Allée des Baobabs (June 4)


Bear-hugging a big, broad baobab

All across Madagascar, agriculture is the lifeblood of the Malagasy people. Half an hour's drive from Morondava, the westcoast city where we stayed for two nights, is an area like many others -dominated by rice, cotton, tobacco, and peanut plantations where dense rain forests once grew. This area has one unique feature though - scattered across the landscape is a species of baobab tree (Grandidier's baobab) found only in this southwest region of Madagascar and nowhere else on earth. These trees grow to be about 25-30m tall and the trunks up to 3m in diameter. Their branches and canopies are restricted to the very tops of the trees where they fan out mostly horizontally.

Looking way up this giant of a tree!

It would take about 6 of me to wrap my arms around this one

Because the surrounding forests were cleared long ago, the trees now stick out like sore thumbs. In the dry winter season especially, they are a very peculiar looking tree. An ancient legend actually tells the tale of the baobab tree being plucked out of the ground by God and stuck back into the ground upside down because he was tired of listening to the tree complain about its God-given appearance.

A baobab in the distance.  It looks like its been pulled out of the ground and stuck back in upside down

This species now grows fewer in number and is fighting off a number of threats to its survival, including: over-exploitation for its fruit, seeds, bark and wood; loss of habitat; and a number of factors that prevent its seeds from growing into mature trees.

Leading north from Morondava is a very rough road that leads to Kirindy Private Reserve and Tsingy de Bemaraha National Park, both of which we visited and are described in separate posts by Lucas and Maya.  About 30 km out of the city, a short, 250m section of this road has been dubbed "The Alley of the Baobabs" because of the higher density of baobabs that line the road.  This section of road is one of the most tourist-visited sites in all of Madagascar because of these trees.  We visited 'the alley in the late afternoon, walking the road along with about 40 or so other tourists.   While walking and taking pictures we were greeted by quite a few happy, friendly local children eager to be photographed with us.  After the 'photo shoots' were done though, they invariably turned to asking for money.  

 The 'Alley' is definitely one of the more unique and surreal looking sites we saw along our travels. Here are a few more pictures of this beautiful and unique giant and the road lined by them as the sun was setting.  


Allée des Baobabs

Us and a friendly local boy on the Allée!

Hawkers selling wooden baobabs with the real baobabs in the background

Alley of the Baobabs at sunset




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