This is a travel diary from a group who spent five weeks touring Madagascar in rental 4x4s.
In Post 1 Madagascar Road trip. River boat to Tsingy.you can read about the trip from Tana (Antananarivo) by car and the two-day boat journey down the Tsiribihina River. Here you will find general tips on travelling in Madagascar.
Post 2 covers the visit to the unique Tsingy rock formations and the drive south along a roadless coastline dotted with small resorts.
Post 3: Madagascar Roadtrip 3. RN7 to Tana – Isalo og Ranomafana. describes the well-known tourist route RN7 from Toliara back to Tana.
In Post 4 Madagaskar Roadtrip 4. The East Coast– Ambila Lemaitso you can read about the coastline east of Tana, the beautiful resorts located here, the Indian Ocean and the quiet backwater region, and the Canal des Pangalanes.
All Madagascar posts can be found here: Madagascar
Tsingy
The boat trip ends in Belo-Tsiribihina. From there we head towards one of Madagascar’s greatest attractions: the Tsingy.
Infrastructure in this part of the island is extremely poor. Tiny villages made up of straw huts are scattered around, and the “roads” connecting them can hardly be called roads at all. They likely started as footpaths where someone began driving, perhaps cutting down a few trees, and over time a kind of track formed. Only trucks and high-clearance 4x4s can get through here.
River crossings are done on pontoon ferries that take three cars. The first car drives up steel ramps straight from the riverbank; then the ramps are moved for the second and third car. Propulsion is the same as on the boat trip — a Chinese agricultural motor driving a propeller by belts.
After four hours of bumping along, we arrive at the hotel in the village of Bekopaka, the base for visiting the UNESCO-listed Tsingy National Park.
You must visit with a guide, and at 6 AM the next day we pick up two guides at the park office. An interesting detail: the guides must be paid in cash, but the entrance ticket must be paid by credit card — to the same administrator.
We rumble along for another hour and a half to reach the park itself, where we are given climbing harnesses. A half-hour walk through the jungle follows. Along the way we spot several wild lemurs feasting on leaves high up in the trees. Soon the first small limestone formations appear — black, sharp spikes, many riddled with caves of all sizes. The Tsingy is a vast area of limestone formations heavily eroded by water.
Then we stand before the towering cliffs rising dark and dramatic in front of us, and begin the climb. It is extremely steep, but a fixed steel cable is bolted into the rock, and we clip onto it with carabiners attached to our harnesses. Steps are also bolted into the rock. Below are deep shafts disappearing into the ground, and narrow gorges twisting between the formations. A few trees have managed to take root in the depths, their thin trunks stretching up toward daylight.
This is definitely not a trip for anyone with a fear of heights. At the top a platform has been built that offers a panoramic view over the entire area. Spiky ridges rise all around you — an incredible sight. The route then continues between the rocks, up and down, across a suspension bridge, and finally through narrow caves where you must crawl out of the rock formations and back into the jungle.
Absolutely worth the long drive.
Boaboab – Country, Morondava
Madagascar is home to the largest collection of baobab trees in the world. Eight species grow here, six of which are found only on this island. According to legend, a furious god once ripped the tree out of the ground and re-planted it upside down — and that is indeed what it looks like: a thick barrel of a trunk topped with root-like branches. The largest trees can be nearly 10 meters in diameter.
Most baobabs grow along the dry west coast, which we now follow south in three cars along RN8. RN8 would struggle to be classified as a road anywhere else in the world. Just outside Morondava we pass the famous Baobab Alley, a stretch densely populated with large baobabs and a small tourist hub selling drinks and souvenirs. Even late in the season there are quite a few visitors here.
Heading South
After a night in Morondava we continue south through increasingly desolate terrain. Tourists disappear entirely, and it’s rare to meet other cars. Occasionally we pass a dusty village with the ever-present waving and shouting children. Women with white-painted faces wave more shyly, and the occasional man carrying a farming tool also allows himself a friendly wave.
Agriculture is Madagascar’s largest industry, alongside tourism. Farming is extremely primitive and manual, with oxen pulling plows. You almost never see a tractor, but plenty of ox-drawn carts.
The villages look extremely poor with their straw huts. Further east on the island, brick houses are common, but here the soil is mostly sand — unsuitable for making bricks — and trees are scarce. But the residents seem to have good access to food. Mangoes, bananas, and other fruits and nutd grow wild, and although the climate is dry, there is water in some places and irrigation channels for the fields.
