Our first day in Nosy Be and we wind up adrift at sea.

We woke early and enjoyed a wonderful breakfast of tropical fruit and toast, fresh fruit juice and coffee. There was not a better way to start the day than eating breakfast while watching the the waves lap the sandy beach, thinking of what the day may hold. We enjoyed watching the morning procession of activity on the beach, women wandering the length of the beach with huge bowls of fruit balanced on their heads selling the fresh produce along the way, children picking up bits of drift wood and anything that may be of use and men launching their small fishing Dhows and proceeding to sea for a days work. The daily rituals of life that we in a modern society don't see anymore.

Early morning view of the bay.

One of the many women selling fresh fruit on the beach every morning.

After breakfast we sorted out our gear and organized for some weights to be delivered to the villa, we also organized a boat for the afternoon. We needed to get out and dive so we could sort out any problems with our gear and get our weights correct for the coming days.
I also took a trip into Hell-Ville to get some cash as we were unable to get any from the money changer at the airports in Johannesburg or Antananarivo. We then found none of the money changers would exchange South African Rand or Australian dollars both of which I had plenty, this would turn out to be a problem that plagued us for the rest of the trip. After numerous attempts we found an ATM that worked and I was able to  use a prepaid Mastercard to withdraw $800,000 mga yes that's right the exchange rate was in the vicinity of 2500/1. If you plan to travel to Madagascar try to bring either Euro or US$ as they are about the only currencies they will exchange.

The result of the trip to the ATM, a huge wad of cash and a headache!

We had managed to arrange a boat for the afternoon, and planned on visiting a reef some 20km offshore that held small Dogtooth tuna and a wide variety of reef fish. This would serve as a warm up dive to sort out any problems that our gear may have developed in transit. Luckily we encountered no problems with our gear and everything worked perfectly, unfortunately the same can't be said for the boat!!.

We ate a leisurely lunch before loading our gear on to the boat and setting out, the first sign of impending trouble came about half way to the dive spot when the motor unexpectedly stopped. We had a quick look over the motor and discovered a loose electrical connector which was quickly and easily repaired with some duct tape. Having overcome that minor inconvenience we set off again and quickly reached the reef. On entering the water we were greeted with amazing visibility and a wonderful variety of fish. We both made use of the time and tested our gear to the fullest, I spent some time pursuing a school of Black Snapper and was rewarded with a large fish after some long dives laying on the bottom throwing up sand, Greg also had success landing an exceptionally large Coral Trout.

The Boat prior to the trip to the reef.

Greg with a large Coral Trout.

Having checked our gear and both landing good fish we headed for the beach and this is when things took a turn for the worst. About half way back to Nosy Be the motor started making some pretty expensive sounding noises, the boat driver decided that the best course of action was to go faster therefore ensuring that any failure on the motors behalf would be catastrophic. Well that is exactly what happened, soon enough something inside let go and it clunked and spluttered to a stop. We were still about 10kms from land at this point however the tide and wind were in our favor for the time being.
We conveyed our displeasure to the boat driver however not understanding a word of English he just smiled at us. It was at this point we discovered that even though the boat had a nice flash looking marine radio it didn't work!!! Luckily we had come armed with a phone number to call in the event something like this happened, and even more astounding we actually had phone reception.

It never ceases to amaze me that even in the worlds poorest countries, everyone seems to have a mobile phone and mobile reception is everywhere, hey we may not have running water but we got a mobile phone aren't we flash!! who gives a damn that I live in a washing machine box I got a phone!! something is wrong with peoples priorities somewhere that's for sure.

Well after a dozen calls and trying to learn French on the spot, the sun had set, it was pitch black and 4 hours had passed. we had fashioned a sail from the boats canopy and were making a steady 2 knots towards Nosy Be. Some 5 hours after the motor died we were finally picked up and towed back to the beach.
The following morning we discovered the numerous reasons behind the delay in towing us ashore, the boat tasked with towing us back had originally set out with no fuel and had to return to fuel up. By the time they had fueled up it was dark and they could not see us so they went home, another round of phone calls ensued and we were able to tell them we had a torch and would signal them with it, only then did they find us and tow us back to shore.

Finally back on dry land we walked the 100 yards to the villa where thankfully dinner was waiting for us and we hungrily ate another wonderful meal of local produce followed by the local brew "Three Horse Beer" and some Malagasy Rum before showering and falling into bed exhausted after the days events.