Multi-Day Expedition · Custom Itinerary
Red tsingy needles, the turquoise Emerald Sea and Madagascar's great northern bays — an overland expedition beyond the island.
After the boat crossing to the mainland, the road north winds through cacao country and dry forest toward Diego-Suarez (Antsiranana), Madagascar's northern port set on one of the world's largest natural bays. Depending on the length of your trip, highlights include the surreal Tsingy Rouge — wind-carved towers of red laterite — a pirogue trip across the shallow, impossibly turquoise Emerald Sea, the Three Bays coastline, Montagne des Français hikes, and Amber Mountain's rainforest waterfalls.
This is a fully custom trip: tell us your dates, interests and comfort level, and we build the itinerary, book the hotels and handle all transport. The per-day price covers guiding and vehicle; accommodation is arranged to your budget.
Diego Suarez — Antsiranana — sits at the very tip of Madagascar, wrapped around one of the largest bays on earth. It is a long way from Nosy Be, and that is the point: over a few unhurried days we take you through a north that most visitors never reach — red rock towers, grey stone forests, a rainforest full of chameleons and waterfalls, old war batteries above the bay, and some of the emptiest turquoise beaches in the country. This page is a taste of what the trip strings together.
An hour or so south of the city, rain and wind have carved the red laterite earth into a field of fragile spires and pinnacles that glow orange, ochre and rust in the sun. The Red Tsingy are small enough to walk among and strange enough to feel like another planet — the colours change through the day, and the whole formation is slowly, visibly eroding, so no two visits ever look quite the same.
Further on, the Ankarana reserve is the opposite in colour and the same in wonder: a vast field of grey limestone blades, razor-sharp karst pushed up and dissolved into pinnacles, bridges and deep caves with underground rivers. Crowned lemurs and Sanford's brown lemurs pick their way over the rock as if it were nothing, and if you are patient the forest between the blades turns up chameleons, birds and the occasional startled reptile.
High enough to catch the clouds, Montagne d'Ambre is a cool green island of rainforest above the dry plains — all tree ferns, mossy trunks and the sound of falling water. Trails lead to waterfalls and a sacred pool ringed by forest, and the park is one of the best places in the north to meet Madagascar's small, strange residents: jewel-coloured panther chameleons, leaf-tailed geckos that vanish against the bark, ring-tailed mongooses, and crowned lemurs overhead.
The bay itself is the reason the town exists. Rising from the middle of it is Nosy Lonjo, the Sugarloaf — a small, steep, sacred island where locals still leave offerings. Above the water, the ridge of Montagne des Français gives the widest view of the whole bay, and the old gun batteries and lighthouses scattered along the headlands are a reminder that this deep, sheltered harbour was fought over in 1942, one of the forgotten battles of the Second World War.
The trip ends where the land runs out — at Ramena and the Trois Baies, a run of white-sand bays backed by dry forest and almost nobody. Offshore, a shallow reef-sheltered lagoon glows a green so bright it is simply called the Emerald Sea; a fishing pirogue will take you out to snorkel or just to float. It is a long way to come, but this corner of Madagascar rewards it — wild, empty and quietly spectacular.
See all our trips on the Nosy Be tours page. Diego Suarez is a multi-day trip and we tailor it to your dates and interests — just ask, and we will build the itinerary around what you most want to see.
✓ Transfers and boat crossings, private vehicle with fuel, driver-guide, entry tickets and hotel accommodation.
Three days covers Diego and the Emerald Sea; five lets you add Tsingy Rouge and Amber Mountain without rushing.
The main road north is paved but slow in places; side trips like Tsingy Rouge use tracks — hence the 4×4. Expect an adventure, not a highway.
Reserve online through our contact form — no payment, card details or transfer are needed to hold a date. For some tours we ask for a deposit the day before departure, paid in cash to your guide when you meet. Everything else is paid to your guide on the day of the tour, in cash (EUR, USD or MGA) or by mobile money. We never ask for online payments or bank transfers — if anyone contacts you claiming to be us and asks for one, it is not us.
150 € per person per day. You pay your guide on the day of the tour, in cash or by mobile money — nothing is charged when you reserve.
Transfers and boat crossings, a private vehicle with fuel, a driver-guide, entry tickets and hotel accommodation.
Staying on the island instead? Our Nosy Be 4×4 tour packs the best of Nosy Be into one day, or browse all our Nosy Be tours.