‘Beyond Water’ Celebration – Welcome to Madagascar, Macleans’!
Years of collaborative work leading to this moment.
April 16th marked a very special day in Ambohimahamasina, not just because it was the official launch celebration of ‘Beyond Water’, our most ambitious clean water programme to date, but because the three brothers who rowed the full Pacific in 2025 to fund this vital work were right there to celebrate it with us.
Ewan, Jamie and Lachlan Maclean and their cousin Guy Maclean, who project managed the whole row and campaign, joined us in Madagascar to reunite with our team, dive into our Beyond Water plans for the coming years, and see first hand everything that has already been achieved since we began implementation at the end of last summer.
The boys with some of our team members: L to R – Vahatra (Social Organiser), Elise (Clean Water Social Manager), Vasil (Clean WaterProject Manager), Vonjy (TreeMad Field Agent), Herve (Clean Water Field Agent), Ewan, Nathalie (Head of Programmes), Florent (Solar Project Field Agent), Gildas (Teacher Training Supervisor), Falisoa (Communications Officer), Noella, TreeMad Project Manager; Jamie; Dama, Clean Water Field Agent; Lachlan
But back to the celebration!
Within minutes the municipal centre of Ambohimahamasina was overflowing with colour. Hand-painted banners towered over colourful hats as hundreds of people poured in from villages across the region — from babies strapped to backs to school children and elders, village chiefs, commune officials, the mayor and the British Deputy Ambassador, young and old all gathered on the square.
Among those celebrating were the people of the village Tolongoa Nord, where the first official Beyond Water borehole was completed on December 10th, 2025. Read more.
Long speeches extended gratitude to the rowers, their donors, our team and everybody involved in bringing clean water to Ambohimahamasina. And then quickly thereafter singing, dancing and other revelry.
Hordes of children squeezed into the youth centre (built by us in 2011) to watch films with our portable projector – a short Pacific Row film which led to many questions that the Macleans got to answer in person, giving a rare insight into what it takes to raise funds, as well as videos on the many wonders of water. In the same room we displayed a photo exhibition of water works built so far and the myriad benefits they are bringing. And of course, visitors and dignitaries were treated to a welcoming lunch.
We watched the sun set over the mountains of Ambohimahamasina that evening, red dust in the air, dunking the landscape in even more vivid shades of pink, blue and orange.
Looking Ahead
On day two, our whole Ambohimahamasina-based field team (from education and livelihoods to environment and water team members) sat down with the Macleans to go through the detailed plans for the months and years ahead and elaborate on how clean water will impact each area of our work.
The conversations that day underlined something central to Beyond Water: clean water doesn't sit in isolation.
Reliable, safe water access improves health, supports school attendance and livelihoods, strengthens our school feeding programme, opens up new possibilities for agriculture and reforestation to name just a few things. And it links directly to TreeMad, with 1,000 trees planted around key watersheds for every new water system built.
In the following week Ewan, Jamie, Lachlan and Guy got to explore Beyond Water from every angle.
Trekking nearly the whole outline of Ambohimahamsina with us, they visited two boreholes already drilled in Itaolana and Ampitambe and soon to be connected to solar pump systems (serving 5 villages, 2 schools and over 800 people), came with us to Tolongoa Nord to meet the community and filled their water bottles from the first Beyond Water borehole.
They visited schools we have built and continue to collaborate with, played a friendly football match with the local youth team, saw water towers completed and currently under construction, walked around our TreeMad community nursery in Ambatolahy and the Ampebe reforestation site, hiked to the main watershed during a tree planting event where 100s of people planted out 1,089 young trees with our team that day, and saw firsthand the rainforest we are working so hard with our community partners to protect and regenerate.
Another standout moment was visiting one of the health centres we helped renovate and electrify, and speaking with Dr. Jean de Dieu about what clean water will mean for the health of the local population and for the rhythm of his day-to-day work. With USAID cuts now placing immense strain on the treatment of women and children under five, and waterborne diseases being among the leading threats to that same group, the importance of Beyond Water couldn't have felt more real.
It was a visit to remember and we look forward to welcoming the Macleans back again. In the meantime we are hard at work with our partner communities across the municipality of Ambohimahamasina.
You can learn more about Beyond Water here.
Stay tuned for the Maclean brothers' own logs from Madagascar.
Three Pacific Row funded boreholes in Andranambomaro, Lempoka and Analabe were completed while the Maclean brothers were still on the oars. Outside the Beyond Water programme and Ambohimahamasina municipality, they nonetheless continue to serve 1,000 people with clean, safe water for life.
