Kangaroo Island – Raw Beauty and Many Wild Marsupials

(Location: Kangaroo Island, South Australia) In January of 2014 I had a work trip to Adelaide, so we decided to make a long weekend out of it and tick Kangaroo Island off the list. Our flight from Melbourne landed late afternoon, so we arranged to spend the first night in McLaren Vale. After a light […]

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Wine and Penguins – Why Not?

(Location: Phillip Island, Victoria, Australia) After returning from sailing in The Whitsundays, we had a few days to kill before returning to work so we made an impromptu road trip to the Mornington Peninsula and Phillip Island. By “quick trip to the Mornington Peninsula” I mean that we drove through there on the way to […]

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Maned Wolves, Macaws, and Monkeys

When we booked the trip to the Pantanal, we were “upsold” to spend a few days at another one of the owner’s properties. He promised maned wolves, a macaw hide, and nut-cracking capuchin monkeys, so we decided to give it a go. From the Pantanal (Cuiaba airport), we flew to Brasisila, and then drove four […]

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Jaguars of the Pantanal

From Rio, we flew west to Cuiaba. It was a three hour drive to our first stop, the Santa Teresa Farm. The plan was to visit their bird viewing stand, and have a bite to eat to break up the journey. We also switched vehicles, from a van to an open safari-style truck. It was […]

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Fossa ! The cat-like lemur-eating star of Madagascar

 Kirindy, Madagascar When we booked this trip, we asked the travel agent when the best time to travel was based on what we wanted to see. I remember him saying, “If you go in the first few weeks of November, all of the fossa are mating so you will be more likely to see one.” […]

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Dancing Sifakas in Berenty

Berenty, Madagascar We’d been warned about flight delays and general inefficiency in Madagascar. But our flight to Berenty actually departed four hours early! Our guide found out late the night before, so we were up early for the now 6:45am flight. I guess this is why our travel agent insisted we have him with us […]

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Andasibe – 8 types of lemurs and a bunch of lizards

Andasibe National Park, Madagascar   The drive from Tana to Andasibe was a little rough – lots of passing on one lane roads, and very, very, windy roads. We were both glad when the four hour drive was over and we arrived at the Vakona Forest Lodge. We were in room #1, which was conveniently […]

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Getting to Madagascar from the US

Traveling Light Getting to Madagascar from the US takes a bit of time, especially if you are on frequent flyer tickets. We’d booked forever in advance so we got business class tickets and were flying Houston – DC – Johannesburg – Antananarivo. There was a hurricane in the Atlantic, so we were watching the weather […]

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The Quest for the Quetzal

(Location: San Gerado del Doto, Costa Rica) We’re not birders. Well, I’m definitely not a birder. Andy says he’s not a birder. In any event, we found ourselves driving halfway up the Pan American highway in search of the Resplendent Quetzal. Neither of us are feeling that great at this point in the trip. Let’s […]

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Birds, birds, birds

(Location: San Vito, Costa Rica) From Pavones, we drove (well, were driven) two hours back to Golfito, and then another very hilly, windy hour to Las Cruces Biological Station. There is one reason to go here: birds. We were only here for one night, and had the whole place to ourselves. We did a two […]

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