Not possible to confirm Tana?Johannesburg flights at Tuléar. Try at Tana. That’s always assuming we get the Tuléar?Tana flight. Tense, isn’t it? Nailbitingly cliff-hanging. Palpitatingly anxiety-inducing. Except that somehow, in the unremitting sunshine, with the slow surge and drag of the surf, the languid sitting around waiting for the tide, and the prevailing attitude of ‘mora mora’, it’s a patently futile expenditure of energy. And it’s astonishing how effectively inactivity breeds yet further lassitude. Four days is sufficient: I might get to like it.
Adrian did a dive this morning that was so bad, they aren’t going to charge him. I was due to join the second outing at 9.15 to go snorkelling. At 9.10, I saw the boat leave the beach. They’d forgotten me. I tried to get a motorised pirogue to take me to meet them, but he’d disappeared. The pirogue à voile would have got me there as they were leaving the site, therefore attempt abandoned. Read Iain Pears and ‘Martian in the Playground’ instead. Fascinating insights into Renaissance art theft and autism respectively.
In the afternoon, we rented a quadbike and guide for a couple of hours to go north up the coast to Soalala which was the main port in this region but now the customs houses are abandoned and the jetty, substantial but disused, thrusts into a pretty, neat bay backed by 100 foot cliffs, topped by Mahafaly tombs. As we stopped to admire the view, the now-familiar strains of Malagasy music floated over the scrubby plain, so we attended a funeral: a very jolly, populous event with gifts for the family from friends from 50km away, which they walked. Congas of people waving lambas danced round the plain, singing and chanting, all dressed to the nines, some over the eight, to send him, in his crenellated casket, to seventh heaven, sixth sense permitting. (Enough numerical contriving – Ed).
Driving the bike was easy and fun, but very expensive. In the last kilometre or so, we Did the Dunes – I let Adrian take over because he loves it so much. As a toy, it’s rather humiliating compared with those of the local children. Yesterday, one had a home-made aeroplane with a working propeller. This is the most sophisticated jou-jou I’ve seen. Another had a carved boat, complete with an outboard, that he towed on a string. They play in the waves so joyfully, so innocently, so simply – it is uplifting and humbling. And what’s more, they don’t seem to grow out of it. Ever.