight months ago I read some trip reports on AFF about gorilla trekking. We didn't even know that was something available to tourists, and it sounded fantastic, so we decided to give it a go.

Mr F is an avid reader of Wilbur Smith novels and said that he would like to visit the Masai Mara and the Serengeti. We then added a trip to Victoria Falls and a week in Madagascar.

We wanted to stop in Perth on the way home to visit family, so rather than flying back to South Africa to catch a flight to Perth, we flew from Madagascar toMauritius, and then caught a direct flight to Perth from there.

In total we have nineteen flights, and in most countries we are only staying for a few nights, but we will most likely never return to Africa so that's what we decided to do.

Sounds awesome

 

[craven morehead]

After a little over an hour we reached the place where we would enter the national park, up a few steep rocky steps. Inside the park the tracks were much smaller, steep in parts ,and many of them really muddy. The ranger guides and trackers carry machetes and just hack their way through the vegetation and make new paths where they want them to be.

After walking for about ten minutes we were told that the gorillas were very close. At this point we had to leave the porters behind with our backpacks, and put on surgical masks to protect the gorillas from catching anything from us.

A couple of minutes later we saw our first gorilla sitting near the top a tree, and then a couple of females eating and playing with each other. After observing them for a while we walked a short distance and found Muhoza up a tree. While up there he did a massive wee that was like a torrent of rain falling down. He then climbed down and joined the others who were there. He was massive.

There was a lot of others in the family including several babies who were running around and fighting just like human toddlers. They were climbing trees, pulling each other off the trees, rolling around on the ground, wrestling, and generally just making mischief.

As the gorillas moved through the forest we followed them and before we knew it our hour was up and we had to leave.

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Brilliant photos

 

[RooFlyer]

Just caught up with this - wow! Great TR and great experiences. Envious.

 

[bPeteb]

Just caught up with this - wow! Great TR and great experiences. Envious.

we have much to live up to with our respective August trips

 

[Flashback]

Thanks for the TR, as someone who visits Madagascar quite a bit but doesn't get time to do anything too touristy I'd be interested in what kind of costs the tours were? I often think of tagging on a few extra days and flying down Mrs FB but whenever I scope out using a driver or local tour companies, the cost is far higher than what I would expect for where it is.

When we had finished we walked to the Victoria Falls Hotel for a late lunch.

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We ate on the terrace at the rear of the hotel and there was a great view across to the falls in the distance.

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The food was delicious, spag bol and grilled seabass.

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Afterwards we caught a taxi back to the Zim border post, and then another taxi to the Zam border. The process was very easy and there was no problem getting taxis in Zim or Zam.

At dinner time we weren't very hungry so went to the hotel restaurant just to have dessert and a hot chocolate each. The first dessert was a mille-feuille with chocolate custard that was served with orange ice cream. The pastry was not at all flaky and really dense, the custard filling was plain and not chocolate, and was virtually non existent, and the ice cream had no orange flavour.

The second was a brownie topped with a dome of chocolate mousse and covered in a chocolate glaze. It was served with a berry sorbet. Unfortunately the brownie was dry and the mousse not very good. However the sorbet was really nice as were the hot chocolates.

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When you crossed back into Zambia from Zim did you have to pay for the Zambia entry visa again or did you have a double entry visa ($25 vs $40 USD)?

The next morning we caught an Airlink flight to Madagascar. It was the same type of plane as yesterday's flight, and the lunch boxes served were the same. It took off ten minutes late at ten past ten and landed in Tana just under three hours later.

There was quite a queue at immigration but there was a priority queue for 'elderly persons' so we used that one. We paid 10 USD each for our visas and then walked past the booth to where there was another line along the back wal,l queuing up to see a lady sitting at a table. An official motioned for us to go straight to the exit, bypassing this line, so we did.

Just after we walked through the exit another official called us back, and took our passports and gave them to a policeman at another booth. The policeman asked us to pay another $10 each and we told him we had already paid at the first booth. He said twice more that we had to pay, and we kept telling him that we already had.

Next he stuck the visas in our passports and then gave them to someone in the adjacent booth for her to stamp. We didn't even realise that the visas weren't put in our passports at the first booth where we paid We should have paid more attention.

