{"id":1154,"date":"2007-01-02T16:00:00","date_gmt":"2007-01-02T16:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.hodson.ca\/Travel\/?p=1154"},"modified":"2017-09-22T23:43:55","modified_gmt":"2017-09-23T03:43:55","slug":"day-18-ile-sainte-marie","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.hodson.ca\/Travel\/?p=1154","title":{"rendered":"Day 18 – Ile Sainte Marie"},"content":{"rendered":"

We awoke at 4:45 this morning to get ready to leave for the airport for our flight to Ile Sainte Marie.\u00a0 Nadine and I plus her family accounted for 7 of the 12 passengers on this flight, so we had lots of room on the 72-seat ATR plane.<\/p>\n

Like other flights in Madagascar, this one is not very far; only about 325 km when measuring a straight line distance.\u00a0 Total flight time would be about 50 minutes.<\/p>\n

\"SainteMarieMap\"<\/p>\n

Below is a close-up map of Ile Sainte Marie.<\/p>\n

\"SainteMarieCloseup\"<\/p>\n

One bit of good news is that Cyclone Clovis seems to have taken a turn and moved further to the south than expected, so our weather here is fantastic.\u00a0 It seems we successfully dodged another storm.
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Ile Sainte Marie is an island just off the east coast of Madagascar (but still part of Madagascar) in the Indian Ocean.\u00a0 The island itself is about 50 km from top to bottom, but no more than about 6 km across at its widest point.\u00a0 We would arrive at the airport, which is located on the ocean at the extreme southern end of the island.<\/p>\n

The girls are excited about the trip\u2026
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Here are some photos from the plane just before landing\u2026<\/p>\n

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Below is a photo from the plane just after landing.<\/p>\n

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Once inside the terminal building, we headed back outside and waited for the porters to gather our luggage and bring them to the van to take us to the hotel.<\/p>\n

Here are some pictures of our plane\u2026<\/p>\n

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Just outside the terminal building, our hotel has a small building of its own to greet it’s guests as they arrive.\u00a0 They provide a nice lounge to relax in while waiting for luggage.\u00a0 I just can’t figure out what is taking them so long to get our luggage.\u00a0 There were only 12 people on the plane, so how long can it take?<\/p>\n

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Looking back at the airport terminal from the hotel lounge\u2026<\/p>\n

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Dave waiting in the lounge for the luggage\u2026<\/p>\n

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Here\u2019s a map of Ile Sainte Marie.\u00a0 You can see our hotel, the Soanambo Hotel shown near the bottom of the island, not far from the airport.<\/p>\n

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Once our luggage was loaded into the hotel van, we headed for the Soanambo Hotel, which is only a couple of kilometres from the airport.<\/p>\n

Here we are on the main road up the island of Sainte Marie.<\/p>\n

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We arrived at our hotel and checked in.\u00a0 It is a very nice place, and below are a few photos.<\/p>\n

Here is the pier across the lagoon, as seen from the restaurant.<\/p>\n

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This image is looking up the beach.\u00a0 Our cabin would be a fair walk up the beach.<\/p>\n

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Looking back at the restaurant from the pier\u2026<\/p>\n

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