Things to do
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Ambalavao
South of town on the highway, a Betsileo market centre makes Antemoro paper pressed with wild flowers and holds a weekly zebu market that draws herds walked up from the south. Nearby Anja Reserve shelters ring tailed lemurs among granite boulders, an easy hour of walking. Herds arrive along the road the evening before market day.
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Fianarantsoa Old Town
Steep lanes of brick houses with carved wooden balconies climb to the cathedral in the upper quarter, one of the few Malagasy towns where the nineteenth century street pattern survives intact. Restoration has been patchy and several buildings are propped up, which is part of what the walk shows. Late afternoon light on the brick and a view over the rice basin reward the climb.
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Park
Isalo National Park
Eroded sandstone in the deep south forms canyons, ridges and hidden pools, a dry landscape unlike the rainforests further north. Day walks reach the natural swimming pool and the Canyon des Makis, while longer routes camp among the rocks. Heat builds quickly after mid morning, so walks start early, and the park sits far enough down the highway to need a night at Ranohira.
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Park
Ranomafana National Park
Montane rainforest east of town protects the golden bamboo lemur, identified here in the 1980s and the reason the park exists at all. Trails climb and drop steeply through wet forest, and guides find the lemurs by following bamboo damage and calls. Leeches and mud come with the territory, and a night walk on the road outside the boundary usually turns up chameleons and frogs.