Yaounde, Cameroon

I bought a watch two days ago from a market stall. It worked, i had a look at it, and it worked so I bought it. By the time i got back to the churchgrounds the watch had given up the ghost. We took it apart and examined it, and we threw it on the grass and smacked it against a table, but just couldnt get it to work. Very short lifespan. So yesterday i took Lena to the clothes market and to solve the problem of having no watch. I got a dude to but in a replacement battery but that didnt help so i gave up and bought an "Adidas" watch for 3 dollars.. And it still worked when i got it back to the truck. I also bought a wallet and 3 boxes of weetbix for the upcoming weeks. So, happy days.We had lunch on the roof of the market overlooking the city; which is pretty modern and easy to get around.

As some people are leaving, we went out for Chinese last night. I had duck curry but it was pretty bland. Spring rolls were good though. The usual suspects went for drinks after. We went to a bar where they had a live band and they encouraged people to get on the stage and sing. So Katey sang "I will survive" in a Lily Allen style while the boys did backing vocals and she sang "My Girl" with Mayumi. After that is a bit of blur but we did lots singing and dancing with the band. When they went for a break we got on the stage and played their instruments; they didnt seem to mind.It was a successful evening's entertainment.

We did a bit of truck clean this morning, mainly cos a few bits of fruit on the truck had large bites out of them. A mouse is probably the culprit but we couldnt see it. After that i went and sat in the small bar watching trashy movies. At one point it was just me and the owner, and he was drinking his beer and i was just drinking water, as it was only midday and i wanted to come out. But i reckon i will be back there this afternoon on the comfy sofas as people come and go. Its been really cruisey here waiting for visas, no work, just sitting around in a nice big garden, or the bar, maybe playing soccer, going to the bakery or playing with the kids who live here.

We are leaving on sunday. There is, apparently, a big soccer match at the stadium and most of the guys are going. I am not too fussed, i would prefer to watch the Premier League on TV, but i guess  will go to be sociable. In march we will be in some less well-travlled parts of the world so not sure how much blogging will be going on....

thats all, back to the sofa and beer for me.

Yaounde, Cameroon

well, after the other days lengthy blog, just thought i would write some quick notes while the internet is working. wasted heaps of time trying to upload pix to facebook yesterday, finally got it done today at the one posh internet cafe out of town. We are still staying in the church yard. Probably the only such place that has a bar, comfy sofas, rastas and soccer, so spent the last couple of nights in there. funny how everyone staggered out last night when the guys starts stacking the empty seats.

we should leave here on saturday if we get our visas sorted. 5 people are leaving, for various reasons so we are going to a chinese restaurant for dinner for farewell. i knows its going to be silly expensive but it will be fun so will just have to bite the bullet. some of these overlanders have too much money for my taste! Lena is one of those leaving so i will need to get a new cook group member from somewhere. We made curry last night and it went pretty well as we are normally a bit slow when it comes to cooking, but we havent had any disasters so far.

bought a couple of pairs of shorts at the Big Market because mine are falling apart. As soon as you get to the market, guys will follow you around and try to direct you to shops for a commission, but it was driving us nuts as we are perfectly capable of shopping by ourselves. i might have bought more stuff if they had left me alone. i think i got a fair deal on the shorts, hopefully they wont fall apart!

Yaounde, Cameroon

its been a while, but i think the last few weeks have probably been

the best so far....

we left the Sheraton, thank heavens. it was horrible there; although i

did get to play soccer with some local boys on the soccer pitch behind

the hotel. a bit flippin hot for running around even at 6pm.

We bushcamped for a couple of nights on our way to the Cameroon

border. Very glad to have mozzie net/hat as there were lots of bugs

around. i may have looked ridiculous but i reckon i could have sold it

to any of the others for 20 bucks that night.   Stopped in a random town

and a lady was cooking ommelette at the roadside so she got unindated

by hungry overlanders. We brought our own dishes and ketchup from the

truck, would have looked funny to the locals.

As expected, the Nigerian immigration people tried to give us a hard

time when we left; telling us we needed documents that we didnt have, then taking

us in groups of five into a small dark room to fill in poorly photo

copied random forms. They tried to get money off us and when we said

no they wanted our books from the truck library but after about 3

hours of nonsense they let us through to Cameroon. We camped at the

border in a hotel car park.

Next day we started on the infamous logging road. We knew it would

have lots of holes and during the rainy season it could take a week to

do 80kms. As it is the dry season it only took a day and a half but we

certainly got to do some digging. There were a few huge holes that we

had to cover over so the truck could get through, especially as the

fuel tanks are quite low to the ground. We had 5 spades, a useless

pick axe and a couple of big crow bars. Most people got stuck in and

it was great fun attacking the road. I was mostly hammering the crow

bar into the edge of the road to break it up and use it to fill in holes. It took 20

of us a few hours to fix some of the holes. And a few of us ran ahead

of the truck on scouting exercises to find the next hole. It was lots

of sweaty fun and good team bonding! At the end of the road we bought

hard-boiled eggs with bread and homemade chilli sauce. Yum.

