So we arrived on the beach with our family vehicle, alias, the blue double-seat kayak, to explore the small Nosy Antsoba. We have been told by fellow cruisers that this is an island not to be missed, and what we have seen under the water so far, proved them right. Now we are ready to explore above the water.

As we pulled the kayak above the waterline, a tourist boat pulls in and offloads a group of tourists. They have come to see the "wild" lemurs. The two tour guides meet the two locals managing the island and they provide a basket full of bananas to lure the lemurs to the beach. The lemurs jumped on the tourists and the sound of clicking cameras proved the success of the activity. After about 15 minutes the tourists are loaded back on the boat again, and off they went.

This left us with the two locals, and we enquired about the route to the top of the island, as we had seen a path going up to the top of the rocks earlier the morning while we were circling the island to find an anchor spot between the corals. They each grabbed a handful of bananas and one leaded and one followed us. Johannes was right behind the leader, followed by Joop carrying Lelei, then Dirk, followed by me. As we were leaving the lemurs, it seemed there was some aggression within the group and we could see some fighting occurring between two of them. At one point in time, Joop and everyone in front of him had turned a corner into the vegetation, and just before Dirk could turn, there was a sudden haze of movement in front of me, and next thing I saw a black lemur hanging onto Dirk's leg and he was shouting. It all happened so fast, but I realised this lemur was actually biting him! I ran, but by then the local walking at the back of the group had already gathered what had happened and he had chased the lemur away and had picked Dirk up. I ran towards him and examined the scars. Luckily it was only two scratches on his leg, with little blood coming out of it. But we were all in shock, also the locals. After that incident, the local at the back of the group kept on chasing the lemurs away by throwing bananas to them. Dirk was in shock for quite a while and I ended up carrying him up to the top of the island (luckily only approximately 60m high), but still a heavy rock climb! We enjoyed the view, and seeing the white lemur species which we had not yet seen, but we were all glad when we were safely in our kayak again, on our way back to Goody!