After a long day on the road (or on the mud trenches sometimes misleadingly labelled as ‘roads’) all a girl really needs wants is a long shower, a comfy bed and a beautiful boy to cuddle…

Well, at Orchidea Beach II Hotel I got it all in a cosy beachside bungalow. It was pretty close to perfect (well, right up until my beautiful boy for cuddles got typhoid, but that’s a different story…)

Orchidea Beach II Hotel welcomed us late after a long day and ended up being our home base in Sambava during an unexpectedly long time stranded in this capital of Madagascar’s Vanilla Coast…

Orchidea Beach II Hotel is fairly new and modern (as it was built to replace the former Orchidea Beach Hotel that perished in a fire). It has a beautiful tropical garden and direct access to the gorgeous beach of Sambava. Orchidea Beach II Hotel has an extremely relaxed atmosphere,and offers the perfect place to relax after hiking the nearby Marojejy forest (or the perfect place to wait to be emergency evacuated back to Antananarivo…)

The hotel rooms are exquisite, with spacious bedrooms, clean and modern bathrooms, private balconies on the second level and air conditioning in each room. For the more budget conscious there are also two beach bungalows that are more basic but directly on the beautiful beach of Sambava (be aware these bungalows are on a public beach so don’t expect a lot of privacy).

The restaurant at Orchidea Beach II provides high quality food with a Chinese influence from the owner. The fresh seafood is especially wonderful featuring fishes, lobsters and shrimps all year long straight from the days catch. The staff will definitely let you know what is fresh (even if you are having a 3pm drink and haven’t even considered dinner yet…)

One tip – don’t ask for vegetables with coconut sauce. It is a far too crazy request…