Adventures of Beth and Dan: Nosy Be Snorkling with Lemurs Nov 15: “Let the sea breeze blow your hair, let the sunset bring tranquility to your heart, let the distant places you travel allow you to explore yourself”. Somya Kedia

It was great to have a few sea days to catch up on sleep, happy hour, and playing cards with our group. We have had too much fun at this because people want to join us and now the group is getting too big and demanding. The days pass too quickly. Each day has been sunny and warm with few to almost no rough seas or winds. Sometimes we go to the night shows but most aren’t all that to our liking. We had a lady singer/ comedian and her singing was better than her comedy. We’ve had pianists that are mostly classical which the ship already features during the day so it’s nothing special. The movies that play in the small Wajang Theater also play on your tv so we prefer that. They do offer you popcorn bagged when you go. Lots of folks just come in and snatch the popcorn and leave :). They have shown the new Top Gun, Mrs Harris Goes To Paris which I loved, Dog which also was very touching. There are three movie channels but lots of them are sci fi or really old movies that we have seen. There is a little emphasis to show movies about Africa like The White Lion and Out of Africa. Very few ports have had a welcome for us or markets set up. We have not had but three pillow gifts: a small box of chocolates and a small blue delft like ceramic box and a plate showing Africa. We gave our plates to some of the gals working in the Lido and they were thrilled. I think Dan has ravaged the chocolates secretly but that’s ok with me. I’ve had way too much dessert even though I get the sugar free. I know it’s showing up in all the wrong places!! Our room has still been very hot and noisy. They have offered us another room two floors up but we can’t move till December 20th!! They say they are going to offer us compensation but we don’t know what that will be. The Lido if I haven’t said this before is very hot. Many of us have written to management about this. Our ship is 22 years old so how long do you suppose they will keep it. Several people on board are watching Carnival stock and say it dropped to $5 a share. When you own 100 shares you can send in your cruise details and get up to $250 room credit per cruise on Princess, Holland, Carnival, Costa, and P&O I think. So we have done that for both our cruises. Our service staff are tremendous and I probably have written 20 notes to put in the drop box at desk services about them by name. One came and gave me a big hug. He said they read my note aloud at the staff meeting about him and he got a promotion!!!! So if you are a cruiser don’t forget to do this.

Here’s another tid bit… our visas for this cruise cost us about $780 dollars. We let the ship handle all that but we have had multiple times we had to turn them in to port officials and several face to face immigration checks with our passports. Not one time has anyone asked to see our COVID cards or our passports off ship. We have had one temperature check on board and one COVID test. We have had several musters because of the length of the cruise.

Our next port on November 15 is Madagascar, Nosy Be. It is a tender port and we stay here overnight. We have a third party tour with snorkeling, lunch and seeing Lemurs. We actually travel to a village called Andoany “ Hell Wille”. Nosy Tanikly and Nosy Komba are small uninhabited islands which they say have tranquil coral beaches, a marine sanctuary and clear waters. They say we could see sea turtles, rays, dolphins, small harmless sharks and an “ aquarium” full of colorful fish. We are to snorkle from the beach for about 2 hours. We also are to spend some time at Nosy Komba knick named the island of lemurs. It’s a much larger island with emerald waters, a variety of flora and fauna and we are to have lunch here including fish, rice, vegetables and meat. The Lenora are led by females which are red and brown in color. The males are black. They live in trees and their incredible agility allows them to jump very far and climb high. Our cost is 75 euros per person. The tour company is one we used before Safari Baleine.

Some history on Madagascar from our cruise director and Kate Ross our spectacular guest speaker…Madagascar broke off from the African continent 120 million years and 88 millions years ago it separated from all other areas. It has unique plant and animal life. It’s like a living laboratory studying evolution as a living science. Who settled here first is uncertain. There was intermarriage with local groups and as much as 1/2 the people descended from people from Borneo. Africans were probably brought there by slave trade. The people there speak Malagasy. Rice was brought by means of bringing a live plant. Ports were established on the coastline and forts and walls were 8 ft high and 29 ft thick to protect the area. Black Death may have killed most of the settlers. Portuguese were the first explorers to locate it and they labeled it in 1502. The word means in the midst of the water. Then the Dutch, French and English came but none thought it was worth fighting for. Pirates became more prevalent and were raiding ships in port Captain Kidd was one of them. The only pirate cemetery in the world is here. Swords on stones mark them. Cities and names here often have long names with up to 17 letters! The people here did not have last names. Sometimes their cities were even put in their names. For example get this: King Andrianampoinimerina! Misssionaries taught children skills like iron works, printing, the alphabet. CQWX are not in their alphabet. Three queens ruled for many years to the same prime minister, Tainilaiarivony from 1864-1895. Strategically the port was important to the French. They warred to make it a French colony and French became the official language . They cleared the forests to grow sugar cane and coffee but harsh taxes were imposed. In 1942 the battle of Madagascar with British forces occurred. By 1943 it returned back to the Madagasy but was a French territory. In 1960 they moved to full independence but the French culture was still prevalent. The government opposed this strongly by “ people are like plants in the wind they bow down and rise up again” … Kate Ross

Our guide in the boat.

The water was beautiful dotted with sailboats

My new friend. He had a stutter and lots of folks ignored him but I was patient and listened. He really appreciated that

Our beach to snorkle from and relax

Lots of shade in the back ground

Wouldn’t you call this universal signs?

The National Park

Relics on the beach

Where we are

Beautiful isn’t it?

https://vimeo.com/779935205

Dan loved finding these crabs!

Our Buffett shady and very clean

Dan and my good friend Kate who joined our tour

This stuff was the best!!!! I had two glasses!!

Our meal

Storm looks to be brewing.

Anniversary of their republic

This is how the villagers cook. A very small fire of stick and one pot meal

Their homes. Many are much smaller.