Compare Top Rated Madagascar Nature Trips

Explore the “eighth continent” and one of the world’s biodiversity hotspots on one of our Madagascar nature trips!

An island roughly the size of Texas or France, Madagascar is home to more than 250,000 species, of which 70 percent are found nowhere else on the globe. On a Madagascar nature trip, you can discover over 70 varieties of lemur, including one that sounds like a police siren, the world’s biggest and smallest chameleons, and the last surviving elephant birds, the largest bird that ever lived. Near Ifaty in Southern Madagascar, visitors can see forests of twisted, spiny ‘octopus’ trees; in the west, they can marvel at the bottle-shaped baobabs, especially at the Avenue du Boabab near Morondava. Equally compelling is the carnivorous pitcher plant — there are over 60 varieties of them — found around Ranomafana.

The people are no less interesting: Arriving here some 1500 years ago along the Indian Ocean trade routes, they grow rice in terraced paddies and speak a language that is most closely related to the Maanyan tongue spoken in southern Borneo. Their culture is steeped in taboo and magic, imbuing caves, waterfalls, animals and even some material objects with supernatural attributes. Hill peoples live in traditional multistoried brick houses with carved balconies and, in some areas, dance with their dead ancestors in the “turning of the bones” ceremony. Throw in a soupçon of pirate history, coastlines littered with shipwrecks, and great regional cooking — and it’s plain that Madagascar offers a multitude of rare rewards. Check out our current Madagascar nature trips below.