Into the (Ranomafana) woods

This morning, I was relieved to find a longer ramp route up to breakfast. Our hotel kindly packed us breakfast and lunch so we could get an early start, beating most of the groups into the park and seeing the lemurs get their breakfast while we ate ours. Emile and his spotters did their magic, and before you knew it we had a whole group of black- and white-ruffed lemurs to watch, all to ourselves. We spent quite a bit of time observing them and quickly became spoiled to the point where later we didn’t want to linger when there were too many people around. Not that they could block your view of what was overhead, but it felt crowded in comparison.

Black-and-white ruffed lemur (T.Larsen)

Black-and-white ruffed lemur (N.Acero)

too many humans, not enough lemurs (N.Acero)

Pittalike groundroller (T.Larsen) 

Our grand finale in Ranomafana was hiking to a waterfall. It’s probably for the best that I didn’t know how many steep slopes we’d be traversing to get there, and the stairs helped a lot, but it was a lot of up and down before we arrived. Once we arrived I was glad we did it. The falls were beautiful and refreshing, with shaded areas of brightly colored flowers and the only butterflies I saw in the park.

waterfall in Ranomafana

the bridge back to civilization

Late that afternoon, we visited an area on the outskirts of the park where Emile again amazed us with his critter spotting. We parked at an unassuming area along the road, Emile went off into the bushes, and the next thing you knew he produced this frog and giraffe beetle for us to photograph and admire up close.

Mantella baroni (T.Larsen)

giraffe beetle (T.Larsen)

We finished it up with another night hike, and topped it off by having dinner at the research center with its head of operations, Eileen, and a few of their staff. It’s a beautiful facility in an incredible location, and I started scheming about how to have a workshop or retreat held there as an excuse to come back.