We were in no hurry so on consecutive days we camped near waterfalls.

This meant that we could have a wash and swim and enjoy the scenery.

Apparently no crocs, but we stayed in the shallows anyway. It was a

great place to chill out and be at one with nature! I had expected

more of this kind of thing on the trip rather than all the towns.

Happy days. Another time we camped under a big road bridge and walked

to a couple of waterfalls, not really knowing where we were going

through the bush and the river. But we made it, high-fived, whooped

and swam. I ended up with one mozzie bite; i am very lucky that they

dont really like me, cos some of the others get heaps of mozzie bites

and other bites.

Next stop was the seaside town of Limbe. Oasis, the other overland

group, was there so it was good to catch up with their gossip; i like

hanging out with them when we are in the same place, which is quite

often. Limbe is also the place from where we started the 3 days hike

of Mount Cameroon. So on day one, the ten of us were up at 6am and

started climbing to the 4200 metre peak. Apparently the porters had

been out the night before so they struggled a bit with our bags but

they were cool. The walk was really tough. Its all uphill, obviously,

but there were just no flat bits and with the altitude too we were

moving pretty slowly. At one point we walked 1km up and only 3 across.

We had quite a few reststops and kept together at the same pace. We

arrived at 2800 metres on the first night, where we cooked vegie stew

in the bush. There was a cabin so we slept in there. It wasnt long

until we heard mice going through our food; well, luckliy not my food.

They chewed a hole in Kiwi Phils backpack and the metal lid on his

bottle of peanuts and got to see a mouse climb out of his cup. My

runners were used as ammunition.

We were woken by Mayumi at 6am banging on the cabin wall and telling

us all to get up! Her improving English has its downside! More very steep

climbing on day 2. I started off pretty well but the altitude was hard

to deal with. Lots of heavy breathing and it got colder so we wrapped

up. I was a bit burnt out and happened to be at the back of the pack as we

reached the summit, but it was great when we were all stood on the

summit after a day and a half. We started the long walk down; a

different route. The scenery in the afternoon was excellent. Lots of

different coloured landscapes and cold mist coming across us as we

walked. We also went to the top of some craters that were formed in

the 1999 and 2000 eruptions, in which nobody was hurt, and the resultant lava flow.

Camped that night in a clearing. Tasty vegie stew again.

Day 3 we carried on down, now through dense forest for five hours. It

was a bit slippy and the path had lots of holes and branches and roots

to fall over. We were a bit over it by the time we finished, in a typical small African village. 50kms in " days. Ten exhausted people but satisfied with our conquering of Mount Cameroon. We rewarded ourselves at the Pizza Restaurant. In the evening a few of us went to a local bar to watch the Champions League, they had two games on at the same time, so we sat there and sweated and drank beer, watching the footy.

Spent the weekend in Kribe, camped by the beach. On the way the checkpoint people asked for 250 dollars for us to go over a bridge. So we reversed through the traffic and found a policeman who came back with us and told the checkpoint people to get lost. Anyway, the sea was actually warm so not very refreshing but we walked along to the waterfalls which run into the sea. In the evening we went to town, but its about 7kms. There were some mototaxis around but i was a bit unsure about that, some didnt have lights. So we carried on until Mac flagged down a big tipper truck. The driver was cool. Four people in the cab with him, and four of us stood up in the back, in the empty tipper bit. He drove us to the pub, and wouldnt accept any cash. We had a good night out, a few drinks. Got a taxi home down the broken road. We crashed into the ditch about 200 metres from home. We helped to get the taxi out and sent him on his way.

Left Kribe and bushcamped along the way. Bushcamping is the best. We are normally out in the middle of nowhere, just a few locals looking on. Sometimes we have a look around and often have a river or something to hang out near while the cook group gets busy. Unfortunately this bushcamp wasnt so good as Mayumi had her bag stolen from her tent when she got up in the night. Someone must have been watching. So she has lost her passport etc. We searched all along the roadside looking for her stuff but it wasnt there.

In the small villages we passed in Cameroon the local kids would rush out and shout "white, white, white" at us which is pretty funny. We started shouting "black, black, black" back at them.

Played soccer at the campsite here in Yaounde last night which was very competitive and fun. We played in bare feet so the top of my other toenail has finally come off! Painlessly. I think we are playing again tonite, after baking cookies.

I bought a couple of t-shirts cos mine are getting wrecked. With the sweat, it is hard to get t-shirts off and mine started to rip so i bought a bright orange one and a yellow one, much to the others amusement. No danger of them losing me.

 

So Cameroon is definitely my favourite place so far. The people are kind and helpful, the logging road was fun; the natural landscape is lovely and the Mountain was a great experience. We are here in Yaounde waiting for visas until the weekend and then to Gabon, Congo, DR Congo and Angloa in the next month. These countries will be more of a challenge so just going to enjoy relaxing here for the rest of the week.

