Nosy Iranja
Interesting facts
- French astronaut Thomas Pesquet photographed Nosy Iranja and its sandbar from the International Space Station in January 2017.
- A survey of Nosy Iranja Kely from 2000 to 2004 counted 345 green turtle nests against 76 nests of the rarer hawksbill.
- Nosy Iranja is regarded as the most important nesting site for green turtles anywhere in Madagascar.
- Hawksbill nesting is rare across the Comoros Basin, which gives the island's hawksbill beaches unusual conservation value.
- Turtle monitoring here grew out of cooperation between a hotel and researchers, and tourism on the south beaches helped curb poaching.
- The island's steel lighthouse dates from 1909, in the colonial era, and is traditionally attributed to the firm of Gustave Eiffel.
- The sandbar linking the two islands is roughly 100 metres wide and surfaces only around low tide.
Why it is worth it
Nosy Iranja is really two islands and the ribbon of sand that joins them. Off the northwestern coast of Madagascar, in the Mozambique Channel, the larger island, Nosy Iranja Be, and its small wooded neighbour, Nosy Iranja Kely, are connected at low tide by a bar of white sand about two kilometres long. As the water drops the bar emerges in a pale curve across the shallows, and you can walk from one island to the other with the sea on both sides; when the tide returns it vanishes under clear turquoise water and the two islands are separate again. Few places show the movement of the tide quite so plainly.
The island's other name, Turtle Island, explains its second claim. Nosy Iranja is one of the most important nesting beaches in Madagascar for green turtles, which come ashore mostly at night between about May and October, while hawksbill turtles nest here mainly between October and February. Turtles also feed in the surrounding water throughout the year, and snorkellers often meet them over the reef, along with rays and reef fish; dolphins pass offshore, and whales travel the channel during their migration season. Development has been kept deliberately limited to protect the nesting beaches.
Life on Nosy Iranja Be is quiet and small in scale: a fishing village whose people live by the sea, a small lighthouse, and broad beaches of fine pale sand. The pleasure of a visit lies in the simple sequence of things: arriving by boat over shallow, luminous water, climbing for the view down onto the sandbar, and walking it while it lasts.
Getting there
The usual gateway is Nosy Be, served by Nosy Be International Airport (NOS), about 62 km from Nosy Iranja; the island's main town, Hell-Ville, lies about 53 km away. Boat trips leave from Nosy Be and take roughly an hour and a half each way, typically as a full day excursion timed around low tide so that the sandbar can be walked.
On these lists
-13.59250, 47.81667per Wikidata