To get to Moca from Anivorano you 1st have to cross the river, this invovled take a tinny dugout canoe. The canoe can hold about 4 people plus the driver and the water bailer, without sinking. There was one moment where i thought i might die but i just reminded my self to take a deep breath and that this was nothing compared to the boats that i used to row for the U's crew team.

After crossing the river and scaleing a cliff we set off along a very muddy track that even the most miberal minded would not call a road. We were tramping along through the mud that at times came up to my knees (absolutly no exageration). The landscape was amazing, pathces of primary rainforest surrounded by rice paddies, sugar cane fields and little hamlets, all made more magical by the late evening sun. We were making pretty slow progress as we would frequnetly stop to talk to people (Mbola knows everyone) or to chop down some more suger cane to munch on, people around here are always chewing on suger cane-thus the reason they have no teeth.

I was having such a great time tramping along ruining my teeth and chatting way thay i wasn't paying any attention to how late it was getting. We got to the point where you turn off the "road" and start up a tiny little foot path just as dusk was falling. Mbola turns to me and says "this is the shortest way but it is getting dark maybe we should go the longer way around as the path is better." After determining that the this longer path would add at least an hour to our trek and that we were "really close" (never again will i trust a Gasy person's sense of distance) we decided to take the shorter path, I had my head lamp after all and if it got really dark we could pull that out.

I quickly discovered that this path may be shorter but it was a hell of a lot more difficult. We were scrambaling up the side of a mountain and dark was falling fast. We reached a nice little grove where we stopped so I could catch my breath and Mbola looked for the head lamp but couldn't find it, we would have to make the descent in the dark. Amazingly enough I didn't die or even injure myself particularly badly. I slid down more than i climbed down and by the time we got to the bottom I was covered in mud-head to toe-and had thorns in one hand as i had grabbed at the nearest plant when i found myself falling only to discover that it was coverd with nasty little thorns. But i was still enjoyingh the adventure, we had not only descended a slope that was more wall than hill we had forded two rivers, waded threw some rice paddies and gotten lost once, but the stars were out and the house was in site. I happily started immagining a large bowl of rice and a nice warm bed, I was soon to be sorely disallusioned.

As we approuched the house Mbola calls out "odio, odio" Malagasy for "hi, i'm here" as we didn't want to gaurdien to have a heart attack when we jumped out of the woods, strangely we got no response. We stood on the edge of the forest for a couple of min calling out and waiting for a response but we were never to get one, the gaurdien was missing in action.

Not knowing what else to do Mbola decided to break into the house, not particularly difficult, and we set aboakeing ourselves at home. After we had settled in a bit, changed into different clothes and washed off some of the mud we were ready to make dinner. We found the firewood and we had a lighter but we couldn't find the pots. We searched high and low, in the rafters and under the bed but there were no pots to be found. No pots, no dinner. The only thing to do was to go to bed. It is at this point that Mbola goes "didn't your bring a blanket?" Well no, I hadn't brought a blanket, "that wasn't one of the things that you told me we needed" his response "ooh, we are going to be cold" at which point I started cracking up, wet, cold, hungary and tired without a solution to any of these problems the only thing to do was to laugh. "Why do you laugh" asked Mbola and so I told him "it's either laugh or cry"

It was a miserable night to say the least, we put on all our dry clothes and curled up as close togeather as possible and tried to get some sleep, I don't think either of us were very sucessful. The bed was hust some boards and no mataress and there were a lot of REALLY big rats scurrying around. They were so big that when they ran across the florr the entire house shook, absolutly no exxageration. At one point Mbola and I both got up to go pee, stretch the kins out of our backs and do a couple of jumping jacks to warm up. I pulled out my cell phone to see what time it was wanting to know how much longer we would have to suffer before the sun came out, I was sure it was around 1 or 2 and was really disapointed when i discovered it was only 10:30, AHHH! The rest of the night passed VERY slowely.

The sun finally came up on a very gray and rainy morning, it was the end of the nice weather. We crawled out of bed, cracked our joints-i actually had a bruise on my hip from trying to sleep on my side-and set about trying to find something to eat and a way to cook it. We found a large tin can and cooked a breakfast of cassava in that. The gaurdien finally decided to show up around 10, he had been off drinking with a buddy and unless I am much mistaken he will soon be looking for a new job. We headed off to the local village to find a friend who would lend us a blanket. It, of course, poured the entire time and the only slightly dry clothes we had were now compleatly soaked. I also managed to fall into not one but two streams. We found a blanket whihc lead to a slightly warmer though still very uncomfertable night; It is this hike through the rain which i am convinced gave me a mild form of hypothermia.

The rest of the trip passed without to terribly much misshape, we looked at a lot of trees, slogged through some more mud, and saw a bunch of lemurs. Mbola wanted to stay a third night but i was done with this rustic living thing, I wanted some civilization. Who would have ever gussed i would consider Anivorano to be a lrage and civilized place.