The Lonely Planet says Anakao is one of the best places in Madagascar so we remained faithful and left our madagascan companions for a night to take a look. It is undoubtedly beautiful but needs much more time than just one night to be fully appreciated. It's quite a chore reaching it, taking a bus then a boat and then a truck. We were automatically dropped off at 'La Reserve.' There were no bungalows left so we took the tent. I hate camping but the tent was in a wonderful location right on the beach. 'La Reserve' was a bit too isolated for our liking. It took 45mins to walk to the village, well 3hrs after we had paddled and searched the beach for shells. There were so many beautiful shells and it went against all of our upbringing not to pick them all up, customs wouldn't allow it. We even found elephant bird egg shell fragments. They were huge birds, even bigger than an ostrich made extinct 200yrs ago.

It's not a particuarly relaxing stroll along the white sand beach. We were attacked by little kids, annoyingly too cute to ignore pleading for 'un bonbon,' 'un cadeau' or 'd'argent.' At points I would have 10 of them hanging off each arm, a bit too much attention to handle! They're perfectly pleasant though and don't seem too hurt if they don't get anything. More than anything they're just friendly and curious and are just as happy to play. But if you're after peace and quiet this is not the place to come to! I nearly ended up with my very own live lobster to carry with me thanks to my lacking French. I heard the word 'langoustine' which I recognised and decided meant 'dolphins.' So with a bit of imagination I decided we were being offered a trip to go see the dolphins and happily agreed to it. It wasn't until its little claws were waving at me that I realised it was the word for 'lobster!' You can see dolphins and whales at Anakao though. Unfortunately we didn't have enough time.

After sunset (around 6pm) there was absolutely nothing left for us to do. It would've been better to stay in the village centre where at least there was a bit of life and some very cute pet lemurs!