South African Runner Takes On His Madagascar Challenge

South African adventurer David Grier has an impressive adventure resume. Besides being a successful restauranteur and chef, he has climbed Kilimanjaro, raced in a number of ultra-endurance events, and completed a 2500 mile run along the entire length of the Great Wall of China, in just 98 days. Now, he's set off on another long distance run filled with plenty of challenges, as he is currently making his way across the entire length of Madagascar, from south to north, on foot.

David began this current adventure in grand style, choosing to paddle from Mozambique to Madagascar, a distance of more than 300 miles, in a kayak. That portion of his journey took 11 days by itself. During that time, he faced tropical storms, miles of open water, and oppressive heat. After paddling for 7-8 hours each day, he would then sleep in his kayak at night, only to resume his efforts the following morning. After arriving in Madagascar, he was created by friends, who then drove him to the southernmost tip of the island, which reportedly took another eight days.

On December 20th, he began the actual run, which will have him covering a distance of more than 900 miles. You can follow David's progress through his frequently updated blog, through the website Miles for Smiles, which tracks all of his adventures, and from his Twitter feed at @davidgrier. You'll also find video updates on the YouTube Madagascar Challenge channel.

Big thanks to Lisa over at adventure racing, and more, site AR.co.za for the heads up on this story. And as if it didn't sound like a big enough challenge already, Lisa says she believes that David's plan is to kite-surf back to South Africa or Mozambique. Crazy!

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Kayaking Around Madagascar

South African adventurer Riann Manser is finishing up another long distance solo expedition according to this story at Adventure World Magazine. Manser has just 200km (124 miles) to go to complete the first ever solo circumnavigation of Madagascar by kayak. He is expected to finish the 5000km (3106 miles) journey on July 11th.

Manser set off in August of 2008 from the town of Tamatave on the eastern coast of Madagascar, the fourth largest island in the world. From there, he turned north where is 'Round the Outside' journey properly got underway, as he paddled an average of 8 hours per day in a counter-clockwise fashion around the massive island off the coast of Africa. Along the way, he's been updating his website regularly and sharing his thoughts from the sea and tweeting his progress as well.

This isn't Riann's first "Round the Outside" adventure. He also spent more than two years riding his bike around the outside of the entire continent of Africa. In the process he covered 36,500km (22,680 miles), across 34 countries. You can read about that incredible journey on his website as well.

Another cool adventure that looks like will be coming to an end in the next few days. Exploring the coast of Madagascar by kayak has to be an amazing experience. Very cool!

Thanks to the team over at Adventure World Magazine for this one. Great story.

Update: Looks like I was off on the date of Riann wrapping up his adventure. According to a tweet on his Twitter feed, he'll finish up tomorrow, Wednesday, July 8th at 12:00 GMT. Congrats Riann!

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Climbing The World's Toughest Big Wall

When one thinks about the top climbing meccas around the world, Madagascar doesn't readily spring to mind. The small, island country is better known for it's vast amounts of plant and animal life, and tropical conditions. But, it also happens to the home of the Tsaranoro Massif, the site of some incredibly challenging rock climbing routes, and quite possibly the toughest big wall in the world.

PlanetFear has a great article about a team of top French climbers who managed to successfully climb every pitch on Tough Enough, spread out over two different expeditions this past summer.

Tough Enough was first completed by two Germans, Daniel Gebel and Ari Steinel, who finished the route with the use of aids. In 2007, the first attempts at free climbing the face were conducted by several European climbers, but the daunting wall turned back all challengers. Since then, there have been others, but they all went home in defeat. Until now.

In June of this year, Stephanie Bodet, Sylvain Millet, Laurent Triay, and Arnaud Petit went to Madagascar to give the route a go, and managed to successfully free climb all but one pitch. That one pitch left a glaring hole in their accomplishments, so in September, Petit and Bodet went back with a new group of climbers, and finished what they had started.

The article I linked to above has more details, including the ratings for the different pitches, and details on the climb itself. The face is certainly a daunting one, and I have a feeling it'll be seeing more traffic soon.

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