Let's Get Out of the City

Just outside of Sambava, in an area that locals refer to (very adamantly, it seems) as “the bowl,” lies Andapa, a small mountain-surrounded town (hence the name), and, just outside of Andapa, lies the park Anjanaharibe-Sud, and, just inside this forest preserve, lies the Takhtajania, one of the first trees to ever grow flowers. That seems like a big evolutionary step. As a testament to my high school nerdiness, I actually remember reading, in 1997, that scientists had rediscovered the Takhtajania, a 120 million year old species first found in 1904 and thought since to be extinct. 120 million years. When you think about the dates of the ice ages and of man and the fact that some people (including, perhaps, the future Republican nominee) believe the world to be 60,000 years old, that’s a long time to survive.* So I suited up the backpack and headed out. As it would turn out, the park is not so “just outside of town” as I initially thought, nor is the tree so similarly “just inside” the park. But, after 20km of hiking (all of it in mountains, the last quarter of it through pathless rainforest) I finally found the Takhtajania. At first, my response was, “This is it?” but then it became “This is it…” and finally transformed into “This is it!” Yes, the tree wasn’t flowering (rain’s been slow this year, delaying the event until January), and yes, it was small, but it was also, perhaps because of my dehydration and fatigue, somehow awe-inspiring. (Hence the amount of pictures, particularly of its millipede-style sproutings and its colorations.)
On the way down, I noticed some more pretty flowers and decided to take a few shots of the path I’d taken (for evidence of its lack of existence, note the picture of random forest and the one of the ubiquitous ferns)


as well as a little clip of a curious chameleon. Did I mention that half the chameleon species in existence worldwide are endemic to Madagascar? All told, the hike was about 10 hours, not including the 1.5 hour car ride each way with a taxi driver who liked to blare out Omega and had a cracked (passenger side) windshield.
Luckily, I had eaten a big breakfast of soupy rice and diced-up re-fried meat. Who knew the best way to heat something up was to put it in a wok full of hot oil?






*(I should add that there were other trees with the same idea, some of which are far older, for example the 300-million+ year old ginkgo tree.)




PS
There were also some kids playing dreidle in the village with halved litchi pits! Terribly cute...

AND!
If you were impressed by THIS tree (and I know you were), then you should totally check out THIS! tree, which I haven't seen in person but which my friend Suzie just told me about!
http://www.breitbart.com/article.php?id=2008-01-16_D8U7D9100&show_article=1&cat=breaking