mora mora - a taxi-brousse trilogy
ep. 3
butterfly confetti
- Route: Vangaindrano > Fort Dauphin
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Distance: 264 km
- Water crossings: 10
- Changes to original plan: >37458
- Duration: 20 hours
Our battered, off-road Yamaha sped into the deep South-East, the crimson mountain path unfolding before us like a red carpet. Butterflies blossomed through the air like confetti, their intricate, fluttering colours set like fabulous jewels between the rusty red of the earth and the euphoric beams of equatorial sun. Tree roots snaked majestically across the trail providing welcome traction for our tyres in the waterlogged sand. The landscape was both desertic and swampy in quick succession, slithers of white sand entwining with the burnt copper soil, creating defined swirling patterns like marble cake.
The experience enveloping me is a gift and the tectonic ordeal that preceded it now seems entirely irrelevant – and perhaps even necessary. As I felt the freedom of the journey shimmering across my skin, the complications of its inception pale insignificant, trailing behind us as impotently as the dust kicked up in our wake. What begun as a taxi-brousse reservation to traverse a remote 264-km section of Madagascar's South-East coastline had morphed into an entirely different beast, disintegrating and exceeding all expectations with the scintillating, pulsating vibrations of a revving motorbike.
*
[3 days earlier:]I was stranded in a small, provincial village for two nights in wait of an elusive taxi-b for a 3-day journey to the tropical paradise of Fort Dauphin. This obstacle was unfortunate, though entirely unsurprising in the context of Mercury (the planet ruling travel and communication) retrograding through my first house (physical self) of Aries (the fiery sign of initiation and forward movement). While the retrograde mirrored the exasperating difficulties I was having accessing my resources in this town, an oncoming solar eclipse would conjoin Mercury on my scheduled departure date. This forecast sudden change to plans, lack of control and deceit.
I had never planned on staying in Vangaindrano, and the feeling seemed mutual. After a stressful arrival and the breakdown of my financial system, I sat down – ravenous – in a local hotely (eatery). I was then charged six times the standard cost for rice and beans. As £5 was a relatively minor financial loss, I decided to pay. Nevertheless, the betrayal was foreboding. Plus I now had even less cash to tide me through this involuntary besiegement.
More than any place I'd visited, I felt othered by the constant name-calling ('vazaha,' meaning outsider, foreigner). The tone of delivery varied from harmless and inquisitive to hostile and menacing. As I moved through the streets, eyes, conversations and people followed in a way that made me feel vulnerable to the unpredictable tides of crowd psychology. Cashless and trapped, I minimised departures from my hotel room to food acquisition and diligently awaited my escape.
[day of departure:]
To my great fortune, I discovered through a chance encounter with a man I'd met days prior that the taxi-brousse guy was significantly overcharging me. This revelation led to another – even more troubling: that the promised 2pm departure time was impossible as the bus had not yet returned to the village. That sleazy, bedraggled ponytail had looked me in the eyes, shaken my hand and lied to me in bad faith – I was fuming. Hot-headed with the sting of deception and desperation to leave this sworded place I marched across the village in pursuit of justice.
An episode of confrontation and fervent denial of any wrongdoing by the pathetic man and those surrounding him unfolded at the bus station. He doubled down on his lies and sunk with the ship of his integrity. I got my money back and before I knew it I was speeding past the empty bus station on the back of Akram's motorbike in a gratifying victory parade, engine roaring and proverbial guns (and 'fuck yous') blazing.
*
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The terrain we were covering was incredibly adverse: sand; mud; thigh-deep puddles; steep, boulder-riddled inclines; and extremely rickety wooden bridges... you name it, we were driving over, around or through it. The devastating impact of the cyclone season on the nation's infrastructure was tangible. Sections of asphalt roads were few and far between. I was beginning to understand my naivete regarding the complications which this route entailed.
The most efficient solution to this terrain was the motorbike. In fact, it became quickly apparent that any attempt to embark on the journey by taxi-brousse would have been stymied, as the second of ten ferries on our route was out of action. Our 350kg motorbike was expertly transported across the misty mirage in a wooden canoe.
As we paddled gently through the mirror-like waters, I silently praised the travel gods for saving me from the devastating fates of the bus journey that could have been. Plus, motorbikes are just straight-up sexy. Vangaindrano had not been an easy stopover, but it also hadn't been without its merits; I never would have met Akram without guidance from the people I encountered.
*
As we teetered on the edge of a puddle that swallowed the sunken width of the path, the bike's rear wheel slipped from the muddy ledge. We lost balance and followed suit, plunging sideways into the water. Time and engine stopped and we quickly pushed the bike into vertical alignment and stumbled out of the bog.
No harm no foul but the engine was flooded and wouldn't start. This was not the beginning of our mechanical troubles, which had begun just hours after our departure the day before. Birds chirped and a gentle breeze took the edge off the late-morning sun rays. There was no sign of civilization in either direction. I'd lost my water bottle en route and Akram didn’t have all the tools he needed for the repair. As we surrendered to the silence of our lifeless bike, I felt an overwhelming sense of peace and was consumed by the baffling beauty of our surroundings.
*
After plumbing the depths of Route Nationale 12 we found ourselves on increasingly manageable road surfaces – civilisation near. My bum ached from days of impact on the rocky terrain and my neck struggled to accommodate the gravitational force of a helmet so big for me I had to pull the chin strap down with my hand to prevent it from flying off my head. Breakdowns, ferry crossings and sustenance stops aside, we rode from dawn till dusk for 20 hours over three days.
Finally, in the early hours of a Wednesday morning, we cruised down a road set into the formidable white sand beaches of Taolagnaro. I knew then that I wouldn’t change a thing about the journey; this was the ride of a lifetime.
* * *
THE END.