The final day into Antsiranana

25 June - We had all received the bicycle jerseys for the trip last night, so before starting today was the group photo with all of us appropriately uniformed.

Just over 100 km today - hot, windy, quite a bit of climbing especially in the morning which in itself probably wouldn't have been all that bad except that on this final day, the road conditions really seriously deteriorated.

Pleasant countryside to ride through, especially after lunch when there was a fairly steady gentle descent...

 

...one bird worth putting in a photo of...

...and one town that we went through and despite it being a Sunday, had a busy market and streets lined with Madagascar flags, tomorrow being their national day...

We haven't mentioned police checkpoints before - here is the last one we passed before reaching Antsiranana. They didn't all have barriers, but we must have passed six to ten such checkpoints every day. The support crew had advised the checkpoints that a string of cyclists would be passing and with only one exception we were waved through with smiles and 'salamas'. The exception was on day one at a particular checkpoint that the support vehicle could not reach due to road condition.

There was an incentive to getting into Antsiranana in good time since the bikes have to be cleaned, seats and handlebars removed etc to get them packed into the bike boxes so that the truck can leave tonight to head back to Antananarivo and get there soon enough for people catching flights on the night of June 27 - bear in mind that they have 1200 km to drive on roads that at places had unmarked holes - we saw a couple of culverts that were half caved in so half the road had an unmarked two meter deep hole in it - night driving doesn't work up here - oh yes, and we are speaking about the major highway from the capital to the north, the only 'paved' road that comes up here.

Anyway, us slowpokes were pleased that after lunch, we were not at the back of the pack - maybe we'd even NOT be the last ones to arrive at camp. Nice thought, but with just 15 km to go, a flat tire on Ursula's rear wheel delayed us enough that true to normal form, we were the last ones to finish. Finally we got to the last bit of orange flagging tape, tied to a post below the Madagascar colours...

...marking the turn down Antsiranana's main street to the rather fancy hotel...

Then the end-of-trip formalities, the thank yous, slide show, farewells especially to the absolutely wonderful Malagasy support crew who had truly done so much to made the trip easy for us, similarly farewells and thanks to the TDA crew who were also nothing short of superb, encouraging, and supportive throughout. And medals for everbody. Then and a great dinner.

26 June - this morning, a number of us had breakfast together at 0700 - late by the standards of the past six weeks, and indeed the people on the morning flight back to Tana had already departed to the airport. We have four more days here before going back to Tana. Met our new guide this morning and got checked into tonight's hotel (but not before a refreshing swim at last night's hotel).

tonight's hotel - Hotel Colbert - on the main street just 250 metres from where we
were last night. Note that the street is absolutely empty - nobody there.

We then wandered around Antsiranana - the town was totally spooky - looked like it was abandoned - no businesses open, nobody on the streets - NOBODY. Today is Madagascar's national holiday celebrating independence from France in 1960. The main celebration was last night. The lady at the new hotel said that many people probably went to the beach (19 km outside town), but it still seemed unnaturally quiet. By late afternoon, though, people were in the streets. We doubt that most of them were at the beach, most likely recovering from too much partying last night plus we think there had to be some other formal things happening elsewhere than in the old town centre where we are.

Provincial Building for national holiday

 The town has many old building that are in various states of repair - hard to know if this one is derelict, abandoned, or under slow construction.

 Right next door is this one that is in significantly better state...

Returning later towards the main street, Avenue Colbert, is another forlorn looking place, the street surface in disrepair, and the sixties-vintage French car outside...

We walked to the corner at the left of the photo above, behind the Renault, and looked left to this scene up Avenue Colbert...

The fact that the town seemed so deserted probably accentuates the contrasting images, and we've become aware that outside appearances here do not necessarily have the same relationship that we are used to with respect to inside cleanliness and functionality. There was an apartment building near the water that viewed from one side looked like an old abandoned 4-story warehouse. From the other side, there were apartments with freshly painted clean looking balconies right beside other balconies that appeared derelict.

We were out tonight for dinner with some of our fellow riders who are still here. But they all leave tomorrow early, so it will be at breakfast tomorrow that we feel the vacuum that is left at the end of these trips when, after several weeks of such closeness with people, suddenly none of them are here any more; we're on our own; the 'reality' of the past several weeks is changing back to 'normal' life, but not too quickly... although the biking is over, we still have a few days here before returning to Tana for the flights home.