Which of these Indian Ocean island paradises is for you?

By Amy Cooper

Wake me up before you dodo, Mal, because I'll be fast asleep long before I'm close to counting the vast numbers of unique, exotic and very much alive creatures calling Madagascar home.

Madagascar's the one you can't miss on a map of the Indian Ocean. It's the massive landmass just east of Mozambique; bigger than Thailand or Spain, three times the size of the UK and twice the size of Victoria. The world's fourth largest island looks as if someone carved a mighty chunk out of Africa while accidentally flicking a crumb about 1000 kilometres to the right. That's Mauritius.

It must be tough, existing in the shadow of a place 250 times your size with 587,000 square kilometres of wildlife so special that Madagascar's known as the "eighth continent". Tougher still when your one notable creature's claim to fame is being extinct, while your overachieving neighbour is one of the planet's 17 megadiversity hotspots, with 90 per cent of flora and fauna found nowhere else in the world: 5000 endemic plants, 300 and 200 reptile and bird species respectively, more than half the world's chameleon species and at least 100 species of the world's oldest primate, lemurs.

Even Australia can't match Madagascar's weird and wonderful wildlife. Thanks to their isolated evolution, most animals look as if they were dreamed up by Dr Seuss on some fabulously freaky party drugs. You'll see surreal specimens like the giraffe-necked weevil, the long-tailed ground roller (it's a bird!), the Malagasy giant jumping rat (it leaps a metre high!) and the leaf-tailed gecko, so skilfully camouflaged you could mistake it for your best mate.

Chameleons change colour according to mood and some have independently swivelling eyes. Like politicians, but prettier. The legendary lemurs combine the cuteness of kittens, monkeys, possums and teddy bears in various ratios depending on the species. From the stripy ring-tailed lemur (King Julian in Madagascar) to dancing sifakas who boogie upright on two legs to the gremlin-ish nocturnal aye-aye, they're the best show in town. They inhabit grand and otherworldly landscapes; jagged limestone needles in the Tsingy de Bemaraha Reserve; 30-metre, 800-year-old bulbous trees at Morondava's Avenue of Baobabs; or the squiggly, spiky octopus trees in the southern spiny forests.

Madagascar's African-Asian-Arabic-French cultural melting pot means exciting food, eclectic architecture and copious crafts - and the fun doesn't stop at the shore. An azure-bathed 4828 kilometres of sandy coastline is dotted with idyllic little islands like secluded Ile Sainte-Marie and palm-fringed Nosy Be.

I don't want to be vicious about Mauritius, but it's no wonder Madagascar inspired four blockbuster movies and a spin-off series. You'd be mad to go anywhere else.

By Mal Chenu

You won't find a dodo on Mauritius anymore but neither will you come across cartoon movie lions, hippos, zebras or giraffes in Madagascar. So Amy shouldn't be suggesting we should all head to Madagascar because of David Schwimmer, no matter how sexy a giraffe he was.

The dodo's demise made Mauritius an extinction poster child but the Indian Ocean idyll resurrected itself to become a divine destination. As Mark Twain put it: "Mauritius was made first and then heaven, heaven being copied after Mauritius." And unlike the author's misreported death, this is no exaggeration.

Served by the wonderfully named Sir Seewoosagur Ramgoolam International Airport in Port Louis, Mauritius is surrounded by a lagoon that has created impossibly gorgeous beaches, clear sapphire waters and secluded islets, all intelligently designed for boating, fishing, windsurfing, snorkelling and scuba diving. It's one of the few places beach-spoilt Australians concede: "Yeah, not bloody bad, mate."

Palm-lined and powdery, Mauritius's famous sandy stretches surround the island, from Trou aux Biches on the north coast, to the surf- and sunset-friendly Tamarin Beach on the west coast, to the undeveloped Belle Mare Beach and black volcanic Poste Lafayette Beach on the east coast.

Rising sharply from the shoreline, the mountainous interior is a hiker's heaven, especially around the forests, heathland and waterfalls in Black River Gorges National Park in the south-west. This is also where you'll find the town of Chamarel, home to several natural wonders including the legendary Seven Coloured Earths, a kaleidoscopic sand dune, layered grains of which you can bring home in a souvenir test tube. Chamarel also boasts excellent restaurants and the Rhumerie, an eco-distillery and museum dedicated to rum.

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In addition to the luxury resorts, Mauritius is an eclectic blending of East and West. Think Indian/Creole/French/Chinese cuisine, colonial plantation houses, quiet fishing villages, mosques, markets, golf courses and horse racing at the stately Champ de Mars Racecourse.

Mauritius does a much better job of looking after wildlife these days, too. The 26-hectare Ile aux Aigrettes nature reserve preserves rare coastal forest, ebony trees, wild orchids, giant tortoises and endangered pink pigeons, among rather a lot more.

The dodo may be as dead as, well, itself, but it is still celebrated on the country's coat of arms, and as the nickname of the national soccer team. As for Madagascar's lemurs, they are far from thrusting themselves centre stage and singing "I like to move it, move it!". They are actually waaaay up in the trees at the end of a long hike, far from the maddened crowd who came here to get up close and personal with King Julien.