I was once privileged to visit Madagascar as part of a travel delegation, and one of the items on the itinerary was a day visit to Nosy Komba, the Island of Lemurs, in the coastal curve of Nosy Be.  Visitors arrive by boat and go on a guided trip through the tropical forest to view Madagascar’s strange and interesting flora, including the vanilla vine and the travellers’ palm.  There is a traditional village famous for its handcrafts, but the real attraction here is the lemurs.

The first thing you do when you arrive on the beach is buy a couple of bananas from one of the local vendors.  Then you walk through the forest, find a likely spot, present your banana and watch the lemurs come out of the trees.  Except it did not quite work out that way. I was standing in a clearing along with a few other guests, intent on peeling a banana to put on a rock as an offering, when I was suddenly klapped on the side of the head by something soft and furry and my banana disappeared, leaving me holding only the peel, and speckled with bits of banana.  According to eye-witnesses, a brown and black lemur had jumped on my shoulder, grabbed the fruit and vanished back in the trees.   I was left open-mouthed and distinctly unbanana-ed. The episode caused a lot of hilarity among my fellow-tourists, and I have to report with chagrin that no one else got mugged by these furry bandits, but it has left me with a hugely soft spot for lemurs and other members of the primate and pre-primate species. So I was delighted to hear about a place near Hartbeespoort Dam called the Bush Baby Monkey Sanctuary, and made haste to interview the owner, Craig Saunders. Craig’s love affair with monkeys began in a similar fashion to mine – he was visiting the Monkeyland sanctuary near Plettenberg Bay when a monkey jumped on him and proceeded to turn him inside out – checking his pockets, delving inside his clothing, possibly even looking for fleas in his hair.  This confirmed Craig’s conviction that animals have personalities, logical thought processes, sensitivities and insecurities like all of us – in short, they have souls. Craig went back to his property in Hartbeespoort, where he already had an Elephant Sanctuary to rehabilitate elephants, and began to build a simian sanctuary on an adjacent piece of land. “We began by building a system of elevated walkways,” he says, “because the land is very uneven and we needed to make it accessible.  The result is a large, safe, enclosed area where monkeys can almost feel as if they are back in the wild.  The idea was to create a haven for rescued exotic animals for a programme of rehabilitation.  I built an environment where, if I was a monkey, I would like to live.” But this is not a zoo or a circus.  Craig has a conservation background and, even though he believes in the essential ‘humanity’ of animals, he does not believe in anthropomorphising them. 
“Most of the monkeys come here from being pets.  They were bought when they were small, but when they grow up the owners find them problematic and no longer cute.  A monkey is a wild animal.  They arrive here wearing pyjamas, with all their toys, but it is surprising how quickly they lose their ‘tameness’ and retreat back into the wild.” The Bush Baby Monkey Sanctuary, therefore, is not a petting park.  It is an educational facility where interaction is not encouraged between the people and the primates.  Instead, visitors are taken on a guided tour through the enclosure and taught about monkeys while viewing them in an environment close to their natural habitat. “Our eventual goal is wild-release,” says Craig.  “Our tours can be called ‘Monkeys on Safari’ – it is like primate-spotting in the company of a knowledgeable and experienced guide.  We don’t take in sick or injured monkeys – we are not a shelter in that sense: we are rather an educational facility with the long-term solution of allowing monkeys to go back to being wild monkeys.” The nine-hectare park is not only a haven for monkeys, it is also a haven for visitors.  “The land is beautiful,” says Craig.  “There is a little stream, a lot of pristine bush – it is a wonderful and very educational walk through prime habitat.  People who have done the tour say that it has completely changed their view of primates and they feel enriched by that knowledge.” A full tour of the sanctuary should take about an hour and a half, and there is a coffee shop for refreshments and a curio shop for keepsakes.  If you feel like a fascinating day trip, head out to Hartbeespoort Dam and look for the Bush Baby Monkey Sanctuary alongside the Elephant Sanctuary.  Just make sure that you leave your bananas at home.