A Little Bit of Paradise

The view from our restaurant.

A tortoise.

A black and white ruffed lemur is tempted inside to steal....

a banana.

Graham, Lynn and I went snorkelling just off shore.

The Les Lumerien Echolodge as seen from the boat of the way back.

The kitchen in which we had our cooking demonstration.

Clouds are amazing over the open sea.

Monday, November 20^th.

Slept in today and took it easy. It felt great to not have to get up early to go somewhere. This is an Intrepid mini trip, and as such doesn't have a guide, but we do have a small itinerary. This morning we had a snorkelling trip. Florien decided not to go but the three of us did. We boarded a small powerboat with a hotel employee who spoke no English and rode for about twenty minutes along the coast until he docked on the reef. The water was fairly clear, and the reef was pretty good. There were some soft corals and large brain corals and I didn't see any evidence of bleaching which is affecting the reefs around the world. There were fish, but not in great numbers, but there were some of the usual beautifully coloured species. We really enjoyed paddling around in the warm ocean for over an hour.

On the way back the driver stopped at another small hotel and picked up a generator as the one at our hotel isn't working and we don't have electricity. There is no electricity anywhere on the island, they rely on generators.

When we got back we had another activity lined up – a Malagasy cooking class. The three of us (without Florien) were invited into the hotel kitchen and were lead through a lesson in making a breadstick type snack, that looking like crinkled French fries and calamari in a coconut sauce. Both were quite good.

We had that for lunch and then the four of us had another one hour included relaxation massage. Mine was at 3 pm, after which I went for another walk down the beach to the same spot as yesterday in order to cool off in the beautiful warm water. While I was in the water I saw schools of small silver fish jumping out of the water. Not sure if there was something chasing them, but it was interesting to watch.

Back to the cabin to read before dinner and then working on the computer for a bit before bed time.