Nosy Be in 6 days

A roadless volcanic island twenty minutes by boat from Hell-Ville, where black lemurs, protected by a traditional taboo, come down for bananas.

The covered market of the main town, Andoany, selling spices, vanilla pods, wild pepper and ylang-ylang, with fresh tuna and crab in the morning.

The island's last primary forest, usually reached by outrigger canoe, where guides find the Nosy Be sportive lemur, black lemurs, tiny frogs and panther chameleons.

A small protected islet with a lighthouse and a fringing reef, where at five metres you meet green turtles, clownfish, stingrays and sometimes barracuda.

A viewpoint above dark crater lakes, sacred and home to crocodiles, looking over the west coast and the islets of Sakatia and Iranja.

A car-free island ten minutes off the west coast, where green turtles graze a seagrass bed you can snorkel straight from the shore.

Two kilometres of white sand at the north-western tip, lined with coconut palms, facing a shallow lagoon that stays calm when the wind rises elsewhere.

Two islets joined by a 1.5 km white sandbar that appears at low tide; the larger has a fishing village and an old lighthouse.