Lemur watching in Madagascar

Caught looking, originally uploaded by jasonwmak.

We just finished a one week tour of Antanarivo, Madagascar. The country was suprisingly developed as it was once a French colony. Jennifer and I had to get by on some broken French for a few days but it was fine. I think we were both pretty worn out after India so we didn't talk to many locals anyways.

The one highlight of going to Madagascar was to see the lemurs (pictured). These are monkey-like specimens that are indigenous to the island. Contrary to what I thought earlier, Madagascar doesn't have lions, zebras, and other "big 5" animals as shown in the Disney movie "Madagascar". These little lemurs were the most exotic creatures there. Nevertheless, they were really cool. During our hike, we caught a family of lemur mid-howling. Their screeching was very loud and intimidating.

We are in South Africa now. This is our 2nd time here and Capetown has become even more developed since our trip here in 2003. We spent one day in a shopping mall just getting back to some 1st world conveniences. It's also winter here so we had to go to the local department store to buy some warm clothes. The real treat was watching a movie in the movie theatre. How nice it was to sit in a nice cushy chair and watch Ben Affleck and Russell Crowe run around for 2 hours. Nevertheless, we feel refreshed and ready to finish our last month travelling in Africa.