Beach Life in Belo Sur Mer
The southern coast is lined with wonderful beaches dotted with charming lodges. Here you can enjoy lazy days at very affordable prices compared to, for example, the Seychelles. Activities include swimming, snorkeling, fishing from local boats, and various excursions.
You don’t need to drive across the whole island as we did — there are several airports along the coast. And for example, from Morondava to Belo Sur Mer you can take a boat instead of hours of bone-rattling driving. But I would still recommend taking the car at least one way.
We spend two days at Ecolodge du Menabe, run by an older French couple. The lodge offers bungalows and all the comforts a modern traveler could want. Early risers can admire the fishermen heading out in colorful outrigger canoes with simple sails, gliding swiftly through the narrow channel right in front of the lodge.
If you’re not up early, you can instead relax on a sunbed with a gin and tonic in the evening and watch the boats race back with the day’s catch as the sun dives blood-red into the western sea.
Further South, More Lodges – Manja
From the ecolodge we continue along a truly awful track. In some countries we talk about gravel roads — roads built of gravel. But the “roads” here are built of nothing at all; they simply exist. The English “dirt road” or the French “piste” is far more accurate.
We drive toward the town of Manja through completely deserted terrain — no villages, just dry bushland. Our drivers do a superb job, speeding at 70–80 km/h where it’s flat and open, then braking at exactly the right moment to tackle huge holes or water-filled pits. The horn is used frequently in dense bush and blind curves. We do not meet a single car over the 100 km to Manja.
Out here we encounter the truly massive baobabs — far larger and in greater numbers than at Baobab Alley. And here we can admire them without traffic and tourists. The biggest one we saw must have been at least five meters in diameter.
After lunch in Manja we get a pleasant surprise: the road ahead, RN9, is pristine asphalt, not even a pothole, for the 60 km to the Mangoky River. The road even has lighting through the villages and speed bumps. And this is the deep outback — we met only one car on the entire stretch. Since the road has no potholes, it must be newly built. The tragedy, of course, is that maintenance is not Africa’s strong point. Good roads slowly deteriorate until all that remains is deep ruts and holes.
A Special River Crossing
The beautiful new road ends at the Mangoky River, where the only crossing is a single ferry. Unfortunately, the ferry’s engine was broken and it lay moored on the opposite bank. Driving to the next ferry crossing would have taken us enormously out of the way, so we had to get across somehow.
Luckily our drivers negotiated a solution: the ferry would be pulled across manually. Sixteen young men jumped into the water and hauled the ferry toward us with a long rope. The river is shallow in many places, so they could walk most of the way, but toward our bank there was a deep channel they had to swim across. They pulled the ferry upstream, allowing it to drift down to where our cars were waiting.
One by one, the cars were driven down the steep riverbank and onto the ferry via heavy steel ramps. Then the ferry was dragged back to the other side. We passengers were paddled across in canoes — perhaps a safety measure in case something went wrong with the cars?
Morombe
After the river crossing we continue toward the coastal town of Morombe. The road had once been asphalt; now only fragments remained, the rest sand and deep ruts. The town also showed remnants of former glory — colonial-era homes and industrial buildings now falling apart.
After a night in Morombe we head to the first of three lodges where we’ll be staying: Laguna Blue Resort, Shangri-La, and La Bella Donna, before ending up in Toliara where we will follow RN7 back toward Tana.
The landscape remains flat, dry, and mostly loose sand. The drivers work hard to avoid getting stuck. The cars weave from side to side, jolting and shaking constantly. Fortunately, we only get stuck once — inside a village where the sand was as fine as talcum powder — but we eventually get free.
Over three days we meet only two cars. If you’re heading into areas like this, you should travel with at least two vehicles — partly to pull each other free, but also for backup if one breaks down. There are some villages around, so you won’t die of thirst, and it’s probably possible to get help pulling a car free with oxen if needed.
A good navigation app is crucial. Many tracks criss-cross the landscape, and the flat bush terrain makes orientation difficult. We used the OsmAnd app, which shows most roads and pistes.
Along the coast are endless beaches and almost no tourists in November, so we have the sands entirely to ourselves, aside from the occasional passerby carrying goods on their head. Fishermen head out in their canoes at six in the morning, and no one bothers us.
Toliara
Just before Toliara we rejoin the excellent RN9 and check in at La Bella Donna, a beautiful lodge with a lovely garden right by the beach. But here, at the end of the main tourist route — RN7 — there are many European tourists. I walk down to the beach and am immediately surrounded by vendors and well-dressed women offering massages. I quickly retreat to the hotel and find myself missing the quiet beaches further north where you can walk in peace.
