A Madagascan journey in a rail car on tyres

By Klaus Heimer Aug 17, 2010, 13:04 GMT

Antananarivo, Madagascar - The group of Madagascans, Frenchmen and Germans stood expectantly on the railway platform in Madagascar's capital Antananarivo.

'All aboard!' called the three friendly hostesses, Rindra, Haingo and Felana. They would inform the passengers, in English and French, about points of interest along the way and also serve snacks.

Everyone boarded the Micheline, a vintage French pneumatic-tyred rail car resembling a bus. It was refurbished by Madarail, the company that has been operating Madagascar's northern railway network for the past several years. The Micheline goes east to Andasibe as well as to Antsirabe, 170 kilometres to the south.

On this day, the destination of the four-hour journey was Andasibe, where a national park is home to indris, the largest lemurs.

The Micheline's comfortable vintage seats - softly upholstered and with leather armrests and neck cushions - regularly induced one or another of the passengers to take a brief nap. The trip went without incident: none of the five spare tyres had to be used.

The driver, Marc Razafindrabe, his electrician and two mechanics know every curve, tunnel and railway crossing by heart. Riding the Micheline is nothing special to them.

But not to the passengers, who are transported back into the 1950s, when Series ZM 571 Michelines were in vogue and deployed on Madagascar, the world's fourth-largest island, by then-colonial master France.

Weighing seven tons and 14 metres in length, Madarail's Micheline, the only intact one of its type, has a 120-horsepower Mercedes engine, 19 seats, a small bar and a toilet - all restored true to the original. It is called Viko-Viko, which is the name of an endemic bird species, the Madagascar pratincole.

The most important tool on board is the horn, which blares loudly no matter whether the vehicle is rolling through open countryside or announcing its arrival in populated areas.

Viko-Viko spent nearly 10 dreary years in a workshop before returning to work in early 2010. The rail car consumes about 35 litres of diesel fuel on the 148.32-kilometre stretch of 70- centimetre-gauge track between Antananarivo and Andasibe. It crosses the Mangoro River on an iron girder bridge and passes through several tunnels at short intervals during the descent from Mandraka.

The round-trip fare between Antananarivo and Andasibe is 130,000 ariaries (about 65 dollars) per person. The 'small train like no other,' as Madarail bills its Micheline, departs the capital punctually at 8 am on Saturday mornings and arrives in Andasibe, honking loudly, around noon.

The return trip, which also takes four hours, leaves Andasibe at 2 pm on Sundays.

This gives travellers plenty of time to look for nocturnal lemurs during an evening walk on the edge of Mantadia National Park and Analamazoatra Special Reserve, and then track down the big indris, which are diurnal, the next morning with the aid of a local nature guide.

Highlights of the outbound run are the stops at Mandraka, with a grand view into the valley when there is no late-morning fog, and the stop at the bottom in Anjiro, where the passengers get out briefly, the rail car backs up and then re-enters the station so they can take pictures.

During its journey, Viko-Viko constantly passes people who wave - farmers ploughing their fields or working in rice paddies and, when the tracks run parallel to National Road No. 2, friendly motorists.

The road, which links the capital with Tamatave on the east coast, provided a spectacle on this particular day, when Viko-Viko passed the scene of a traffic accident. A minibus, now badly damaged, had collided head-on with a lorry and both wound up in a ditch.

The scenes that mostly stream past the windows, though, are those of eucalyptus forests and pine groves. The trees are exploited industrially, especially around the small town of Moramanga.

Passengers who secretly hoped to see a tyre change on rails were disappointed on the outbound run. But they got their money's worth on the return trip. A tyre had to be changed on that Sunday morning at Andasibe station, then another after 20 kilometres and a third after a further 20 kilometres.

After the tour was over, travellers who had acquired a taste for Madarail's Micheline could look forward to a leisurely chug from Antananarivo to the gemstone centre of Antsirabe.

Travel information can be obtained from Madarail. E-mail: tourisme@madarail.mg. Tel. (00261) 020 22 34599 or (00261) 034 00 50357.