Day 10 - Saturday 12/09/2015: Zombitse
We had a pre-breakfast walk in the area around the grounds, which include a moderate lake. Despite looking quite promising, disappointingly few birds were found. Nevertheless we added 2 bird species: Greater Vasa Parrot which we saw well both perched and several times in flight and we flushed 4 Madagascar Partridges, none of which gave a particularly good view (and we didn’t get a better view later in the trip).
After breakfast we drove south for 1-2 hours, initially continuing our passage through the scenic Isalo NP. Here we paused briefly in an unsuccessful search for Benson's Rock-thrush. Then we continued through open grassland, through the gem town of Safira, and on until we reached the small forest reserve of Zombitse. Here we were looking for, and were successful in finding, the extremely local Appert’s Tetraka – which occurs nowhere else. We also enjoyed seeing a pair of roosting White-browed Owls, several lizards, Red-tailed Sportive Lemur and Verreaux’s Sifaka. Whilst we were having a picnic lunch at the reserve, we were joined by 2 Giant Couas, looking for scraps and sunbathing.
After lunch we resumed our journey south through grassland to the south coast town of Tulear. In the last hour or so before reaching Tulear we began to see the occasional Baobab, and then an area of thorn scrub that we visited tomorrow. We missed the turn off to Ifaty and Alex, our driver, tried to take a short-cut to get us onto the road. It was dusk by now and the roads were sand – at one point there was much concern that we were going to get stuck. Eventually we found the right road and continued on it for about 20km and 2 hours before finally arriving at the Ifaty Beach Club. It seemed that the staff were not expecting us, though they soon found us accommodation in nice beach bungalows. We then ordered a meal, some of which arrived after far too long an interval.