Tuesday 20 July 2010

West African Road Trip - Day 4

When I met the others at breakfast, they had already ordered some omelettes for us, so that we had a more substantial breakfast than the previous day. After packing our bags, I had to go and get more cash from the bank machine to settle up the hotel bill, and while I did that Roine went to haggle over a couple of African masks for his souvenirs. Eventually, we set off after 9 am, and agreed that we had all grown rather fond of Bobo Dioulasso.

We set off for the Ghanaian border, stopping quite often to ask directions, always in French, and usually getting the same answer – yes it is this way. It almost seemed as though there was only one road, and since you are on the road, what on earth are you asking for?’ The road from Bobo was the really well made road that was not too bouncy. It was still being built, with the placing of mud bricks on the embankments and road edging, and setting them in mortar, to secure the sides of the roads to prevent them from being washed away in the regular floods that are characteristic of the rainy season. After getting back to the main road, which was older and more bumpy, we went the wrong way first, towards Côte D’Ivoire, where the rebels are in power. Fortunately, we stopped and checked with someone who put us right, and we turned round to head towards Ouessa. It started to rain a little bit, but not properly. We drove for hours and hours, eventually stopping at a town called Wa for lunch at about 3 pm. I loved the idea of a Chinese vegetable provencal, so that was my lunch. It had begun to dawn on me that we were on our way to a safari park, and Sammie called ahead to make sure they were going to reserve rooms for us. It was a good thing he did this after lunch, because we did not really get going until 5 pm, and arrived at the Lodge at Mole Safari Park after 8 pm. We were not settled into our rooms until 9 pm, then we had a beer and a chat. We shall be up with the lark tomorrow, because the safari sets of at 6:30 am. We'd covered a lot of miles today.

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