Thats all

Abuja, Nigeria

Looking for snakes at the Sheraton Hotel? Yep!

So we left Cotonou, Benin and went to Abomey and to the National Museum. But the guide's English was very poor, though he did try, and they wouldnt let us go round without him so it didnt mean much, except for the old throne which had a human skull under each leg which was a bit scary. There was another voodoo dance, which apparently was a bit better, but i was on cook duty so missed it, which was fine. It rained alot and we had crepes and cakes with a twist.

Next day we left Abomey and crossed the border into Nigeria, after 3 hours waiting at the border. 100 metres down the road we came to an unofficial checkpoint where they tried to bribe us. This happened about 30 times in the next few days. They sometimes but a piece of wood, with nails sticking out, in the road so you have to stop. They show you "permits" that you need tocarry on. Driver Gav is pretty Africa smart and talks his way out of it. And we really didnt have any Nigerian money to give them. The proper police are friendly and dont usually ask for money. They also carry AK47s which they were firing onto the tarmac about 100metres down the road from our bushcamp at 7 in the morning, in between asking us if we had any alcohol for them. 

We then went through Ideban which was scary. We got stuck in traffic until some crazy local guy decided to help us by shouting and screaming at people to get out of our way and hitting their vehicles with a big stick if they didnt move immediately. This created a bad atmosphere and a couple of guys climbed onto the steps of Gavs cab and threatened him and wouldnt go away for ages. But at the same time, the other locals were waving and smiling and shouting "hello" and "where are you from?". Eventually we got out of town. After a long day we bushcamped in a random petrol station, where we cooked dinner by roadside!  Another night we stopped at a random church and they let us stay and we were able to watch soccer in the pub next door. At the church, the truck accidently knocked an ants nest out of a tree and loads of ants fell into the truck so they was a fenzy of squashing ants with our flip-flops. The scenery in Nigeria was good, a few big hills and pine trees and stuff and we crossed the River Niger which we had sailed down in Mali. So I kept my head out of books. The people are really friendly although their English accents are a bit hard to understand.

So it took from Thursday morning until Sunday to get to Abuja, the capital of Nigeria. Bushcamping, no showers along the way. Now we are staying at the Sheraton Hotel. No, honestly. There isnt really anywhere else to put 25 people and a big truck in Abuja (its a bit like Canberra, purpose built, because the South of Nigeria is Christian and the North is Muslim and they wanted a compromise). So we are camped in the small soccer field at the back of the hotel, for free. The only condition was that we had a buffet meal the first night, which Africa Trails paid for. We were allowed to use the hotel pool for the first couple of days but now they want 20 euros! Stuff that! We have had a few confused passersby asking what we are doing cooking in the car park. Even the chef came out last night, when we had almost finished cooking! The hotel bar is very expensive but the only place to hang out at night. Also, pretty much the only women there are prostitutes. Telling them that you are sleeping on a flat air matress in a tent out the back doesnt seem to put them off. Its annoying really cos they grab hold of your arm and ask stupid questions and for drinks and we cant just chat among ourselves. Clearly though, the Western Busimnessmen are not so bothered.

So we are here waiting for our Cameroon and Angola visas. That has been a bit of a downside to the trip. Sometimes we come to places, just to wait and dont see the rest of the country. There seems to be an emphasis on just getting through to Cape Town and not enough of actually seeing the rest of the country. Today we went to look at the church, mainly cos it is airconditioned (its about 39 degrees outside) and to the mosque but they didnt seem to want us there.

You might possibly have heard that the President of Nigeria has gone AWOL. He has gone to Saudi Arabia for treatment but that was before christmas and nobody can decide who is in charge so now we have a constitutional crisis (they are talking about it on the TV as i write). So the papers are talking about a coup. Also in Jos, about 100kms away, 450 were killed in riots between Christians and Muslims so Nigeria is not that stable at the moment. But there are no signs of trouble around town, except for the long queues at the petrol stations.

Last night i went for a pee behind my tent and spotted a metre long thin shiny green snake. My torchlight reflected in its eye. So i went to the truck to get my camera. I turned my camera on and it took a few minutes to find him again and i was thinking how brave i was to be hunting a snake, but when my camera beeped to say it was turning itself off i did jumpand my heart missed a beat, so not so brave after all! Anyway, i found him and got some pictures, and checked my tent bag was empty before moving it inside my tent....

There are lots of other things going on of course, like the dynamics in the group and the gossip and rumours going round. I guess we each have things that we enjoy about the trip and things and people that annoy us. But some of the people are leaving the trip in 8 weeks when we get to Cape Town and i am already thinking we will miss them......

I wish i could post pix but its just to slow...

Finally, i have a blog follower called Jane....is that Jane as in Brett and Jane?

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