Family Wildlife Tour in Madagascar

You’ll fly into Ivato International Airport in Antananarivo, where you’ll be greeted by an English-speaking guide who will accompany you to Maison Gallieni, your hotel in the upper town of Antananarivo, locally known as ‘Tana’.

Maison Gallieni is a restored colonial mansion with an elegant mix of modern and traditional décor. Take a dip in the pool and enjoy the lovely views over the city, or head out to explore the traditional architecture and distinct Indonesian influence of Tana. You stay here for just one night, but you will return later in your travels so today is ideal for rest after the international travels.

After breakfast, you’ll meet your guide who will take you east to Andasibe-Mantadia National Park, a beautiful rainforest park, about four hours’ drive from Antananarivo. The park consists of two protected areas including the Perinet Special Reserve and Mantadia National Park, famous for their population of indri lemurs, the largest living lemur species on earth.

The journey to Andasibe offers first time visitors to Madagascar a great insight into rural life with rice fields, redbrick houses and roadside stalls selling seasonal fruits and vegetables lining the route.

You’ll arrive at Mantadia Lodge in time for lunch (you’ll stay at the lodge on a full-board basis), where you stay for two nights.

This afternoon, visit a private reserve operated by local NGO Mitsinjo. The NGO funds reforestation, community education and sensitization to conservation issues as well as running Madagascar’s first amphibian captive-breeding facility. Here you will see a stunning array of wildlife and can also plant an indigenous species along the reforestation trail.

After breakfast, you’ll make the 1.5 hour drive to Mantadia National Park for a day of adventure and a picnic lunch. Keep your eyes peeled for lemurs in this stunning park including the indri lemur, diademed sifaka, grey bamboo lemur, red-bellied lemur and white ruffed lemur.

While the trails are slightly more difficult, the rewards are great as the forest is taller, wilder and less crowded than Perinet. It’s a naturalist's goldmine with many rare species of mammals, reptiles and birds, and an abundance of birds including the scaly ground roller, pitta-like ground roller and breasted coua.

Enjoy a family picnic by the Rianasoa Waterfall before hiking back to the vehicle and returning to the lodge.

You’ll have the chance to head out on a night walk with a local guide this evening to explore the forest surrounding the reserve. You’ll get to see a variety of nocturnal lemurs including mouse lemurs, white footed sportive lemur, fat-tailed dwarf lemur, and the woolly lemur.

Enjoy an early breakfast before meeting your local guide and heading out to the 180-hectare Perinet Reserve in search of the indri lemur. With a barely visible tail, black and white markings and a surprised teddy bear face, this lemur is one of the few animals in the world that cannot survive in captivity.

There are another 11 species of lemur to spot as you walk through the rainforest, and you may also find a troop of grey bamboo lemurs, common brown lemur, diademed sifaka and the black and white ruffed lemur.

Birdwatchers should look out for the velvet asity, blue coua, Nuthatch vanga and many more endemic species. Perinet Reserve is also home to scores of reptiles, invertebrates, and some of Madagascar’s orchid species. After lunch in Andasibe, you’ll drive back to Antananarivo, where you’ll check in to Maison Gallieni for the night.

After breakfast at Maison Gallieni, you will be driven back to the airport in time for your 3 hour flight west to Morondava.

Morondava is situated in the west of Madagascar, on the delta of the river of the same name at the edge of the Mozambique Channel. Morondava was the centre of the Sakalava kingdom and is known for its elaborately sculpted wooden royal tombs. These tombs are frequently decorated with well-executed, often erotic, funerary carvings representing life and fertility.  

Upon arrival you will meet with your guide and transfer to your hotel, Palissandre Côte Ouest Hotel, where you stay for two nights on a full board basis. 

The afternoon is at your leisure or you can choose to have a tour around Morondava. In the evening, you will be driven about 20km to the Avenue of the Baobabs for a beautiful sunset and fantastic photo opportunities. This is the most iconic view of Madagascar.

After an early breakfast, you will be driven 50km to the north-east of Morondava to the Kirindy Reserve.

This is a privately managed forest that is known as the best place in Madagascar to see the elusive fossa. It is also home to the very cute Madagascar Giant Jumping Rat, endemic to this forest, and 8 lemur species including Madame Berthe’s mouse lemur which is endemic to Kirindy. Birdwatchers will enjoy the 70 bird species including the rare White-Breasted Mesite.

The landscape is dry deciduous forest interspersed with towering baobab trees. Three out of the island’s seven baobab species are found here.

After a leisurely picnic lunch, you will be driven back to Morondava to your hotel.

Today, your guide will meet you and transfer you to the airport for your flight back to Tana. Upon arrival, you will be met by another guide who will transfer you to your hotel, Maison Gallieni where you stay for one night on a half board basis.

After an early breakfast, you will be transferred back to Ivato Airport in time for your scheduled charter North-west to Anjajavy.

Upon arrival you will be greeted by a hotel staff member and transferred to Anjajavy Le Lodge where you will stay for the next three nights on a full board basis in a Seaview Villa. Anjajavy Lodge is located within a 450 hectare nature reserve on Madagascar’s north-west coast. The lodge’s 25 duplex, rosewood villas all have private decks overlooking the ocean. Meals can be served in an enclosed oasis in the hotel grounds or on the beach. The surrounding forest is alive with lemurs, chameleons, malachite kingfishers and hummingbirds.

At 5:30 pm you will depart for a night walk in the reserve to spot a variety of nocturnal lemurs. While the reserve’s show-stoppers are undoubtedly the charismatic coquerel’s sifakas, the hours of darkness also have their star performers. Weighing a mere 63 grams, danfoss mouse lemurs scamper about in the shrubbery around the reserve just after nightfall, springing from branch to branch, quick as a flash, in search of food.

If you hear a strange squeal coming from the tree tops, then you have probably found a Grewcock’s sportive lemur. Other mammals to spot are the endemic tsingy tuft-tailed rat, Commerson’s leaf-nosed bat, or Madagascar’s largest predator - the rare and elusive fossa.

This morning, depart for a walk along the ‘Chemin des Crabes’ to see the fabulous birdlife, beautiful baobabs and of course, the famous hairy crab.

Even if bird watching isn’t your thing, you can’t help but be enchanted by the kaleidoscope of colours and shapes of the reserve’s common birds, from the vibrant red fody and Souimanga sunbird to the exotic paradise flycatcher and sickle-billed vanga. It is one of the best places to spot the regal Madagascar fish eagle, shy crested Ibis, or rare Madagascar sacred Ibis.

At the end of the walk, you will visit a small cave where you will find a fossilized lemur skull, stalactites and sharks’ teeth. You will return to the lodge for lunch and a leisurely afternoon.

This morning you will enjoy a long walk along the Giant’s Causeway and King’s Alley. You will discover extremely ancient baobab trees, tsingy rock formations found only in Madagascar, along with a variety of lemurs including the Coquerel’s sifakas.

These remarkable animals live in family groups of up to 10 individuals, and though they are perfectly adapted to life in the trees they often descend to the ground too. Unlike the famous Verreaux’s sifaka from southern Madagascar with its characteristic sideways dance, the Coquerel’s sifaka bounces across the ground like a mini kangaroo! The sifakas, along with troops of common brown lemurs, roam freely in the gardens and surrounding reserve.

You will return to the lodge for lunch and a leisurely afternoon.

At 9:30 am, transfer to the airstrip for your morning flight to Tana by scheduled charter.

Upon arrival at Tana airport, you will be met by a Wayfairer representative, who will assist you in checking in for your outbound flight. This brings your stunning Family Wildlife Adventure to an end, but with memories that will last a lifetime.