We always wonder: where will we go for the next trip? I could tell you, the United States, Costa Rica, Bolivia or the Seychelles? And why not Madagascar. This island contains everything you can have in these different places. The large expanses of the south are reminiscent of America, the eastern forest closes in a unique vegetation like that of Costa Rica. Strangely, some villages in the central highlands are very reminiscent of these hilltop villages and even the women have features borrowed from Bolivian women. If we talk about beach and sun, the big island has stretches of sand to make the most skeptical dream and the sun is present almost all year round.
With all this, a friendly, smiling and welcoming population.
You take the plane, you fly over the arid Libyan desert, the wild coasts of Somalia or the rich savannahs of Kenya and you land in an ocean of colors, where the seasons are reversed, where the riches are offered diversity of the island, recounting their origins: Asia and the rice terraces; the ocean and the canoes or the coconut palms leaning over the sea; Africa and the black and muscular men, and the savannahs embellished by the zebus.
One cannot resist the fascination of this country where, for centuries, Indo-Malaysians, black Africans or Oceanians, Arabs have mixed more than melted, and where the blood of explorers, pirates, traders, navigators and soldiers has been injected. Portuguese, Dutch, English or French.
Fascinating by its inhabitants, both gentle and cruel, by the charm of the language and by the names with musical sounds like the verb, whose syllables are added to each other and which seems obscure to us. This language likes words, composed of multiple ideas…. (Francois Lery)
The northern region of volcanic origin is dominated by the Tsaratanàna which is the highest peak of the island; is subject to the monsoon regime. The west is the most extensive area, an area of plateau and alluvial plains, with a hot season and heavy rains and a dry and cool season, while the semi-arid southeast has thorny vegetation. On the opposite side to the east, bordered by the Indian Ocean, a line of steep cliffs parallel to the coast condenses the rains driven by the east winds. Between shore and cliff is a strip of rainforest. The center is occupied by high plateaus denuded of lateritic clay. This is where most of the agricultural land in the country is found consisting mostly of rice paddies.
The originality of Madagascar lies in its extreme diversity: the variety of relief and climate has favored the biodiversity of flora and fauna characterized by a high rate of endemism. Added to this is a great diversity of origin of the populations due to successive migrations.
Guides 12/04/2019
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