We headed for the exit again and another official there asked us where we had come from. We told her Jo'burg, and she said that meant we had to join the queue for the lady sitting at the table. We told her we had only stayed overnight at the airport so she let us through.

I don't think we did enough research on the arrival procedure at this airport.

We were met at the airport by a driver who drove us to our hotel, the La Varangue Boutique Hotel. There are some beautiful vintage cars parked out the front and a lot of antiques adorning the walls of the common areas.​

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In addition to the usual amenities provided in the bathroom was these

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Went for a walk around the area near the hotel

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The JNB-TNR Airlink flights are usually half full at best, so passport control shouldn't be too bad, although it depends on how close you land to the ET and KQ flights. I've done the entry at TNR......... quite a few times, so hopefully this information is of help.

When you arrive, go straight to the line/desk on the far left; that's where you can pay for your VOA. If your trip is less than 2 weeks, you just simply pay the admin fee (€10) and the person in the booth will give you a receipt. For longer stays, you just pay a bit more, the process is the same. They'll ask you how many days you're staying and charge you accordingly. You can pay by cash or card. Once you have that...... you then pop over to the next desk and they will then put the visa sticker in your passport. Think you're done and ready to enter? Nope. Then you need to play booth lottery (shortest line) and they will then process your entry, stamping an entry stamp over the top of the visa and that's your ticket to enter. Well.......... almost. Just as you leave the passport control area and before you enter the baggage reclaim area, there's a desk with a few ladies there checking the documentation you filled in, this is the health check area. Yes, they still ask you when you had your last COVID vaccine (on the form), what type etc. 2 trips ago she looked at my entry for "countries visited in the last 14 days" and I had 7 countries on it. She laughed quite a bit, commented on it and told me I was good to go. Some people do seem to get stopped there, but I've been waived through every single time regardless of where I've been prior. Then it's off to the baggage reclaim area and you're good to go............. Don't forget, once you enter arrivals, if you want cash don't use the SocGen ATM! They'll charge you 9,500 MGA for the privilege. Go around to depatures and use the MCB one, which is free.

Later on in the afternoon we went for a walk and found a nice patisserie and had a hot chocolate and a chocolate eclair. On a walk around the town we saw the post office, the train station, and the Tribes Monument, commemorating the eighteen different ethnic groups in Madagascar.

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There was a few small ferris wheels operating and we saw some young men hanging off the outside of the cabins. We thought they must have somehow fallen out, but when we watched a bit longer, we realised the ferris wheels are manually operated, and these men were making them rotate.

It was fascinating to watch. About half a dozen young men would climb up a ladder, and then climb onto the framework of the wheel. They would use their body weight to make the wheel turn, and when they got to the bottom they would let go. They were extremely agile and they could make the wheel rotate really fast.

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This morning Ravo had pointed out a burger restaurant that he said served good food so we went there for dinner. The burgers weren't bad and the chips were excellent.

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Afterwards we caught a pousse-pousse (a rickshaw pulled by a man) for the trip back to the hotel.

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The place you had your meal is a chain restaurant - La Gastronomie IIRC. You'll see a few around the place. It would have to be one of very few chain restaurants that exist in MG! I've never eaten there, but have been tempted for a guilty pleasure. That being said, the hotel I usually stay at in Tana which is near the airport has very good food, so although I've done the menu 10 times over, I generally am happy just to eat there.

 

[Fruitloop50]

When you crossed back into Zambia from Zim did you have to pay for the Zambia entry visa again or did you have a double entry visa ($25 vs $40 USD)?

Australian passport holders get a free VOA in Zambia, valid for 90 days, so we didn't have to pay anything.

 

[drron]

What a beautiful TR. Loved the Madagascar part. You really got to the nitty gritty of the country as it really is. Thanks for taking us along. hopefully we will visit from a cruise ship in 2026. As long as I see some lemurs i swill be happy. but I would have loved to have done your trip when I was a bit healthier.

 

[Fruitloop50]

What a beautiful TR. Loved the Madagascar part. You really got to the nitty gritty of the country as it really is. Thanks for taking us along. hopefully we will visit from a cruise ship in 2026. As long as I see some lemurs i swill be happy. but I would have loved to have done your trip when I was a bit healthier.

Thanks @drron . There is so much to see in Madagascar it would be easy to spend a few weeks there. Even though we only had one week we were really happy with what we were able to see