Madagaskar

A reef stretches over 450km along the southwestern coast of Madagascar, making it the fifth-largest coral reef in the world. Running from Andavadoaka in the north to Itampolo in the south, it's the main attraction in the region, with its own changing personality.

Madagascar’s number-one beach destination, the island of Nosy Be has all the ingredients you'd expect: soft white sand, turquoise waters and wonderful seafood. A paradise for water-based activities with its sunny climate most of the year, diving is the top draw, and there is plenty of swimming, snorkelling, sailing and fishing. Operators offer excursions to the surrounding islands with their beautiful beaches and great diving opportunities.

Att göra i Prag: besök Centraleuropas största begravningsplats Olšanský hřbitovy.

It's as if Madagascar had conspired to provide a microcosm of its myriad travel experiences all in one place: here you'll find the isolated Sava region with its wild coastline and vanilla-scented air, the relatively sophisticated city of Diego Suarez and the country's premier beach destination, Nosy Be. Travellers will revel in the region’s diverse national parks while activity junkies will be spoilt for choice with everything from diving to kitesurfing.

Eastern Madagascar is travel the way it used to be. There is a wildness here of primordial allure, from the misty mountains of Masoala, down the huge coastline with its pounding sea and overhanging palms, to the lush waterways of the Pangalanes Lakes. This part of the country is largely cut off from the rest, and from itself, by a degraded transport network, including some roads out of an engineer’s nightmare. Travelling here requires a combination of plane, car, 4WD, motorbike, scooter, pirogue (dugout canoe), ferry, cargo boat, taxi-brousse (bush taxi) and motorboat. This inaccessibility results in isolated communities and, for the traveller, a constant sense of coming upon undiscovered locales, including entire national parks. There’s no doubt it can be frustrating at times, but Eastern Madagascar produces more travellers' tales than anywhere else. If you value that, come here first.

While it's the beaches that are the big attraction in the area north of Tamatave, with the quiet sand fringed coves of Mahambo being the best option, this region also holds other attractions including a tumble-down fortress in Foulpointe and an excellent zoo in Ivoloina. If you have your eyes set on the beaches and islands even further north then head to Soanierana-Ivongo, which is the ferry port for Île Sainte Marie. Beyond lies the daunting RN5 that can only be traversed by a reliable 4WD.

Kaféet Pražírna har blivit en favorit bland unga kaffedrickare i Prag.

Tana, as the capital is universally known, is all about eating, shopping, history and day trips. Bypassing the city would be a mistake: Tana has been the home of Malagasy power for three centuries and there's a huge amount of history and culture to discover, as well as some unexpected wildlife options.

The best thing about Île Sainte Marie is that it contains all the ingredients for a great holiday and great travel. This is a very long (57km), thin, lush and relatively flat tropical island surrounded by beaches and reef and spotted with thatched villages. The port of Ambodifotatra, a quarter of the way up the western coast, is the only sizeable town. South of here, the shore is lined with a great variety of hotels and resorts, which don't overpower the setting, culminating in the small island of Île aux Nattes, a postcard tropical paradise where you can easily imagine pirates coming ashore with treasure chests in tow. In contrast, the upper half of the island is quite wild, and its great length means that there is plenty of room for exploration.

Madagascar's most important seaport, Tamatave is a hot, dusty and chaotic town full of decaying colonial buildings, roadside markets and throngs of pousse-pousse carts. The emphasis is on commerce, not tourism, apart from being an important transit point.